Dear Burt

At 14:30 07 February 2005, wrote:
Interesting how standards vary. We train for 50 by
250 feet for
touchdown and stop. This is my personal standard before
candidates are
sent to the examiner.
UH


To make this answer complete, what glider are you training
in?

Mark James Boyd Wrote:
"I've told people the difference between a 2-33 and an ASW-20
is simple. Just take all of the built in safety for the
design and replace it with higher workload and
higher required pilot proficiency for the same level of safety.
As Bob K. is apt to say "it goes like stink." The
downside is the naked edge of safety vs. performance."


Okay...alright...I'm not trying to start a fight, but to claim that an
ASW-20 is the "naked edge of safety" leads me to believe that some
definitions are in order.
I don't own an ASW-20 but I have flown one, and I have to say they fly VERY
nicely. At no point was I left hanging on the brink of safety. I think that
comment is mis-representative of the machine, to say the least.

I guess my whole thought on this topic has not really changed from my first
posting. This weekend I thought about the fact that the way we are all
taught to fly, is mostly focused on "How-To" do the correct thing and that
basis makes it pretty difficult to deal with what to do when things go awry.
In many cases simple little snippets of information that you learn along the
way that you rely on when all the normal stuff goes to hell...Comments about
we ALWAYS do things this way or that way, generally lead to problems later.
We simply cannot teach all the variable adversities that one may encounter,
so we have to teach student to think and analyze and act to the best of
their abilities.

I had a truck driver once who came to work for me. My old truckdriver was
moving up within the company, so we had him take the new hire on the route
the first day to show him where to go...they borrowed my pickup truck
instead of the delivery truck in an effort to save some time. The next day
the new hire set out on his own and at 5 o'clock in the evening I got a call
saying he had hit a bridge and that my delivery truck was badly
broken...upon arriving I found my delivery truck torn into 4 or 5 major
separated components after having been driven under a 7ft8 clearance train
tressle ( the truck was 13ft 6" tall as opposed to the pickup truck which
cleared easily the day before) When asked what in the hell he was
thinking...you guessed it..."That's the way I was shown to go yesterday"
Full steam ahead 45 miles an hour...

Students can be like that, they take what is said far too literally
sometimes and I think that's why I believe that we ought to concentrate more
fully on addressing how they think. All too often, you see an instructor who
settles into his plan ie...rope break in the same place...pattern always the
same, you get to know fairly quickly what they want to see and it is then
easy to comply with... sorta the same way the Designee's are...I'm sure we
all remember the instructors two cents worth..." Okay when he asks you about
this, remember to say this...and oh yeah...don't forget to clear those
turns" I mean..there's the little "wink wink" that let's everyone in the
loop know you're okay and ready to pass...There really wouldn't be much
point to checkrides if instructors sent "maybe he'll be okay's" on to
checkrides.

We had a guy die at our airport last year. His own sailplane, nicer than
anything on the field. Everyone was a little in awe I believe. He took a
"familiarization flight" with one of our CFIG's in our Blanik, who said he
did great. We have a little one way, mountain strip and he self launched and
flew for 4 hours and when he came back, he was high and fast and screwed
things up horribly. He then proceeded to flail around indecisively, until
which time he stalled and spun in dying on impact. Everyone felt
horrible,his logbook revealed he had hardly ANY experience with his ship but
hundreds of hours in Blaniks. Nobody did anything wrong, but in the end, the
real issue is how do we keep it from happening again.

From my perspective, if I were an instructor, I'd be very keen on training a
student the way I wanted them to fly, but then I think the last 4 or 5 hours
would be spent on just doing things differently, and with an open mind, to
see how they react. Induce stress and see how they react. Tha,t after all,
is what I was referring to from my view on student training, making sure we
teach them to think adequately.

