Perfect Soaring Safety - How to Achieve

toad wrote:
Bob,

I would summarize (I think) it as, "I think I might have an accident,
therefore, I am safe."

No disrespect or sarcasm intended, but the first half of your quoted
statement above is a good start, but simplistically incomplete.

Joe Glider Pilot's continuing safety definitely is NOT ensured by merely
thinking, "I might have an accident, therefore, I am safe."

In any event, taking your summary as a point of departure for further
discussion, I'd change/expand your word 'think' to '(really and truly)
*believe*'...then complete building your 'inoculatory' mental edifice.
The Big Goal (of course) being to ensure your *actions* reflect your
thinking.

Could you maybe explain a bit more clearly, with maybe some actionable
items on the list.

Here's an attempt...taking the inadvertent pattern 'departure from
controlled flight' as an example (both because it's: a) not uncommon; b)
generally fatal; and c) a category that includes two dead glider pilots
I once knew), I've seen many a low pattern down the years, had 'quite a
few' conversations with some of the pilots who've done them, and 'only
rarely' come away from those conversations feeling comfortable with
those pilots' mind-sets. Common reasons for my discomfort follow...

Some denied their patterns were low. (Scary, to me...one involved the
instructor post-instructional-flight in a 2-33 that had actually grazed
the tops of trees (well) under the normal approach cone...as judging
from fresh green smear on the leading edge of the
lower...appeared-to-be-skidding-in-the-final-turn...wing!)

Others' attitudes seemed to be summarizable, as: I don't understand why
we're having this conversation; I'm safe, the plane is safe. What's the
problem?

Another not uncommon attitude seems to be: Yebbut I was carrying
extra/safety speed. (In most cases they did not appear to me to be.
Further digging usually obtained they were referencing 'extra' to 1G,
wings-level stall, and not their real-world situation. Worst cases
resulted in outright dismissal of the possibility that their recent
technique *might* have been both altitudinally/speed-coordinationally
problematic, *and* that they really *could* pilot a pattern that might
result in a departure from controlled flight on any day.)

My larger point is that ANYone can do a stall spin in the pattern, and
believing you can is much more likely to be a long-term-healthier
attitude toward real-world-flying
decisions/coordination/speeds/altitudes/etc. than NOT believing anyone -
including you, personally - can.

Now exercising my brain farther back in time in the pattern, and
applying my thinking to my home glider field (Boulder, CO), I have a
hard time explaining the (hundreds? thousands?) of patterns I've seen
flown by glider pilots (limiting things to single-seat, to eliminate
instructional training) that seemed to be started with complete
disregard for the fact there are 3 parallel runways on narrow (150'?)
centers, the southernmost one being a busy power one, with 3 glider
operations on the field (two typically very busy). Point being that it's
an avoidable risk - if not outright foolish - to come back to such a
situation *needing* the pattern NOW! Personally, I've long hated to come
back to Boulder's pattern without spending 'considerable time/altitude'
developing my visual/radio picture of both the air through which I'm
descending AND the ground situation I'm about to descend into. I'm
happiest making all my approaches as if the only one responsible for my
safety through rollout - and expedited removal from the runway - is ME
(and not anyone[s] on the ground hauling other gliders out of the way
[or whatever].)

Yet I've seen experienced pilots not return the pattern that way. Even
talked with several who were upset after landing because of 'some other
gliderpilot who screwed up the works.' I've also had to modify my own
pattern(s) to account for a few who came screaming back, inserted
themselves ahead of me (more than once, when I've been on an otherwise
routine base leg, by folks who were nowhere *near* the pattern
'energically-speaking,' prior), then proceeded to land/wait in prime
landing territory, as if they didn't comprehend that by so doing they
were risking *their* ship/life, too.

I can't help but believe that better 'situational awareness' all along
such a chain of thought and decisionmaking would've greatly minimized
the risk inherent in those situations.

If none of my examples seem particularly important to how a particular
Joe Glider Pilot views things, I guess I'd ask where Joe Glider Pilot
first looks after s/he's survived a situation that got his/her blood up.
If it's *at* the other contributor(s), I'd suggest not stopping there.
Better yet would be to 'naturally begin' by assessing his/her own
contribution(s) to the situation(s).

My Very Largest Point is that the vast majority of glider accidents are
- IMHO - at some level attributable to JGP's internal thought
patterns...sometimes the *lack* of forethought. Certainly all of mine
noted in my OP were, and only one of those situations *might* NOT have
been completely avoided if I'd brought my current thinking to the
cockpit. In any event, if JGP really and truly *believes* that any
future accident of his/hers has the *slightest* potential to be
assessable in the 'pilot-as-contributor' category, s/he is more likely
to work harder to *avoid* 'going there.' I think that's as true for
low-time, ignorance-heavy situations as it is for 'World's Best
Gliderpilotstud.'

Respectfully (and seriously),

Bob W.

P.S. If we could poll every gliderpilot who survived some incident
resulting in glider damage, I'd wager my retirement on well over 50% of
those pilots (rightly) feeling some embarrassment about how they came to
*need* to survive such a thing. True for me. :-)