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#26
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Winch Signals
I am not quite sure why the concept of hooking on only when you are ready
to launch constitutes 'negative consent'? If you subsequently see a problem developing ahead, feel the need to fiddle with bit of kit, scratch your crotch, or start to feel unwell, then pull off and call stop. I did exactly that last weekend, when I noticed a motor glider starting its take off run at the same time as as the Launch Point Controller (Marshal) was signalling up slack for my winch launch. (To be fair to him, the pilot of the motorglider had called some time before that he 'ready to depart', but had delayed his actual departure for some reason. The LPC thought it had already gone, and it was also taking off from a grass area that was behind his back.) It doesn't remove all responsibility from the pilot. You equally well argue that under Don's preferred system, you could be accidentally launched if you raise one finger to pick your nose, and then two fingers to tell the launch marshal what you think of him! We have been teaching the BGA preferred system for quite a few years now. That is, by accepting the cable to be hooked on you are ready to launch, and that you will have your left hand on the release knob. If you have a flapped glider, just set zero (or plus 1) flap for the take off run and then reset them if necessary, once you are safely in the air. The rapid acceleration on a winch launch should give you almost instant aileron control, so a flapped glider in neutral flap should be no worse off than a normal unflapped glider. Under the old 'two finger' launching system, I often used to find that student pilots went on signalling all the way up the launch, even though there was nobody out there to see it at 1000ft (!), and then make a grab for the canopy release knob, the airbrake lever, the flap lever or the undercarriage lever when it was time to release. Obviously this would be even more worrying if they had to pull off because a problem developed during the ground run! I can't remember this happening since the change. Derek Copeland At 01:15 19 April 2009, Don Johnstone wrote: TIBBIN - Thumb in bum, brain in neutral. I have always been very unhappy with the concept of negative consent, the requirement that a pilot has to take action to stop the launch proceeding rather than giving the positive "take up slack" and "all out" signals himself. The current procedure, (launch marshal) was introduced to replace the necessity for the pilot to raise the one finger for take up slack or two for all out. This rather negates the idea that the hand could be fiddling with anything I would have thought. In fact the current procedure lends itself more to misuse as neither of the pilots hands can be seen under the current procedure. The problem, I would suggest, was one of pilots not being prepared rather than their hands being in the "wrong" place. All the current procedure does, with it's insistance on the hand being on the release, is to give an assurance of safety by the action rather than the underlying decision process that needs to take place. Addressing the process and reinforcing pilot thinking was generally ignored in favour of a requirement for hand placement. Whatever the reasoning the statistics show that the incidents continue at roughly the same rate and there is no disparity in rates between the organisations using the original procedure and the launch marshall system. Simply put the incident rates do not appear to have reduced in the BGA compared with the Air Cadets, in fact I believe the contrary may be true. We have in place a system which carries a risk, however small, of launching an incapacitated pilot, and which has shown no benefit in solving the perceived problem. On a final note, pilots do not pull off in their gliders one hopes. They operate the release or pull the release. I know the hand that is not holding the control column is no longer visible, and I do not know Lasham that well, but I find Dels description hard to give credence to. |
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