Please, no rec.aviation.fistfight!

Thanks for posting that, Ramy and for bringing this up, Rex.
FLARM would be absolutely fantastic in areas like the Inyo and White
Mountains, the Sierra Nevada, the Wasatch, the Appalachian chain,
under big cloud streets, in glider contests... Since we never fly in
any of those places, it's not much use at all really.
A while ago Bob Semans came up with "Procedure Alpha" to use on the
Whites. While serving to make people more aware of other traffic, the
constant stream of position reports on a typical weekend afternoon
makes for too much noise in the cockpit. Every time I run the Whites,
I think about how much better it would be with FLARM in every glider.
We all understand that glider pilots are attracted to the same lines
of lift. Having used FLARM for a few years in Australia, I'd say it is
a great tool. FLARM is a logger too! You can attach a FLARM-NAV,
Butterfly Display or PDA to it and have a complete logger, nav and
collision avoidance system for about 1500 dollars. Here's a link to
FLARM-NAV and Butterfly, in case they're new to you.
http://www.swiftavionics.com.au/prod.../1/Sailplanes/
Unlike transponder-based collision avoidance, FLARM doesn't panic
when you're on tow, flying "lead and follow" with another glider and
doesn't ignore signals from near enough to actually cause a collision.
I own a transponder, which is very nice to have around Minden or Jean.
Haven't found a PCAS that I'd install yet.
Think of how many times you've seen another aircraft up close. What
percentage of those were NOT gliders? I'm guessing that if you
actually remember how many gliders you came close to, that number is
pretty low. But we're so used to seeing other gliders that we tend
forget about them after they pass.
Could somebody please post the total number of glider mid-air
collisions in the USA, with a tally of glider/glider versus glider/
other? Anyone would think that a certain AS and Hawker collision
represented 100% of all accidents.
Jim