We have to teach pilots to think and analyze and act. With a decided eye
towards maximizing their odds for survivability. That's probably a whole lot
tougher than I am aware of. I'm not sure it's covered in the Practical Test
Standards or Airmans Knowledge Tests. But it is perhaps the biggest reason
to be dynamic in our training as opposed to static, which I believe to be a
major difference from teaching JUST to the PTS...and JUST to pass the
Exam...

JUST...my humble opinion.

I take my hat off to all you instructors who give tirelessly to this sport
and please, I hope you take my comments as they are intended, which is
constructive, not destructive.


Respectfully,



Steve.

Steve,

First of all, I read the accident report from the accident you
mention. I personally concluded that the pilot was the only one
who could have prevented this accident.
www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/query.asp
look up glider fatalities and I think you'll find it.

Then I got involved in your response about the ASW-20 comment being
mis-representative. So I researched the past 5 years of US glider
fatalities. I had done this a year or two ago, and this time added
some formality.

29 fatalities.

7 ridge
4 off-airport landings
4 spin on final
3 intentional aerobatics
3 did a PCC but not an assembly check
2 drugs
2 midair
1 rope break
1 on top of rotor clouds
1 fuel exhaustion takeoff eng fail
1 trim failure, killed the towpilot

(all of these pigeonholes are arguable, of course).

Of the ridge fatalities, the sailplane L/Ds were
57, 48, 48, 43, 43, 37, 36. Median L/D of 43.

The only make/model to have two fatal incidents was the ASW-20.

Only one non-glider rated occupant was killed. An acro
ride in the ASK-21 with a midair less than 4 miles from
the airport and within 2500 ft AGL killed both passenger and
pilot.

Only ONE of the 29 fatal accidents involved a glider
with a Vne less than 120 knots. This was an SGS 1-26
that broke a shoulder strap on impact.

Over 75% of the accidents involved a glider with an L/D over 33.

The median L/D of the fatal gliders was 43, and was the ASW-20.

From some best guessing and the reports, over 80% of the
fatal accidents had PICs with over 100 hours in gliders. About half of the
pilots were CFIs or ATPs with hundreds of hours, often in make/model.

So I used the ASW-20 as my example. If I'd used the ASW-24E or
ASW-27B or Jantar 42-2 or PIK-30 or SZD 55-1, I'm sure
pilots would have come to defend these aircraft as well.

My point is that if I had to guess the next fatality, it would be
an experienced soaring pilot in a 43:1 ship low near a ridge
in a gaggle. On Saturday I heard just this description from
a pilot (who was in such a gaggle) and he mentioned he was
keenly aware he had put himself in this position. Yes,
he did so intentionally, and found it to be an exciting challenge.

Is there something wrong with the FAA system? No. The low timers
in their low and medium performance gliders are barely a blip
on the accident reports.

Most fatalities from my perspective are due to the "naked edge."
Some experienced pilots choose to fly something with performance in
challenging conditions. They've accepted risk to gain performance.
Should we do something about this? I don't think there's
anything to be done. Drugs, aerobatics, ridge soaring, gaggles,
off-airport landings are all risks the pilots themselves
are aware of, are trained and familiar with, and accept.
Unaware passengers and people on the ground aren't being
significantly harmed (1 fatality in 5 years? An acro ride?).

From a public safety standpoint, I think the FAA has done its
job. And I'll keep training pilots in the 2-33 and L-13 and
1-26 and PW-2. And some of them will move up to fast glass and
practice to try to maintain a level of safety. Hey, man,
that really is their own personal choice, as far as I'm concerned.

In article ,
Steve Hill wrote:
Mark James Boyd Wrote:
"I've told people the difference between a 2-33 and an ASW-20
is simple. Just take all of the built in safety for the
design and replace it with higher workload and
higher required pilot proficiency for the same level of safety.
As Bob K. is apt to say "it goes like stink." The
downside is the naked edge of safety vs. performance."


Okay...alright...I'm not trying to start a fight, but to claim that an
ASW-20 is the "naked edge of safety" leads me to believe that some
definitions are in order.
I don't own an ASW-20 but I have flown one, and I have to say they fly VERY
nicely. At no point was I left hanging on the brink of safety. I think that
comment is mis-representative of the machine, to say the least.

