Thread: Hard Deck
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Old January 28th 18, 04:38 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
John Cochrane[_3_]
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Default Hard Deck

There you go again overcomplicating things ... Just because it's hard to define a SUA that rules out all the problematic high terrain out of Logan or Nehphi does not argue against a simple altitude floor at Hobbs, Uvalde, or all the east coast flatland sites. It does not argue against valley floor SUAs even at those complex sites. Again, we are not here to stop bad behavior, to control what pilots do, and so forth. We are just, where we can with a simple transparent means, removing the strong incentive for SOME dangerous flying. Not all. Not at all sites. Not at all parts of all sites.

There is a lot of speculation around here. I used to do the numbers for the SSA safety report. We had a seriously damaged glider or worse in about one of every two contests. Almost all the damage was off field landings gone wrong, and almost all the traces showed low altitude thermaling attempts before crash. The reports are still on the SSA webpage. (Before the cylinder, we used to have regular crashes at and around the finish too.) Smacking into terrain or midair collisions are present, but quite rare.

On the elevator. I was skeptical too. Then I tried it. It's pretty benign. You float down the eastern shore of Tahoe with an easy bail out to minden or carson most of the way. The ridge lift is very predictable. If there are whitecaps on tahoe, there will be ridge lift. The wind has to go somewhere. If there are not whitecaps on tahoe, it's not going to work. Smooth ridge lift gives you enough for a very comfortable glide back in to Truckee.

I see how it can be overdone. I have seen some traces of pilots shooting through the gap from the west, coming around the corner very low and squeezing lift out of the elevator from low altitude. That's a little hardy for me, in part that the back through the gap escape is gone. So far I have only tried it from about ridge top height up.

John Cochrane