If You've Flown a FLARM Stealth Contest, Vote Here

Two years ago we weren't afraid to go flying in the West or the East. FLARM is introduced and all of a sudden this is all terribly dangerous. Please stop trying to scare everyone into seeing it your way.

XC

Actually, sane pilots have been afraid of midairs, west and east, for a long time. In my time on the rules committee, concern over midairs has been most pilots' number one safety worry. The owens valley pilots developed a whole protocol about high speed oncoming traffic.

Then flarm came along, offering some - -not perfect -- help on this topic. Wise pilots should still be very "afraid" of midairs.

Now it is proposed to force all pilots to intentionally degrade flarm. You can't argue that this does not have some safety implications. The question is simple: how much safety degradation it has, how much you care about that, how much loss of enjoyment it has (knowing where your buddies are, etc.) vs. how much doing so improves (or not) the quality of contest soaring. Once everyone has gotten used to the technology (see the GPS wars)

John cochrane BB

On Friday, December 4, 2015 at 10:30:42 PM UTC-5, wrote:
Lots of earnest opinions, some more strident than others. Lots of confident statements about what works, doesn't work, is possible, is futile, is inevitable.

So let's keep it simple: if you have flown in a contest at any level where stealth was mandated (not necessarily mandatory FLARM, but if FLARM was used, it had to be in stealth mode), what was your experience?

If you HAVEN'T flown in a stealth-mandatory contest, DON'T POST. You had your chance to speculate and make your opinions heard (some of you many, many times) over in "Is FLARM Helpful?" We could run this over on Survey Monkey, et al., but I think it's useful to track the responses on this forum..

My view based on the Elmira nats in 2015: FLARM under stealth provided the collision avoidance and situational awareness intended without changing the tactics or strategy of the competitive flying significantly.

My vote: "yes" for mandatory stealth mode.

Chip Bearden
ASW 24 "JB"
U.S.A.

As only the 4th pilot, by my count, to ring in, I will provide my personal view of my experience at Elmira.
I had no unfavorable issues with Stealth at Elmira. My sense was that there was no degradation of safety. I heard of no safety concerns voiced. Possibly there were, but I did not hear them. I did hear one or two in disagreement with the decision to implement Stealth mode, based upon the individual's personal philosophy. Not surprising.
I liked being able to sneak away at the start knowing that my competitors would not be able to use to use Flarm radar to track me and use my flight decisions as data for their decision.
I liked my principle opponent no knowing when I went in the middle of a task when I slipped away and made a big points day on him.
On another day I didn't much like not having radar when my principle opponent got the hot climb at a critical point and whupped us all badly.
Live by the sword- die by the sword.
What I am sure of is that we each scored based upon our decisions, without radar help. I personally would like to stay with this long held general character of our sport.
I do know of a couple pilots that had technical difficulties with the Flarms staying in Stealth. One landed back to correct the problem and unfortunately got hurt in his score that day due to the timing of his land back and relight.
As requested above, this was my experience.
UH

On Saturday, December 5, 2015 at 3:10:06 PM UTC-8, XC wrote:
Two years ago we weren't afraid to go flying in the West or the East. FLARM is introduced and all of a sudden this is all terribly dangerous. Please stop trying to scare everyone into seeing it your way.

XC

Yes, let's keep things in proper perspective and fact-based.

We killed a handful per decade in glider midairs in the US - a lot more died in stall/spin trying to make a low save - which is part of the romance of the sport I'm told (making low saves, not the still/spin part). Flarm will still yield benefits under stealth, though somewhat degraded in ways that are not totally predictable just yet.

It's ultimately a cost/benefit analysis. Some fractional number of additional accidents that are virtually impossible to predict or calculate with any accuracy (maybe some from collisions, maybe some from thermalling too low or being forced to land from missing the'save' thermal you never saw but could have - if you believe the leeching benefit scenarios) against a benefit of less enjoyable flying for most pilots (if you believe the pilot survey), more pilot anxiety from relying on collision alarms versus conflict avoidance, more work for organizers, more work and expense (for zero incremental revenues) for people who make soaring instruments and less leeching paranoia for a dozen or two dozen pilots (again, if you believe the survey), but unmeasurable impact on contest results (if you believe "leech-y"contest data analysis).

Wait a minute, that's a negative number. Costs are slightly negative (though really negative if it happens to you) and benefits are negative for (almost) everyone. Yet we persist as the technology tide rolls in...