I guess my whole thought on this topic has not really changed from my first
posting. This weekend I thought about the fact that the way we are all
taught to fly, is mostly focused on "How-To" do the correct thing and that
basis makes it pretty difficult to deal with what to do when things go awry.
In many cases simple little snippets of information that you learn along the
way that you rely on when all the normal stuff goes to hell...Comments about
we ALWAYS do things this way or that way, generally lead to problems later.
We simply cannot teach all the variable adversities that one may encounter,
so we have to teach student to think and analyze and act to the best of
their abilities.

I had a truck driver once who came to work for me. My old truckdriver was
moving up within the company, so we had him take the new hire on the route
the first day to show him where to go...they borrowed my pickup truck
instead of the delivery truck in an effort to save some time. The next day
the new hire set out on his own and at 5 o'clock in the evening I got a call
saying he had hit a bridge and that my delivery truck was badly
broken...upon arriving I found my delivery truck torn into 4 or 5 major
separated components after having been driven under a 7ft8 clearance train
tressle ( the truck was 13ft 6" tall as opposed to the pickup truck which
cleared easily the day before) When asked what in the hell he was
thinking...you guessed it..."That's the way I was shown to go yesterday"
Full steam ahead 45 miles an hour...

Students can be like that, they take what is said far too literally
sometimes and I think that's why I believe that we ought to concentrate more
fully on addressing how they think. All too often, you see an instructor who
settles into his plan ie...rope break in the same place...pattern always the
same, you get to know fairly quickly what they want to see and it is then
easy to comply with... sorta the same way the Designee's are...I'm sure we
all remember the instructors two cents worth..." Okay when he asks you about
this, remember to say this...and oh yeah...don't forget to clear those
turns" I mean..there's the little "wink wink" that let's everyone in the
loop know you're okay and ready to pass...There really wouldn't be much
point to checkrides if instructors sent "maybe he'll be okay's" on to
checkrides.

We had a guy die at our airport last year. His own sailplane, nicer than
anything on the field. Everyone was a little in awe I believe. He took a
"familiarization flight" with one of our CFIG's in our Blanik, who said he
did great. We have a little one way, mountain strip and he self launched and
flew for 4 hours and when he came back, he was high and fast and screwed
things up horribly. He then proceeded to flail around indecisively, until
which time he stalled and spun in dying on impact. Everyone felt
horrible,his logbook revealed he had hardly ANY experience with his ship but
hundreds of hours in Blaniks. Nobody did anything wrong, but in the end, the
real issue is how do we keep it from happening again.

From my perspective, if I were an instructor, I'd be very keen on training a
student the way I wanted them to fly, but then I think the last 4 or 5 hours
would be spent on just doing things differently, and with an open mind, to
see how they react. Induce stress and see how they react. Tha,t after all,
is what I was referring to from my view on student training, making sure we
teach them to think adequately.

We have to teach pilots to think and analyze and act. With a decided eye
towards maximizing their odds for survivability. That's probably a whole lot
tougher than I am aware of. I'm not sure it's covered in the Practical Test
Standards or Airmans Knowledge Tests. But it is perhaps the biggest reason
to be dynamic in our training as opposed to static, which I believe to be a
major difference from teaching JUST to the PTS...and JUST to pass the
Exam...

JUST...my humble opinion.

I take my hat off to all you instructors who give tirelessly to this sport
and please, I hope you take my comments as they are intended, which is
constructive, not destructive.


Respectfully,



Steve.






--

------------+
Mark J. Boyd

hmmm ... less then one in four odds ...

but, isn't the more common denominator incompetence ... and lets define
that as a failure of execution because of lack of training or currency
or awareness or attention, etc. You can easily die in aviation doing
some routine non-cutting-edge things ... and most of the people in your
list did.

