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#11
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Thanks Steve, good feedback and I like the process evaluation you describe.
Tools like SeeYou are terrific for that. For the record, 300 feet is way too low for me too! -ted "Steve Hill" wrote in message ... Ted, in my humble opinion you are doing one of the healthiest things you can do for yourself for your long term survival as a sailplane pilot. Expose your mistakes and share them. As a cross over hang glider pilot, I have made all sorts of small mistakes, I like to think I learned from most of them. What I am completely convinced of is the need to not evaluate your successes or failures at this early point in your soaring by the "how high, how far, how fast" methodology, but instead, to evaluate your process...download your flights and determine how many of your decisions were ones that could have had bad conclusions, and then use those as a means to improve your decision making with each subsequent flight...I generally don't say much here, it's more fun to simply watch the banter, but on this front I do feel compelled to suggest that ALL cross country soaring pilots should be trying to share more of the information we use in our own process. To me, 300 feet is WAY too low to be trying to climb back up...once in awhile you'll get away with it...but not every time. And the one time it kills you, the pundits here will have more fodder for the tireless " Well anyone could see it was gonna happen sooner or later"'s...My two cents worth ain't worth what it used to be, but keep sharing those flights...if you aren't sure if it was dumb...ask somebody.."Hey would YOU have done this..?" and then be prepared for the outcome. In this case you got away with something. We've probably ALL gotten away with something ourselves...but if we share a bit more of what was going through our head, we can hopefully relegate some of the future visits to funerals... Steve DG-400 4-93 |
#12
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In the late '70s, Airlines began to examine why certain accidents occurred.
They came to the conclusion that Cockpit culture needed to change. Thus were born courses like "Cockpit Leadership and Resource Management" Or CLR. It is now often called CRM for "Cockpit Resource Management" It changed the premise of Airline Cockpit management from "The Captain is always right" to " The Captain is responsible for the final decision but will gratefully accept any and all input from any source to help him/her arrive at the safest decision". It was a remarkable event and, in my view, is responsible for the avoidance of many accidents. To do this Airline Pilots had to learn and embrace the difference between critique and criticism. Criticism is personality based and can be perceived as a personal attack on an individual. Critique, on the other hand, is situation based and can and should be based on events as they happened and how to learn from them. As Steve suggests, it is better to critique than to criticize. In the instant case, the question is, could Ted have landed at his intended Airport on his intended runway without thermal intervention? If the answer is yes, then ergo, he was not too low. If the answer is no, then ergo, he should reevaluate his decision making process. In any case, sharing the event with us benefits all and no one here should forget the difference between critique and criticism. It has been my experience here that most do know the difference and I, for one, am thankful for that. Allan "Steve Hill" wrote in message ... Ted, in my humble opinion you are doing one of the healthiest things you can do for yourself for your long term survival as a sailplane pilot. Expose your mistakes and share them. As a cross over hang glider pilot, I have made all sorts of small mistakes, I like to think I learned from most of them. ...Snip... |
#13
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want to hear about the very experienced pilot.. who in his first season with
his NEW ASW27B, found a thermal on downwind, thought he had it hooked.. only to get left low and dry and forced into a downwind landing.. and totaled it when it ground looped.. that extra tow back to that "found thermal" is cheap insurance Anyone found "thremaling out" from 300ft in the traffic pattern would not be asked to return. How many pilots did he block in the pattern while he climbed above pattern altitude. BT "Paul M. Cordell" wrote in message ... How Low to Spin?? I was proudly shown a IGC file this weekend. This file show the aero tow thru a thermal and a release into sink. Our proud pilot was unable to find the thermal and started a downwind leg for a landing. As he turned base leg, he flew into a 2-5 kt thermal. Instead of completing the pattern and landing, he turned and climbed in this thermal. The IGC file showed that his altitude at the time of encountering lift was 300 ft. I asked him 1 question as he displayed this flight on See You. How Low do you want to spin? His response scared me silly&&..My glider does not spin and there was no wind. He then continued to display the same flight where he bragged of spending a considerable amount of time in the mountains within 500 feet of the terrain. I am doubtful as to his ability to reach a landable area during this portion of the flight. This pilot is in his first year of private ownership, cross county soaring and may have almost 200 hours of total time. He has embraced soaring completely. I left the gliderport feeling that my suggestions as to his safety practices were just hollow words. I know that he reads RAS and would hope that the response to this post may give him some food for thought. |
#14
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that extra tow back to that "found thermal" is cheap insurance
