On 8/21/2011 2:02 PM, Cookie wrote:
On Aug 21, 10:01 am, wrote:
(Apologies for the truncated earlier post...the 'draft' and 'send' buttons are
adjacent...)

Most U.S. glider pilots know of Tom Knauff, creator and long-time proprietor
of the well-known Ridge Soaring Gliderport in Pennsylvania. Probably fewer are
aware he has an intermittent electronic newsletter, which has as its most
persistent theme the utterly boring, sometimes irritating, theme of 'safety.'

Now I don't know Tom (have seen him once [maybe twice]), so please don't
misread any of what follows as something, somehow, having some nefarious
commercial relationship to his 'sideline' of creating safety-based books,
presentations, and general opinionating, because it doesn't. What follows
*does* represent my own thinking on the utterly boring, sometimes irritating,
'safety theme' as it applies to glider pilots. True, it's a U.S.-centric view,
but it wouldn't surprise me if much of it applies worldwide, simply because
it's based upon one man's perception of human nature.
- - - - - -

Background: Knauff has recently published a 'Young Driver Safety' book,
targeted (he says) at the kids' parents and guardians, and not limited in its
applicability to driving, but encompassing 'the dreaded safety mindset.' I've
used quotations because I've not yet read the book - someone else may
characterize it differently - but I'm guessing it's a generally accurate
representation.

The book came out no more than several months ago, memory says.

Since then, Knauff's newsletter has more than once expressed (serious!)
frustration at pilots' resistance to doing the few things he deems necessary
to fundamentally improve the sorry (especially this season), persistent,
little changing, U.S. glider safety record. (His frustration includes an
apparent resistance to buying the - inexpensive - book!) A day or two ago,
almost in passing, he ended one short newsletter with a comment to the effect
that he suspected there was one sure way to motivate (complacent? resistant?
otherwise disinterested?) glider pilots into have a more genuinely serious
outlook on their own, individual, piloting safety, specifically the improving
of, in the future.

The beautifully simple little idea was: self-insurance of gliders. (Think
about it!)

Having been a private owner who has (though not always) self-insured for hull,
and, a member of a club who also was 'forced' to do so for a number of years
not too long ago, the idea made me smile for its pertinent cogency and power.

Now, this very morning in his newsletter, Knauff expanded a bit on the idea,
and I quote...

Begin quotation

I recently received a note from a subscriber in Europe as follows:

Many years ago, a large glider club in Europe found itself confronted
with a steep increase in insurance premiums after a series of glider
accidents. The proposed insurance premiums would have exceeded the total club
subscription revenues, so the club was at risk of folding.

The chairman of the club read the Riot Act (much needed today) to the
members and said they were no longer going to rely on the insurance
company, but were going to self-insure. (The statement is recorded in
the club newsletter.)

Anyway, that dramatic response to the crisis worked.

Accidents were dramatically reduced, and with further changes to
practices and procedures, the club survives to this day.

As have a lot of people who might otherwise have been killed!

The message is clear: If the current accident rate is going to be
reduced, it will take the attention and cooperation of all glider
pilots, who will develop a new approach to being involved and watching
out for their fellow pilots.

Tom Knauff

End quotation

"What Tom says." Let the hand-waving begin...

Bob W.

Bob......You lost me......Are you saying that flying without insurance
somehow make a pilot safer...or "behave" better???

I'm suggesting that for many people it is not unless something has the very
real likelihood of directly extracting money from their wallet that 'stuff'
becomes important/actionable in their world, glider pilots not excepted.

So, "Yes, I do think there's a (significant) proportion of glider pilots who
would fly 'differently' (i.e. presumably more safely) if they were self
insured for hull."

I have flown my own glider and planes, sometimes with insurance and
sometimes without.......I have flown club gliders...sometimes with
insurance and sometimes when the club "lost" its insurance......I have
flown at commercial operations which have insurance and sometimes
don't have insurance..........

The above had and has no effect whatsoever on the way I fly or on my
attitude and concern toward safety........I try to be as safe as I
can possibly be...on every flight...........