* My point is that if I had to guess the next fatality, it would be
* an experienced soaring pilot in a 43:1 ship low near a ridge
* in a gaggle.

* 7 Ridge in 29 fatalities.



Mark James Boyd wrote:
Steve,

First of all, I read the accident report from the accident you
mention. I personally concluded that the pilot was the only one
who could have prevented this accident.
www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/query.asp
look up glider fatalities and I think you'll find it.

Then I got involved in your response about the ASW-20 comment being

mis-representative. So I researched the past 5 years of US glider
fatalities. I had done this a year or two ago, and this time added
some formality.

29 fatalities.

7 ridge
4 off-airport landings
4 spin on final
3 intentional aerobatics
3 did a PCC but not an assembly check
2 drugs
2 midair
1 rope break
1 on top of rotor clouds
1 fuel exhaustion takeoff eng fail
1 trim failure, killed the towpilot

(all of these pigeonholes are arguable, of course).

Of the ridge fatalities, the sailplane L/Ds were
57, 48, 48, 43, 43, 37, 36. Median L/D of 43.

The only make/model to have two fatal incidents was the ASW-20.

Only one non-glider rated occupant was killed. An acro
ride in the ASK-21 with a midair less than 4 miles from
the airport and within 2500 ft AGL killed both passenger and
pilot.

Only ONE of the 29 fatal accidents involved a glider
with a Vne less than 120 knots. This was an SGS 1-26
that broke a shoulder strap on impact.

Over 75% of the accidents involved a glider with an L/D over 33.

The median L/D of the fatal gliders was 43, and was the ASW-20.

From some best guessing and the reports, over 80% of the
fatal accidents had PICs with over 100 hours in gliders. About half
of the
pilots were CFIs or ATPs with hundreds of hours, often in make/model.

So I used the ASW-20 as my example. If I'd used the ASW-24E or
ASW-27B or Jantar 42-2 or PIK-30 or SZD 55-1, I'm sure
pilots would have come to defend these aircraft as well.

My point is that if I had to guess the next fatality, it would be
an experienced soaring pilot in a 43:1 ship low near a ridge
in a gaggle. On Saturday I heard just this description from
a pilot (who was in such a gaggle) and he mentioned he was
keenly aware he had put himself in this position. Yes,
he did so intentionally, and found it to be an exciting challenge.

Is there something wrong with the FAA system? No. The low timers
in their low and medium performance gliders are barely a blip
on the accident reports.

Most fatalities from my perspective are due to the "naked edge."
Some experienced pilots choose to fly something with performance in
challenging conditions. They've accepted risk to gain performance.
Should we do something about this? I don't think there's
anything to be done. Drugs, aerobatics, ridge soaring, gaggles,
off-airport landings are all risks the pilots themselves
are aware of, are trained and familiar with, and accept.
Unaware passengers and people on the ground aren't being
significantly harmed (1 fatality in 5 years? An acro ride?).

From a public safety standpoint, I think the FAA has done its
job. And I'll keep training pilots in the 2-33 and L-13 and
1-26 and PW-2. And some of them will move up to fast glass and
practice to try to maintain a level of safety. Hey, man,
that really is their own personal choice, as far as I'm concerned.

In article ,
Steve Hill wrote:
Mark James Boyd Wrote:
"I've told people the difference between a 2-33 and an ASW-20
is simple. Just take all of the built in safety for the
design and replace it with higher workload and
higher required pilot proficiency for the same level of safety.
As Bob K. is apt to say "it goes like stink." The
downside is the naked edge of safety vs. performance."


Okay...alright...I'm not trying to start a fight, but to claim that
an
ASW-20 is the "naked edge of safety" leads me to believe that some
definitions are in order.
I don't own an ASW-20 but I have flown one, and I have to say they
fly VERY
nicely. At no point was I left hanging on the brink of safety. I
think that
comment is mis-representative of the machine, to say the least.