A good point, and not forgotten at the time. I haven't shied away from relights in the past, but I wasn't out to volunteer for one either. How many pilots did he block in the pattern while he climbed above pattern altitude. None. As I told GY and Paul (before his post), I was careful to note as I entered the pattern that I was the only one near it. I'd noted when I launched that the entire commercial fleet was on the ground. In the air (when I entered the pattern) were one tow plane with which I had visual and radio contact, a motorglider several thousand feet higher, and another glider just off tow two miles to the west. Also, I didn't thermal at 300 feet -- that was the low point of the downwind leg (it was actually a little more than 300', but why split hairs). I was more than 100 feet higher when I started my first turn, to base. When the lift continued, I simply decided to continue the turn (over 400 feet now), plenty of altitude, airspeed and yaw string straight. At no point was it any more dangerous than a normal landing pattern, and if I'm wrong on that evaluation, I'm the first person who wants to know where why and how, because if it was a mistake for those particular circumstances, I care not to repeat it. I was far more scared when my CFIG pulled the tow release at 200' without warning in a heavily loaded trainer and I had to turn, line up on the same runway we launched from, all while managing the airspeed, and land downwind. (That's more than 180 degrees of turning, those of you who haven't enjoyed this exercise before.) I had to perform that maneuver twice, once before 1st solo and again just before my license exams. Was it safe? If so, then how is what I did less safe, with twice the altitude and no surprises? I'm not trying to be argumentive here -- I'm trying to understand what I should consider next time that I did not consider this time, if there is anything. Still I can't imagine "thermaling" at 300 feet unless there was terrain underneath me I could imagine landing on even less. I hope that goes without saying! -ted |
#15
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In article ,
Stewart Kissel wrote: Part 2 of response- Pushing limits safely is one of the appealing aspects of our sport...once one can actually stay up, this progression seems to be... 1.) How long(duration) 2.) How high 3.) How far 4.) How fast An excellent list...how true... (How low) seems to fit in there somewhere...but it can bite harder then the others. I saw an accident report that noted the cause: "Pilot's inability to maintain terrain clearance." Boy, that is SOME lazy investigator...I laughed a tiny bit, and then was embarrassed at myself because it was a fatality... I read a lot of reports about accidents caused not by lack of lift, but presence of sink. In my close calls, I was always glide ratio or better to an airport, but this meant absolutely nothing. Sink is the killer. -- ------------+ Mark Boyd Avenal, California, USA |
#16
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In article ,
scurry wrote: Paul M. Cordell wrote: How Low to Spin?? When I flew my minature CA state record, at one point I had picked a field and was on downwind for landing. The stupid road on the field was 2000 ft long, but there were trees 50-100ft+ on both ends, and a tree right in the middle of the packed dirt road. I remember grumbling to myself that this could very possibly suck. I caught some lift on the downwind at about 500 ft AGL, right over the field. I circled fast and with shallow bank right over the field, in a wide arc. At every moment, I said I wouldn't get slow and tight close to the ground, and if I wasn't going up, I would go back to the downwind. 1 knot became 2, and soon I was at 1500AGL. I looked around a bit more, and found that I had set up for a tailwind landing (about 5 knots). I hadn't seen any flags or such on the way in, and the wind was 120 deg from what I expected. I tightened up and took a breath, and eventually held the same thermal up 10,000 ft, 4-6 knots. So mediocre landing field vs. 500ft shallow circle at higher speed? I'm gonna say that if I'm always in a position to make a safe landing, I'm ok. The real question is if someone flys slow and steep close to the ground. I do it high all the time, but never below 1000 feet AGL... -- ------------+ Mark Boyd Avenal, California, USA |
#17
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Ted Wagner wrote:
yaw string straight. We've had this discussion on RAS before. I'm still gonna say that yaw string straight doesn't prevent a spin entry. Spins are when you're stalled and one wing is more stalled than the other. One wing is more stalled than the other if one wing has less AOA/more airspeed than the other. With the yawstring straight, this is still true in a steep bank, especially with long wings. It's also true if you're in a slip and then with a punchy foot coarsely correct it to center. The steeper the bank, the higher the stall speed AND the greater the difference in wing speeds, even with a straight yaw string. When I teach rope breaks, I do them at 300 ft and 30-45 degrees of bank, and best L/D for that bank angle. http://www.stolaf.edu/people/hansonr/soaring/spd2fly/ is a start. I also caution against super rapid roll rates and coarse use of rudder. I'm open to thoughts on this. I didn't do the math to see how MUCH the factor affects spins (somebody else did and came up with 3 degrees diff or so for 50 deg and 18m wings), but it sure surprised me. Now when I do spins in the L-13, I do them from string centered flight, and sure enough it always spins in the direction of the steep bank, and in a hurry too... P.S. Of course this assumes the rigging is right. If flaps are lower on one side than the other, hey man, there's yet another factor... -- ------------+ Mark Boyd Avenal, California, USA |
#18
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Ted,
I am pleased with the discussion that has occurred today.. As you suggest, we must have experienced a failure to communicate. It certainly is my intention to help you become a safer and better glider pilot. As a side note, it has been a great pleasure to watch you completely embrace this sport. I can only hope that we collectively as a group will attract more people of your caliber. See ya @ the gliderport! Paul |
#19
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scurry wrote:
Interesting thing about the flight; By following the ridge lines keeping wind and sun in mind, I was able to run out of the hills at 300-400 feet over the ridges, maintaining my altitude until I had enough altitude to circle comfortably (which, remember includes the thermals spreading out enough to be useful). Ridge flying is practised currently *much* closer to the ridge than that, in fact so close than not touching some tree is the real problem. -- Michel Talon |
#20
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In article OrwWc.1538$4o.536@fed1read01,
"Ted Wagner" wrote: Still I can't imagine "thermaling" at 300 feet unless there was terrain underneath me I could imagine landing on even less. I hope that goes without saying! How about the opposite? I can't see much wrong with thermalling at 300 ft or lower if the ground underneath you is landable and unobstructed such that you can roll level and land in any direction. Or on one of those occasions where there is almost no lift about but no strong sink either. If conditions were at all boisterous then I wouldn't even consider it -- both because of the risk of a pin upset, and because of the risk of hitting horrid 500+ fpm sink just as you're facing away from the field -- but in the late evening when it's calm? Why not? -- Bruce | 41.1670S | \ spoken | -+- Hoult | 174.8263E | /\ here. | ----------O---------- |
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