Great Story in this month's AOPA Pilot by Rick Durden

(Michael) wrote:

No, it doesn't. It glider training cost depends on the individual operation, be it club or
commercial. Don't assume the commercial operation costs more

I'd agree with this. It's been my experience that
commercial usually costs more, but it's not always the case.

That's disingenuous. Most training flights are 20 minutes or less.
At $20 to 3000 and $12/hr, that's $72/hr before we even figure in the
initiation fee or the monthly dues. When training, the biggest cost
is the tow - not the glider rental.

True again, but I don't think figuring cost per hour for
training in a glider makes much sense. Landings and tows
are the hard part for the ab-intio and transition student.
Once you've learned those parts, though, hourly cost is
relevant, and that's where the cost drops since you are
making longer flights learning to soar or go XC and your
cost is way down.

Assuming you can get the glider for that long (most operations have a
1 or 2 hour limit)... Only guess what -
at most clubs and commercial operations, if you want to go XC you have
to buy your own glider.

This is just as variable as the cost. Some clubs have
gliders to spare. I was in one club where the glider I
wanted to fly was never in use. Perhaps one day in three, I
had to share half the day with someone else. Some clubs are
very XC friendly.

I used to belong to a glider club that supposedly allowed XC in club
gliders. The process required to get approval was such that nobody
had done it in years.

I was in a club where no one had flown XC for years. I just
had to make it clear that I wanted to go XC. No one else
understood XC flying. They weren't trying to stop it, they
just didn't make any effort to make it easy.

If you can't afford your own glider and plan to
join a club, find out in advance if that's the way it is there too,
before you plunk down the money.

All the clubs I've joined were either low cost to join, or
easy to sell the share and recover my money.

Of course at most glider clubs the instruction is 'free' (meaning that
you're dragging gliders around in the hot sun, washing gliders,
cutting grass, and doing other menial work as 'club duty') while at a
commercial operation, instructors expect to be paid.

I currently own my own glider, and fly at a commercial site
but I still push gliders a lot, hold wings, cut grass around
my trailer, retrieve other pilots when they land out, and do
most of the same things I did in a club.

But glider
instructors are very rarely in it for the money.

That's the truth :-)

if you're really broke and would rather work
for your instruction than pay for it (which is what happens at a club)
you can always find someone who will instruct in exchange for having
his airplane, glider, or trailer washed.

This is pretty difficult. Commercial operator's usually
don't want outside instructors teaching in their gliders and
the employed instructors can't cut that deal. If you want
to work as a lineboy for a flight at the end of the day,
it's harder than the club duty. :-)


Todd Pattist
(Remove DONTSPAMME from address to email reply.)
___
Make a commitment to learn something from every flight.
Share what you learn.

How much do clubs charge for "winch" launches, if they have a winch? Do
most
clubs have one?


usually about $10 per launch, some are cheaper.. depends on club

Jay,

Thank you for the kind words.

I had never considered that my daughter wouldn't fly. In fact, my ex
and I had told her, jokingly, one day, that to be in this family she
would have to get a pilot certificate. It just never crossed my mind
that her actually soloing would affect me as it did.

Interestingly, she has soloed again since the first time and my level
of nervousness has dropped a lot, however, on one flight I was towing
a glider up as she was entering downwind and I thought she was quite
low. That got my heart rate up a bit, but she handled it just fine
(she'd gotten into more sink than she expected getting to the
pattern).

What also takes a while to sink in is how incredibly fast kids learn
to fly (I heard that from both of the glider instructors as they
talked repeatedly about their amazement at the rate at which the 13
year olds learn to fly the gliders), plus we forget just how smart
kids are. They are every bit as smart as us old farts, they just
haven't had the same experiences, their thought processes and
reasoning and ability to learn probably exceed our due to their youth.
That came back to me last week when I was reading a book about the
RAF's 617 squadron and the raid on the German dams in 1943. The
commander, Guy Gibson, then the most decorated RAF pilot, was only 24.
Virtually of the pilots had flown at least one tour in Lancasters
(four Merlin engines) bombing Germany and had been decorated, and one
of the best of those was only 20.