I guess my whole thought on this topic has not really changed from
my first
posting. This weekend I thought about the fact that the way we are
all
taught to fly, is mostly focused on "How-To" do the correct thing
and that
basis makes it pretty difficult to deal with what to do when things
go awry.
In many cases simple little snippets of information that you learn
along the
way that you rely on when all the normal stuff goes to
hell...Comments about
we ALWAYS do things this way or that way, generally lead to problems
later.
We simply cannot teach all the variable adversities that one may
encounter,
so we have to teach student to think and analyze and act to the best
of
their abilities.

I had a truck driver once who came to work for me. My old
truckdriver was
moving up within the company, so we had him take the new hire on the
route
the first day to show him where to go...they borrowed my pickup
truck
instead of the delivery truck in an effort to save some time. The
next day
the new hire set out on his own and at 5 o'clock in the evening I
got a call
saying he had hit a bridge and that my delivery truck was badly
broken...upon arriving I found my delivery truck torn into 4 or 5
major
separated components after having been driven under a 7ft8 clearance
train
tressle ( the truck was 13ft 6" tall as opposed to the pickup truck
which
cleared easily the day before) When asked what in the hell he was
thinking...you guessed it..."That's the way I was shown to go
yesterday"
Full steam ahead 45 miles an hour...

Students can be like that, they take what is said far too literally
sometimes and I think that's why I believe that we ought to
concentrate more
fully on addressing how they think. All too often, you see an
instructor who
settles into his plan ie...rope break in the same place...pattern
always the
same, you get to know fairly quickly what they want to see and it is
then
easy to comply with... sorta the same way the Designee's are...I'm
sure we
all remember the instructors two cents worth..." Okay when he asks
you about
this, remember to say this...and oh yeah...don't forget to clear
those
turns" I mean..there's the little "wink wink" that let's everyone in
the
loop know you're okay and ready to pass...There really wouldn't be
much
point to checkrides if instructors sent "maybe he'll be okay's" on
to
checkrides.

We had a guy die at our airport last year. His own sailplane, nicer
than
anything on the field. Everyone was a little in awe I believe. He
took a
"familiarization flight" with one of our CFIG's in our Blanik, who
said he
did great. We have a little one way, mountain strip and he self
launched and
flew for 4 hours and when he came back, he was high and fast and
screwed
things up horribly. He then proceeded to flail around indecisively,
until
which time he stalled and spun in dying on impact. Everyone felt
horrible,his logbook revealed he had hardly ANY experience with his
ship but
hundreds of hours in Blaniks. Nobody did anything wrong, but in the
end, the
real issue is how do we keep it from happening again.

From my perspective, if I were an instructor, I'd be very keen on
training a
student the way I wanted them to fly, but then I think the last 4 or
5 hours
would be spent on just doing things differently, and with an open
mind, to
see how they react. Induce stress and see how they react. Tha,t
after all,
is what I was referring to from my view on student training, making
sure we
teach them to think adequately.

We have to teach pilots to think and analyze and act. With a decided
eye
towards maximizing their odds for survivability. That's probably a
whole lot
tougher than I am aware of. I'm not sure it's covered in the
Practical Test
Standards or Airmans Knowledge Tests. But it is perhaps the biggest
reason
to be dynamic in our training as opposed to static, which I believe
to be a
major difference from teaching JUST to the PTS...and JUST to pass
the
Exam...

JUST...my humble opinion.

I take my hat off to all you instructors who give tirelessly to this
sport
and please, I hope you take my comments as they are intended, which
is
constructive, not destructive.


Respectfully,



Steve.






--

------------+
Mark J. Boyd

On 7 Feb 2005 15:10:10 -0800, (Mark James Boyd)
wrote:

29 fatalities.

7 ridge
4 off-airport landings
4 spin on final
3 intentional aerobatics
3 did a PCC but not an assembly check
2 drugs
2 midair
1 rope break
1 on top of rotor clouds
1 fuel exhaustion takeoff eng fail
1 trim failure, killed the towpilot

Those statistics is absolutely worthless, I'm sorry to say.