9B

On Saturday, December 5, 2015 at 5:36:29 PM UTC-5, Jonathan St. Cloud wrote:
Going way off subject here but is there a mission or objective statement for the SSA sanctioning of contests? What are the goals?

Read paragraph 1.1 of the rules. It differs between Regionals and Nationals.
This is the closest to your request.
UH

On Saturday, December 5, 2015 at 6:29:43 PM UTC-5, John Cochrane wrote:
Actually, sane pilots have been afraid of midairs, west and east, for a long time. In my time on the rules committee, concern over midairs has been most pilots' number one safety worry. The owens valley pilots developed a whole protocol about high speed oncoming traffic.

Then flarm came along, offering some - -not perfect -- help on this topic.. Wise pilots should still be very "afraid" of midairs.

Now it is proposed to force all pilots to intentionally degrade flarm. You can't argue that this does not have some safety implications. The question is simple: how much safety degradation it has, how much you care about that, how much loss of enjoyment it has (knowing where your buddies are, etc..) vs. how much doing so improves (or not) the quality of contest soaring. Once everyone has gotten used to the technology (see the GPS wars)

John cochrane BB

Now that is more like it, John. How safe do we want to make our adventurous sport? "Safe as shuffleboard" is not the answer I would suggest. (Safe as a ham radio club, though fitting, doesn't have the same ring.)

http://www.theledger.com/article/200...NEWS/702180382

I agree. Be on the look out for midairs at all times. You'll never be as safe as sitting in your arm chair at home.

For years now we have pursued this goal of making soaring ultimately safe. The young people are just not interested in soaring thanks to this kind of thinking and this is a problem.

XC

On Saturday, December 5, 2015 at 3:59:41 PM UTC-8, wrote:
On Saturday, December 5, 2015 at 6:29:43 PM UTC-5, John Cochrane wrote:
Actually, sane pilots have been afraid of midairs, west and east, for a long time. In my time on the rules committee, concern over midairs has been most pilots' number one safety worry. The owens valley pilots developed a whole protocol about high speed oncoming traffic.

Then flarm came along, offering some - -not perfect -- help on this topic. Wise pilots should still be very "afraid" of midairs.

Now it is proposed to force all pilots to intentionally degrade flarm. You can't argue that this does not have some safety implications. The question is simple: how much safety degradation it has, how much you care about that, how much loss of enjoyment it has (knowing where your buddies are, etc.) vs. how much doing so improves (or not) the quality of contest soaring.. Once everyone has gotten used to the technology (see the GPS wars)

John cochrane BB

Now that is more like it, John. How safe do we want to make our adventurous sport? "Safe as shuffleboard" is not the answer I would suggest. (Safe as a ham radio club, though fitting, doesn't have the same ring.)

http://www.theledger.com/article/200...NEWS/702180382

I agree. Be on the look out for midairs at all times. You'll never be as safe as sitting in your arm chair at home.

For years now we have pursued this goal of making soaring ultimately safe.. The young people are just not interested in soaring thanks to this kind of thinking and this is a problem.

XC

"For years now we have pursued this goal of making soaring ultimately safe. The young people are just not interested in soaring thanks to this kind of thinking and this is a problem. "

You are going to have to explain that one to me. Young people aren't interested in soaring, but not being dangerous enough has to be about the last reason on the long list.

I have never felt that Flarm resulted in a huge increase in safety. It is a major increase in enjoyment for me and a lot of other pilots though, and I think enjoyment would rank very high (if not #1) on the reason young people - on anyone - would be interested in the sport.

You are going to have to explain that one to me. Young people aren't interested in soaring, but not being dangerous enough has to be about the last reason on the long list.


Amen. I have also noticed over the years that technophobia and passion for the old ways of doing things correlates with age. Young and new pilots do not see some great disaster in cockpit electronics. They're very comfortable with technology.

John Cochrane BB

Since requesting input this morning from pilots who flew at Elmira, I've been misquoted, misinterpreted, and ignored. I feel like I'm married again. Just kidding!

13 of the 24 Elmira pilots who apparently voted in the pilots' poll favored mandatory stealth. That's 54%+ of those who tried it liked it enough to want it mandatory. If I were into playing statistical games, I might say this is a clear majority in favor!

Or how about this: 100% of the pilots responding to my "voting" request today who flew at Elmira favor mandatory stealth.

