towplane collides with glider, prop hits wingtip

On Aug 30, 11:31*am, Andy wrote:
On Aug 30, 7:06*am, bildan wrote:



On Aug 29, 6:05*pm, tstock wrote:

On Aug 29, 4:34*pm, wrote:

Educational video...
Murphy's law at work... one thing leads to another...
towplane: Wilga
glider: LAK
place and time: competition at Pila in Poland, late August 2009
towplane's engine misses than cuts off during takeoff
prop collides with the wingtiphttp://picasaweb.google.pl/Wojtekpara/Wypadek#5238527461393125826

Andre V, CFIG

Any clues as to what caused the tow pilot to lose control at the end
of the runway and/or make the hard right turn into the glider's path?

After watching this a couple of times, it appears to me the tug pilot
intended to turn around and didn't lose control until he saw the
glider about to collide with him - a failure to maintain situational
awareness.

I've had a tug abruptly stop on the runway centerline just after I was
airborne forcing me to fly around him - it's an experience I won't
forget. *Just as in flight, the tug pilot should bear left if aborting
takeoff on the runway so the glider has somewhere to go.

The PZL 104 Wilga's Russian Ivchenko/Vedeneyev radial can be a cranky
beast - 'ready to go' and 'ready to quit' sound about the same. *The
tug pilot may have been confused by that.

I had an L-19 run out of gas on me on a downhiill asphalt runway. I
had just broken ground and my LS-3 was full of water. Full spoilers
and flying it onto the runway to engage the LS's powerful Tost drum
brake (not!) was the only thing that kept me out of the swampy
overrun. The tow pilot was smart enough to coast to a stop off the
left edge of the runway, leaving me room to scoot past on the right
edge of the pavement. *I ended up with the tow rope wrapped around my
axle but no harm done.

The "tug out of gas" incidents/accidents are getting old. I can
recall no less than a dozen - which means 10x that number are likely
to have happened. You'd think a pilot who is back on the ground every
10 minutes would have time to check his fuel.

We had an as yet unexplained fuel exhaustion incident this summer -
the pilot glided safely back to the runway. One possibility is that a
fuel drain continued to dribble fuel overboard after the pre-flight.
Please take a second or two to check the drains shut off after taking
a fuel sample.

At 17:31 30 August 2009, Andy wrote:
On Aug 30, 7:06=A0am, bildan wrote:
On Aug 29, 6:05=A0pm, tstock wrote:

On Aug 29, 4:34=A0pm, wrote:

Educational video...
Murphy's law at work... one thing leads to another...
towplane: Wilga
glider: LAK
place and time: competition at Pila in Poland, late August 2009
towplane's engine misses than cuts off during takeoff
prop collides with the

I had an L-19 run out of gas on me on a downhiill asphalt runway. I
had just broken ground and my LS-3 was full of water. Full spoilers
and flying it onto the runway to engage the LS's powerful Tost drum
brake (not!) was the only thing that kept me out of the swampy
overrun. The tow pilot was smart enough to coast to a stop off the
left edge of the runway, leaving me room to scoot past on the right
edge of the pavement. I ended up with the tow rope wrapped around my
axle but no harm done.

I doubt very much if the brake fitted to any glider is going to stop it
anytime soon if it is full of water and even if it did I suppose the water
would be handy to put out the brake fire. In the case of the LAK it is a
heavy beast even without the water, as anyone who has been conned into
rigging one will testify. If the tug does not get out of the way it's
going to collect the glider.

I doubt very much if the brake fitted to any glider is going to stop it
anytime soon if it is full of water and even if it did I suppose the water
would be handy to put out the brake fire. In the case of the LAK it is a
heavy beast even without the water, as anyone who has been conned into
rigging one will testify. If the tug does not get out of the way it's
going to collect the glider.


Looks like a LAK 17 rather than a 12.

On Sun, 30 Aug 2009 19:46:05 +0200, "Maciek K."
wrote:

Also the weather was very poor: four tasks
played during 16 days of competition (two of them played on the 16th day -
yes, two tasks played one day).

I was too curious, so I find found out!

http://www.soaringspot.com/smpj/resu...ay-by-day.html

Aldo Cernezzi

On Aug 30, 8:15*pm, Don Johnstone wrote:

In the case of the LAK it is a heavy beast even without
the water, as anyone who has been conned into
rigging one will testify.

Sorry to go off-topic but the LAK-12 (to which you must be referring,
though this glider is a LAK-17) is 100 pounds lighter than an ASW-17.
So when you say "heavy beast" I assume you are referring not to the
glider itself, which is on the light side for a 20.5-meter. You must
be referring to the fact that the wings are one-piece. All that is
needed is a decent wing-rigging dolly and so forth and it becomes a
one-man operation. The dolly carries the weight, not the human. But
without proper knowledge of how to align the wings it will be
difficult to assemble. With proper knowledge and rigging aids it is a
rather easy one-man operation. The secret to rigging a LAK-12 is
finesse, not brute force. Disassembly is rather easy since no finesse
(critical wing alignment) is required. I suspect the same is true of
many 15-meter gliders.

Regards,

-Doug

Ouch. Myself being Lak-17 owner it was just painful watching that
beautiful wing getting chopped off.

Looking at the takeoff I can see the glider was loaded with water to
the top and wheel brakes are pretty weak on Lak-17s.

Limus

Isn't there supposed to be a convention that the tug pilot turns right and
the glider pilot turns left (or the other way round) in the event of an
engine failure during the take off ground run?

Derek C

At 23:13 31 August 2009, Limus wrote:
Ouch. Myself being Lak-17 owner it was just painful watching that
beautiful wing getting chopped off.

Looking at the takeoff I can see the glider was loaded with water to
the top and wheel brakes are pretty weak on Lak-17s.

Limus

At 13:00 01 September 2009, Derek Copeland wrote:
Isn't there supposed to be a convention that the tug pilot turns right
and
the glider pilot turns left (or the other way round) in the event of an
engine failure during the take off ground run?

Derek C


Hmmm....

Maybe in a wide open space like Lasham, but be careful not to plant a bad
seed here, Derek.

;o)

On Sep 1, 9:00*am, Derek Copeland wrote:
Isn't there supposed to be a convention that the tug pilot turns right and
the glider pilot turns left (or the other way round) in the event of an
engine failure during the take off ground run?

In the US I believe the answer is yes. From my copy of the SSA
Soaring Flight Manual:

"If the towplane loses power, the sailplane pilot should immediately
release, maneuver to the right of the towplane, and stop as quickly as
possible. The tow pilot can then discontinue the takeoff and maneuver
to the left side of the runway."

Regards,

-Doug

"If the towplane loses power, the sailplane pilot should immediately
release, maneuver to the right of the towplane, and stop as quickly as
possible. *The tow pilot can then discontinue the takeoff and maneuver
to the left side of the runway."

This is exactly what I did many years ago in the same situation. I
was unable to stop my ballasted open-class ship before reaching the
towplane and coasted past it on the right. I recall seeing the
propeller stop abruptly as I was just about airborne. He pulled to
the left and I went right - no problem.

Mike