I guess they might as well put us out to pasture...g.

Warmest regards,
Rick

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message news:E0oSa.101742$ye4.74560@sccrnsc01...
Our own Mr. Durden has published a wonderful tale in the new AOPA Pilot mag
about the experience of watching his daughter, Amelia, solo a glider on her
14th birthday.

As the father of a daughter who is just 4 years shy of that age, I can
attest to the fact that there is NO WAY I can imagine her soloing an
aircraft of any kind. My stomach tightened as I read the story, thinking
about what it would be like watching my little Rebecca wheeling and soaring
overhead. I actually shed a tear when Amelia successfully completed her
solo flight, and palpably felt Rick's relief upon seeing her perfect
landing.

Great story, Rick. Thanks for giving me yet ANOTHER reason to fear the
future...

On Tue, 22 Jul 2003 22:50:29 -0500, Montblack
wrote:
Boys his age are like sled dogs. They want to run, to work, to pull their
load. Sled dogs hanging around (with other young sled dogs) get bored, and
get squirrelly. (I've seen it in movies)

I'd disagree with that. By the time I was 12, I had keenly honed my
skill at *avoiding* work :-)

The avoidance of work was of course so I could learn more Z80 asm on
the Sinclair Spectrum...or even play Psion Flight Simulator on that
machine.

--
Dylan Smith, Castletown, Isle of Man
Flying: http://www.dylansmith.net
Frontier Elite Universe: http://www.alioth.net
"Maintain thine airspeed, lest the ground come up and smite thee"

(Rick Durden) wrote in message om...
...What also takes a while to sink in is how incredibly fast kids learn
to fly (I heard that from both of the glider instructors as they
talked repeatedly about their amazement at the rate at which the 13
year olds learn to fly the gliders), plus we forget just how smart
kids are. They are every bit as smart as us old farts, they just
haven't had the same experiences, their thought processes and
reasoning and ability to learn probably exceed our due to their youth....

I've got a minority opinion here. I've read the article, and was glad
to read it, and glad for Rick and his daughter. I can see his
justifiable pride coming through the words. But, I'm also glad I'm
learning to fly as a 40-mumble-something year old and not as a
teenager. I'm pretty sure (based on some of the stunts I thought
reasonable back then) that I wouldn't have had the maturity to make
consistently good safety decisions. Note that people vary wildly and
my limitations may not apply to others.

I know now, with the experience of a little age, that screw ups
happen, and bad decisions lead to more screw ups that good decision
do. And that screw ups can have lasting if not permanent effects. I
think that, in my case, it makes me a better student pilot.

I think it helped in my recently XC where my DME and Radio both failed
after leaving the DC ADIZ for Richmond's Class C.

-Malcolm

Malcolm Teas ) wrote:

I've got a minority opinion here. I've read the article, and was glad
to read it, and glad for Rick and his daughter. I can see his
justifiable pride coming through the words. But, I'm also glad I'm
learning to fly as a 40-mumble-something year old and not as a
teenager. I'm pretty sure (based on some of the stunts I thought
reasonable back then) that I wouldn't have had the maturity to make
consistently good safety decisions. Note that people vary wildly and
my limitations may not apply to others.

I'm with you. I originally started lessons about fourteen years ago, when
I was 24. Perhaps it was being single, without children, a slightly
immortal outlook, or maybe even the quality of flight instruction, but I
know I did not mentally approach each flight then as I do now (PPL as of
6/02).

--
Peter

She can date anyone she wants.


When she's 21.

;-D

"Dan Luke" wrote in message ...
"Jay Honeck" wrote:
As the father of a daughter who is just 4 years shy of that age, I can
attest to the fact that there is NO WAY I can imagine her soloing an
aircraft of any kind.

Just wait until she starts "soloing" boyfriends. You'll wish she was looking
for slope lift in the Rockies, instead!

Corrie,

She can date anyone she wants.


When she's 21.


Dream on! She'll find a way - and you'll look, well, pardon me, but:
stupid. Do you have any faint memories of your youth, possibly?

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)