If you want to find a connection between L/D and danger, it's
necessary to compare identical missions. A 2-33 that is limited to
flying traffic circuits is unlikely to hit a ridge or be damaged in an
off-airport landing during a competitition, don't you agree?

Fuel exhaustion is very unlikely to occur if your glider does not have
an engine - and gliders with engines are usually 45:1 plus. Another
case where a low.-performance glider has no chance to enter the crash
statistics.


Training gliders are per se safer than high performance gliders -
because the latter fly the more risky missions, e.g. cross-country.

One must not compare raw numbers - I bet even in the US there's at
least half a dozen glass gliders on every low-performance glider
("with a Vne less than 120 knots") that are flying cross-country.

Of coure accident numbers will be half a dozen times higher - but
accident rate per glider will be identical.


From some best guessing and the reports, over 80% of the
fatal accidents had PICs with over 100 hours in gliders. About half of the
pilots were CFIs or ATPs with hundreds of hours, often in make/model.

So I used the ASW-20 as my example. If I'd used the ASW-24E or
ASW-27B or Jantar 42-2 or PIK-30 or SZD 55-1, I'm sure
pilots would have come to defend these aircraft as well.

I may use the ASW-20 for an example of my own.
We had one in my club for 17 years.
During this time, we had about 20 aircraft damages (fortunately only
one guy was hurt), and NONE in the ASW-20.

Clear case - the 20 was by far the safest glider in our fleet. Its
replacement, the ASW-27, still hasn't suffererd any damage yet either.
Conclusion: The higher the L/D and the more handles in the cockpit,
the safer the glider.

I guess you see the dangers of reading statistics...


My point is that if I had to guess the next fatality, it would be
an experienced soaring pilot in a 43:1 ship low near a ridge
in a gaggle.

Yup.
Because all the low-performance gliders will bei either on the ground
or staying in the traffic circuit and therefore cannot take part your
scenario.


From a public safety standpoint, I think the FAA has done its
job. And I'll keep training pilots in the 2-33 and L-13 and
1-26 and PW-2. And some of them will move up to fast glass and
practice to try to maintain a level of safety. Hey, man,
that really is their own personal choice, as far as I'm concerned.

"Fast glass"... lmao.

Sorry Mark, but up in the air I like to go as fast as possible with as
much L/D as possible. The approach speed of a "fast glass" glider is
the same 50-55 kts as the one of any other low performance glider, and
its airbrakes are as effective.
It's an urban legend that an LS-4 is harder to fly than a Ka-8. Here
in Europe many clubs are using fast glass gliders as first solo
gliders, with convincing success.




Bye
Andreas

I agree that the quantitative number of fatalities is of little statistical
value.

In order to have statistical value the fatalities have to measured against
flight hour, or against flights, etc. in order to establish an fatality
rate.

It is a fact that fatalities seldom happen in gliders that are in the hangar
or their trailer. How many hours have these high performance gliders flown
compared the fatality count? How many high performance gliders are flying
in the country compared to the low performance group?

Flight time, sortie rate, flight mission type, and pilot's experience are
all items that need to be considered in order to determine risk factors
associated with a sailplane's performance level.

Respectfully,
Wayne
http://www.soaridaho.com/



"Andreas Maurer" wrote in message
news
On 7 Feb 2005 15:10:10 -0800, (Mark James Boyd)
wrote:

29 fatalities.

7 ridge
4 off-airport landings
4 spin on final
3 intentional aerobatics
3 did a PCC but not an assembly check
2 drugs
2 midair
1 rope break
1 on top of rotor clouds
1 fuel exhaustion takeoff eng fail
1 trim failure, killed the towpilot

Those statistics is absolutely worthless, I'm sorry to say.

