On Monday, September 25, 2017 at 10:36:08 PM UTC-7, Andy Blackburn wrote:
On Monday, September 25, 2017 at 8:15:59 PM UTC-7, Ramy wrote:
Anyone have more details about it? In particular, was the glider equipped with transponder? This is not good rep for us, but could have been worse..
https://thepointsguy.com/2017/09/uni...00000080461661

Ramy


Found it. 19:45 UTC at 7075'MSL, 10 mi NE of Rockford, IL. ASH-26E topping out in a thermal and 737 exiting a brief hold - same altitude and the same location within a mile or less as near as I can tell.

There's only one flight posted on OLC for the Chicago area today. If there was buddy flying I guess it could have been the other one.

Andy Blackburn
9B

So early days, and little hard information, I do hope we find out that glider involved (if it was even this ASH26E, or even a glider at all) had a working transponder and there is more to this story.

It's easy to just think of the distance to (very busy) Class B and C airspace here and for that reason alone I would hope pilots flying cross country in that general area would make a decision to equip with transponders.

But in addition to general proximity to Class B and C airspace it's also useful to be aware of traffic routes feeding that airspace, and in this situation, the location Andy suspects lies close to a VOR, under a victor airway, and on a O'Hare STAR route. You can see hold locations marked on the enroute chart near the Janesville VOR https://skyvector.com/?ll=42.4454992...art=428&zoom=3. Looking at those IFR charts is a good starting point to seeing what is likely to be around.

The Janesville Eight STAR (https://www.airnav.com/airport/ord) into O'Hare puts aircraft near where the ASH25E seems to have been, at the same altitude range. There should be no surprise there is IFR traffic, fast jets and airliners there and because of that a practical need for transponders for gliders who are flying at those altitudes in that area.

Anyhow posting these enroute and STAR examples are intended to encourage pilots to do some research and be aware of traffic routes around busy airspace they fly near. Don't forget to look at SID routes as well. I hope all that and much more is know to folks locally near where this occurred, and I still hope we find any glider involved actually had a transponder and it was being used.