But I sense that facts aren't really important. Positions are so inflexible that data that support or can be manipulated into supporting a position are gleefully trumpeted. Less convenient data are ignored or dismissed with "yes, but I know better."

I didn't have a position until Elmira. I hadn't even flown with FLARM until then. I tried stealth and liked it. And after I flew another FLARM contest in the fall--without stealth--I confirmed that I liked stealth better, for all the reasons I've already listed.

A few other thoughts: People speak of the "GPS wars" as if it were a dark time in the land when ignorance and superstition ruled. I was quite vocal in opposing GPS when it first appeared, for several reasons.

Cost was the big one. The early Cambridge loggers cost in the neighborhood of $3,000, IIRC. I initially bought a consumer handheld unit for $200. When I finally was forced to buy an approved logger, the price was down to ONLY $1,200. That was still too much, especially for guys who had less than $20,000 in their whole rigs, but at least I'd helped delay things. That was really what I was after all along: just to slow things down.

I'm not a technophobe. My undergraduate degree was in engineering, I did some early coding on mainframes, I've been using PCs since the DOS days, I've been on the Internet since you had to know some Unix to set up a connection, and I've worked as an IT consultant for 16 years. One thing I sometimes have to gently counsel clients is that technology is never a goal; it's always a means to an end. Sometimes young pilots lose sight of that.

As for my passion for the "old ways", I admit that another reason for opposing GPS was that navigation used to be part of the game. There were certain pilots who could be relied upon to get lost at least once per contest. I'm not referring to you, 9B; you didn't have to confess. And BB, you don't have to confess if you don't want to.

Overnight with GPS, their placings shot up. I don't think it's simplistic to say they didn't get better; we just dumbed down the game. At that point, we probably didn't have any choice, though. GPS was widely available and the hue and cry from navigationally challenged pilots was getting pretty shrill.

Finally, I was offended, frankly, by all the talk of how GPS would improve safety by eliminating the "dangerous" high-speed start. In reality, I know of at least one pilot who nearly crashed watching his final glide unreel on the GPS screen until he was too low to find a decent field. And I suspect everyone else did what I did--eliminated the safety cushion I had dialed in to account for uncertainty of my position and just cut it even finer on final glides. I was also offended by all the talk about how GPS would make soaring more accessible and more fun, and how contest participation would surge as a result. Sure.

So, yeah, there are some parallels between FLARM stealth and GPS.

I should also speak to the comment about making soaring as safe as shuffleboard. I'm for safety as much as almost anyone. I've given myriad safety talks. 20+ years ago I paid a premium to get Gerhard Waibel's ASW 24 with its safety cockpit, then added canopy wire deflector bars, an ELT, an onboard water system and a pee system, and a 6-point harness to prevent submarining in a crash. I secured everything that could come loose. I've lost both my father and my best friend to glider crashes, plus other pilots I've known. I think I know my limits and I try to fly within them, recognizing that I sometimes make mistakes. I've eagerly welcomed the added security I believe FLARM provides and I don't believe stealth compromises that.

But...if soaring were 100% risk free, it wouldn't have the same appeal. I like knowing I can push as hard as I want, limited only by fear and my assessment of my skills. I especially like competition flying because it inspires me to push myself to do as well as I can against the best pilots. Playing shuffleboard with them just doesn't do it for me.

So, sorry. I don't have a death wish but I don't think we should try to take every bit of adventure out of competition soaring. BB probably knows where I'm going with this and it's unrelated to FLARM but I'll say it anyway: I like the finish gate and low passes. They're fun. Soaring is appealing in part because it isn't perfectly safe. So yeah, I understand why the sanitized version, dumbed down so anyone with radar can follow the fast guys around, wouldn't have the same appeal to everyone. If that's what you want, go play video games.

For the rest of you, let's see what pilots think after Nephi.

Chip Bearden
ASW 24 "JB"
U.S.A.

That was a reference to a 2 mile/1000 ft. finish ring at Hobbs. Super dull to anyone observing from the ground. Finishes can be safe and still have some appeal to observers on the ground. There is a compromise position.

I don't want to start a whole new subject here but this is just an example of how we've pushed for ultimate safety and lost other parts of the sport. I should have said that more clearly before.

FLARM is similar in this way. Use the safety word to win your argument for FLARM and unlimited resources in the cockpit because who can argue with safety. But ultimately the sport loses something.

XC