https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...crashes-n36371

On Sunday, June 3, 2018 at 8:37:49 AM UTC-7, wrote:
Sorry, must have prematurely hit the send button...

Continued:

...and thus KLGC was obligated to support all forms of aviation activity.

For decades, LaGrange, GA, was the ad hoc headquarters for the regional textile manufacturing business, that had all but been transferred overseas by the early 2000s. In its heyday, however, it was not uncommon for KLGC to have corporate bizjet sorties, along with the traffic conflicts that mixing jets and gliders periodically causes. The money, politics, and power wielded by the local textile companies continuously caused the glider flying to be considered as an undesirable nuisance at best and a safety threat at worst.

The glider club's stance that it had a right to operate at KLGC on an equal basis with every other aviation activity caused the airport authority to hire an aviation attorney. The lawyer counseled the airport authority that glider flying at KLGC could not be restricted.

That should have been the end of story. Yet, from this the airport aurhority enacted a set of glider operating rules (still posted at the KLGC website) to include the requirement for a "spotter" to be stationed at the intersection of the runways to verify there was no conflicting traffic prior to a towplane/glider launch. In essence, causing a degree of traffic pattern control at a FAA designated uncontrolled airport, to be done by an untrained/unqualified person. A usurpation of FAA standardized uncontrolled airport operating procedures and confusing established inflight right-of-way rules.

An public airport authority cannot mandate anything that is contrary to FAA regulations, and has no "authority" to enact any rules of flight. In essence, the KLGC airport authority attempted to introduce a degree of traffic pattern control at a designated uncontrolled airport to be performed by an untrained/unqualified person. This usurps FAA standardized uncontrolled airport operating procedures and confuses right-of-way rules.

A few other points to consider: 1) One airport authority board member would frequently attempt to control the traffic pattern using the CTAF, 2) Another board member is a local real estate broker with listings to sell vacated textile warehouses on the airport premises. At the time, KLGC was in the running for the KIA auto production plant eventually built in nearby West Point, GA, 3) Ironically, the airport authority had used glider sorties to count towards the traffic numbers it needed to procure federal funding, 4) ANY aviation activity utilizing the non-ILS runway had the potential to create a flight conflict at the intersecting runways; however, only the glider operators had to post a "spotter"?

IMO, the "legal" judgment ignores the fact that 1) Codefied FAA regulations clearly mandate that IF there was a flight conflict at, or near, intersecting runways, that the powered aircraft is supposed to give way to the towplane/glider combination, and 2) A public airport authority's "authority" is limited. A local airport authority cannot enact rules affecting flight operation--only the FAA can do that. Attempting to do so confuses universally applicable standard operating procedures to the detriment of the very flight safety those universal procedure were enacted to ensure.

I do hope the government's defense attorney made these points in court.

In hindsight, perhaps the glider club and the CAP should have pooled their resources to formally invalidate the unauthorized, conflictive local operating rules. Ignoring such a circumstance, no matter how obviously obtuse such local airport rules are to an aviator's sense of regulatory "legality", may have nonsensical consequences in an ill adept court of law.

Ray Cornay