Glider Down - Soaring Mag Feb 2015

Or look out at the wings?

Is adding additional information to an already busy panel not complicating
matters?

Is it not also encouraging one to look in and not out? Good look out should
be promoted.

At 04:39 06 February 2015, Bill D wrote:
On Thursday, February 5, 2015 at 8:33:52 PM UTC-7, Mike the Strike wrote:
I've known of more than a couple of incidents involving inadvertent
openi=
ng of spoilers that were not caught by the pilot and led to an accident
or
=
nearly so.
=20
I was taught (by a German instructor) always to visually check spoilers
w=
hen deploying them and again to check they were closed, something I have
al=
ways done. I also only deploy spoilers when within safe distance of the
fi=
eld and almost never while flying cross-country. I remember a colleague
wh=
o outlanded when he deployed his spoiler and the handle broke off,
leaving
=
them fully open!
=20
Mike

As long as we are discussion solutions to unintended open spoilers, why
not=
adopt the airplane solution in the form of an annunciator panel on the
gla=
re-shield consisting of LED lights? A big red one would indicate
unlocked
=
open spoilers and a small green one indicating they are closed and
locked.
=
The idea could be extended to the usual red-yellow-green gear warning
and
=
even to unlatched canopies and tail dollies still on the tail-boom.

Panels are being packed with an almost unbelievable array of computerized
i=
nstruments, why not add a row of simple LED lights that might eliminate a
f=
ew accidents? We now have good batteries and very bright, efficient
LED's
=
so why not?