Mark,
Thanks for clarifying that you weren't mis-representing the ASW-20
itself as dangerous, or trading safety for performance...or increasing
workload on the pilot in command, SPECIFICALLY on JUST the ASW-20...it
sounds like you really meant...All High performance sailplanes and with
that, I'd agree that as performance is gained, somewhere safety is given up.
But I don't think it's at all safe to say that it's because of a sailplanes
design, it's because of what people do with them. Those of us that choose
high performing sailplanes, do accept increased risk...and almost everyone I
know who pursues it, is aware of those risks and mentally works to mitigate
as much or as many of the variables possible. If the complexity of the
aircraft were really the issue, wouldn't in then mean that as aircraft
continued to go up in sophistication levels or performance levels, then that
as some point you'd simply die just by getting in or on one...?? Methinks
the logic is fundamentally flawed. It's what happens in the cockpit with the
pilot...not the craft.

Your comment about predicting the next bad accident is well taken...sorta
like saying the next catastrophic car crash next Friday, will be due to a 17
year old, his three best buddies and a case of Bud....on a long straight
road, with a nasty curve at the end....

We also accept increased risk as a very function of our daily lives Mark,
cars that zip along happily at 75 or 80...when things go bad...they go bad
worse than if you were doing 45. We all know that.

Oh well....not sure where this threads going anymore, but thanks for the
clarification.


Steve.

In article ,
Steve Hill wrote:
Mark,
Thanks for clarifying that you weren't mis-representing the ASW-20
itself as dangerous, or trading safety for performance...or increasing
workload on the pilot in command, SPECIFICALLY on JUST the ASW-20...it
sounds like you really meant...All High performance sailplanes and with
that, I'd agree that as performance is gained, somewhere safety is given up.
But I don't think it's at all safe to say that it's because of a sailplanes
design, it's because of what people do with them.

Absolutely. Flown within the limitations of the pilot and
aircraft and weather, all flying is safe. The interesting part is
that for some aircraft (the 2-33 for example), flying outside of
all of these limitations is still unlikely to result in
death. Not just because it is so hard to even GET into the mountains,
above wave, etc., but also because the 2-33 is a lot like
flying inside a big rubber ball anyway (to use an analogy).

Those of us that choose
high performing sailplanes, do accept increased risk...and almost everyone I
know who pursues it, is aware of those risks and mentally works to mitigate
as much or as many of the variables possible.

That's almost a direct quote from Steve Fosset, right? From what I've
seen of competition pilots and even just "fast glass" pilots,
their preparation and proficiency and experience is quite extensive.
I think this is because it MUST be. They then go out and eeek
performance out of themselves, the weather, and the aircraft.
This reminds me of NASCAR, where the drivers have every concievable
safety device, are very experienced, and know everything about
their craft as well as anyone can. Instead of using this
knowledge to safely drive the minivan with the kids to Chuck-E-Cheeses,
they strap on the fastest, gnarlyest machine imagineable and
drive it as fast and hard as possible without ensuring certain death.

Make no mistake, I think the competition pilots are every bit
as comitted to the sport as the Reno air race guys or NASCAR or
fill in your favorite. Just because it isn't as noisy or
"in your face" doesn't make the "fast glass" any less sporty.

If the complexity of the
aircraft were really the issue, wouldn't in then mean that as aircraft
continued to go up in sophistication levels or performance levels, then that
as some point you'd simply die just by getting in or on one...??

Yes that is precisely what I think. Ask Mike Melvill
(the fastest glider pilot in the world)
why he didn't take the third flight. And ask Richard Branson
how many glider rides he expects to give if his fatality rate
for the White Knight ends up matching NASA's 4%.

Methinks
the logic is fundamentally flawed. It's what happens in the cockpit with the
pilot...not the craft.

I disagree. The pilot, craft, and weather are all co-involved.
I didn't see a single fatal accident that would have happened in a 2-33.
I also noted the Hottelier connections causing fatalities. This
doesn't happen with self-connecting controls. And I don't think this
is a "pilot training" issue. This is a design flaw.
Some accidents can be designed away. A very interesting
area of work in soaring is designing away some of these fatalities
with a minimal reduction in performance. Parachutes, BRS, traffic
detectors, turbo, spin characteristics, etc. are all hotly
discussed here and by designers for just this reason.

