Roy,

This will be an over-the-shoulder view; so nobodies plumbing parts are in the picture. Let's not worry about that.

Again, I understand that it doesn't sell well as a strictly voluntary thing for folks to want to buy individually. I like your autopsy insurance analogy. We're looking for the best idea to solve that. The miracle of collaboration happens when a lot of people think about the problem. I think the best idea so far has come from Paul Agnew yesterday. Paul suggested that the incentive come from insurance discounts. That could do the trick. Sort of like when car insurance is cheaper if you purchase airbags.

Let's say the camera cost is $200. Let's say your glider insurance costs $100 more if you don't use a video logger. That would do a good job of motivating the unit without the need of a mandate per se. Most people would buy one and install it for the economic benefit and not worry much about their privacy concerns. Furthermore, there would then be a built-in mechanism to motivate its proper usage if the insurance is in some degree jeopardized if your logger is not being used or not operating when an accident happens..

Clearly the insurance idea requires a bit of distortion field around the insurance pricing. As we've noted, having a camera won't actually reduce the insurance risk. So the rate difference isn't strictly rational as it is in the case of airbags. The good news is that there are only about 3 companies in the US that insure gliders. If those few players could each be convinced or incentivized to enter the distortion field, then we're golden.

Steve Koerner

On Tuesday, October 2, 2018 at 7:33:50 PM UTC-7, Roy B. wrote:
Steve:
let me briefly respond to your points - but in reverse order.

FLARM is an active and useful accident avoidance device - albeit at a cost. Yet everybody still resisted making it mandatory. Although it is useful in the air to avoid collisions it has achieved less than 1% penetration into gliders operating and flights being conducted. Competition flying (where FLARM is well accepted now) is a microscopic subset of glider flying in the US and the accidents that you want to learn about are not happening for the most part in SSA sanctioned contests.

But your camera idea does not even qualify as an accident avoidance device - it's a post accident diagnostic device that might "possibly" assist in some types of accident investigations if it captures useful diagnostic information and if it survives the crash. And it also has a cost particularly if it is to be made crash-worthy. To use a silly illustration of the comparison with FLARM - it's the difference between Health insurance (that keeps you or gets you healthy) and private autopsy insurance (that tells others why you are dead). Of course nobody buys or sells autopsy insurance - there is little perceived value in it and the government does a generally acceptable job doing it free. The same will be true of your cameras and any attempt to make them mandatory: Little perceived value for the cost and the government does a generally acceptable job at accident investigation.

I also disagree that an electronic stream of GPS data points that requires an intermediary program to collate and present into what is essentially a cartoon presentation of the flight (like SeeYou) is the same type of invasion of privacy as a video which is immediately usable, publishable and understandable. Yes- we all fly with multiple GPS trackers but I retain the option (even in a SSA contest) of refusing to submit my flight log and accepting the penalty for that. And need I mention that none of the tracking devices I use carry the problem of being focused on the control stick area while I am fitting and using the catheter in flight? And if you say "OK - we can turn it off then" - you have just made it non mandatory and ruined your whole argument.

In the end Steve, your strongest argument is "We gotta do something." That maybe true and I respect the feeling - but it's not this mandatory camera idea that we should do.

All the best,
ROY