When I fly...."insurance, yes or no" does not enter my mind at
all....safety, for the sake of safety is on my mind...

I strongly suspect that you and I (because from what I can tell on this forum,
we think fundamentally similarly about safety, pilot mindsets, etc.) are in a
very small minority of glider pilots in that regard. It's been my experience
that 'most glider pilots' learn 'just enough to become effective glider pilots
in their own minds' and then pretty much turn their 'self-aware learning
switch' to the OFF position, unless something scares them or otherwise gets
their attention. This seems to be human nature, so far as I can tell.
(Tangentially, but not entirely unrelated to the point I'm trying to convey
here, everyone who's happy with the safety margins routinely displayed by your
fellow freeway drivers raise one hand...)

That said, Joe Average Glider Pilot IS interested in what he's interested in,
and in that sense is always seeking to learn glider related 'stuff,' but once
he's learned the basics about pattern flying, ridge flying, thermal selection,
worm-burning, etc., he's more interested in DOING those things than he is in
continuing to learn the 'gotcha's' generally associated with them, but which
perhaps are not so obvious.

I believe this from not only having wasted most of my youth at gliderports,
but having also picked a lot of brains about 'glider stuff,' pilots' actions
and their reasons underlying them, and (not so rarely) trying to change how
some of my friends viewed and interacted with their gliding world, because I
cared about them and selfishly wanted to continue to have them around and
enjoying the sport for as long as possible.

My desire for self preservation is a pretty strong factor in my
flying, however. And reading how pilots get themselves in trouble,
and sometimes killed, leads me to try to learn from their
mistakes....and NOT do what ever they did.

"Ditto!!!" And when I got into the sport, I used to think EVERY glider pilot
thought that way. They do not. For most piloting participants I sense a
powerful disconnect between 'mortality reality' and 'learning enough to
participate.' How a person defines 'enough' is key, IMHO.

You, as an instructor, have considerable potential influence on (not control
of) every student coming into your care...and how he or she futurely thinks.

I, as a (non-instructor) club member, have some less direct influence on my
fellow club members via whatever direct peer pressure my presence-to-date, and
preceding reputation, bring me.

Ultimately, though, it is Joe Glider Pilot who 'has the power' to decide how
he or she is going to fly, and with what safety margins, and what ignorance
levels (since we're all ignorant at various levels) he will choose to fly.
Soaring doesn't happen in a vacuum (no pun intended) of course, and the web of
influences, and the sources of knowledge available to every pilot, is an
ill-defined, continuously shifting, amorphous, 'cloud' that unarguably exists,
but is of VERY arguable impact on each glider pilot, the impact varying over
time, and also, to a considerable extent, 'switchable' by each individual pilot.

Given the above realities, self-preservation (of the sport, if not of the
pilots, wry half-smile) seems sufficient justification for all of us to do our
individual utmosts to:
1) move 'permanently and continuously' from the majority 'disconnected pilots'
group, to the minority 'self-preservationally-motivated' group; and
2) apply peer pressure wherever and whenever the opportunity arises/becomes
necessary.

Culture matters, or few of us would sweat blood as parents trying to inculcate
some of it into their kids. Soaring culture matters, too.

To expect - the FAA, the SSA, the SSF, somebody else beyond ourselves - to
'take care of safety' is evidence (IMHO) of more 'disconnected thinking'.

Do I think such a thing as personal inoculation against accidents exists?
Heavens no!

Do I think a personally greater sense of mortality than most of us exhibit is
a) possible, and b) safety enhancing? Hell yes! On both counts.

Do MOST glider pilots (sometimes) think safety could and should be higher in
our sport? I think the hand-wringing on this forum eloquently answers this in
the affirmative.

Hand wringing without personal buy-in and action though, is no more than an
exercise in ground-bound self-gratification, and something in which I have
exactly zero interest in participating.

"Starwars" and its pre-teen pop-psychology aside, we have the power within us,
and it's up to us to develop and use it.

Bob W.