Your comment about predicting the next bad accident is well taken...sorta
like saying the next catastrophic car crash next Friday, will be due to a 17
year old, his three best buddies and a case of Bud....on a long straight
road, with a nasty curve at the end....

Yes, yes. It wasn't a terribly insightful comment to some people. But
I think your analogy surprises few, while my prediction perhaps DID
surprise some people, who didn't know most fatalities are happening mostly
in 33 to 1 gliders.

We also accept increased risk as a very function of our daily lives Mark,
cars that zip along happily at 75 or 80...when things go bad...they go bad
worse than if you were doing 45. We all know that.

Well, airbags and shoulder harnesses and crash zones made cars
better. This maybe translated into exactly the same fatality rate,
but with greatly increased capability.

Soaring pilots seem to accept a certain level of risk. If
a safety device reduces this risk, it doesn't seem to
provide more safety, it seems to provide more CAPABILITY.
For me it's the same for training. The student was at an
acceptable level of safety when he soloed. Beyond that, my
goal was always to improve his CAPABILITY, while keeping
the safety level at least as good as during solo.

Oh well....not sure where this threads going anymore, but thanks for the
clarification.

And thanks for taking the time to share viewpoints. I don't
know right or wrong, but I certainly know discussing this stuff at all
is VERY helpful for me at least.



Steve.








--

------------+
Mark J. Boyd

It's nice to hear others question the validity of useless statistics. How
many privately owned L-13's or 2-33 are there in the US and how many of
those ever embark on an cross country flight??

If all you want to do is train in 2-33's and L-13's and fly around within a
5 to 10 mile area of your local airport...then I'd agree you are at less
risk in some ways and more in others.

That's not what I do however. I take off and leave and come back generally
many hours later. Are there risks?? Damn straight. But I accept them and
understand them and work my butt off to have a logical plan to deal with
them. And hope that I never need to excercise any of those plans, based on
my ability to evaluate my own risk/reward equation and to always remember
that flying is, at the end of the day a very personal reward.

In a way, I believe you have cemented my view that in many cases, students
are not receiving the information that helps them to attain their goals, and
so they have to get it from osmosis, instead of an instructor. The SSA
Master Instructor program is a great idea as well as the mentoring programs
that some areas are fortunate enough to have...we need a ton more of that,
from qualified sources. And again, not to sound like a broken record, but I
believe that the training must become more dynamic and less static. The
pearls of wisdom accrued over the years need to have a better venue to be
shared.


That's about it from me.



Steve.

Steve Hill wrote:
It's nice to hear others question the validity of useless statistics.
How
many privately owned L-13's or 2-33 are there in the US and how many
of
those ever embark on an cross country flight??

If all you want to do is train in 2-33's and L-13's and fly around
within a
5 to 10 mile area of your local airport...then I'd agree you are at
less
risk in some ways and more in others.

That's not what I do however. I take off and leave and come back
generally
many hours later. Are there risks?? Damn straight. But I accept them
and
understand them and work my butt off to have a logical plan to deal
with
them. And hope that I never need to excercise any of those plans,
based on
my ability to evaluate my own risk/reward equation and to always
remember
that flying is, at the end of the day a very personal reward.

In a way, I believe you have cemented my view that in many cases,
students
are not receiving the information that helps them to attain their
goals, and
so they have to get it from osmosis, instead of an instructor. The
SSA
Master Instructor program is a great idea as well as the mentoring
programs
that some areas are fortunate enough to have...we need a ton more of
that,
from qualified sources. And again, not to sound like a broken record,
but I
believe that the training must become more dynamic and less static.
The
pearls of wisdom accrued over the years need to have a better venue
to be
shared.


That's about it from me.



Steve.


SSA M I program is an example of available(in some places) additional
instruction.
The SSA Bronze Badge program was also developed to fill the gap in the
instruction to get the license process.
UH