Video of off-field landing from cockpit

Hey everyone. We had a fun weekend up in Utah with many gliders up in
the air enjoying the amazing fall colors and mountain scenery. At the
end of Friday's flight I decided to extend the flight and go play out
in the weak wave lift in the valley northeast of the Logan airport. It
was fun until it stopped being fun...

For those of you who have not yet enjoyed an off-field landing, this
video shows the final 6 minutes before the landout and then landing in
the farmer's alfalfa field. It does a good job of showing the desire
to try to stretch and make it home but in the end making the correct
decision and landing safely short of the airport in a good field.
Please note the field was chosen and looked over well before the gear
came down.

Other than a few green leaves that needed to be washed away from the
bottom of the glider it was no worse for wear and I am thrilled to
have the video to share with others of what the experience of landing
in a field is like.

Please watch the video in the highest resolution your computer and
connection can handle. It was shot in 1080HD and at that resolution
you should be able to read all the numbers on the instruments. The
camera is a Canon HF20 with a fish eye lens which does a great job of
distorting my face... It is mounted on 1" ball RAM mount
adjustable arms. I have a custom voltage reducer to take a full 12
volt 7 amp/hr battery and lower it to 8.4 volts so I get 7+ hours of
battery life. The standard camera batteries only last a few hours max
so this is necessary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfNA5nhGQM&hd=1

Here is the igc file - it wasn't an impressive flight but you can see
the trace at the end where the video shows the final moments.
http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0...Id=-1117266168

Thanks for watching and hope you enjoy.

Bruno Vassel IV - B4
http://www.youtube.com/user/bviv

On Oct 18, 12:03*pm, Bruno wrote:
Hey everyone. We had a fun weekend up in Utah with many gliders up in
the air enjoying the amazing fall colors and mountain scenery. *At the
end of Friday's flight I decided to extend the flight and go play out
in the weak wave lift in the valley northeast of the Logan airport. It
was fun until it stopped being fun...

For those of you who have not yet enjoyed an off-field landing, this
video shows the final 6 minutes before the landout and then landing in
the farmer's alfalfa field. It does a good job of showing the desire
to try to stretch and make it home but in the end making the correct
decision and landing safely short of the airport in a good field.
Please note the field was chosen and looked over well before the gear
came down.

Other than a few green leaves that needed to be washed away from the
bottom of the glider it was no worse for wear and I am thrilled to
have the video to share with others of what the experience of landing
in a field is like.

Please watch the video in the highest resolution your computer and
connection can handle. *It was shot in 1080HD and at that resolution
you should be able to read all the numbers on the instruments. *The
camera is a Canon HF20 with a fish eye lens which does a great job of
distorting my face... *It is mounted on 1" ball RAM mount
adjustable arms. *I have a custom voltage reducer to take a full 12
volt 7 amp/hr battery and lower it to 8.4 volts so I get 7+ hours of
battery life. The standard camera batteries only last a few hours max
so this is necessary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfNA5nhGQM&hd=1

Here is the igc file - it wasn't an impressive flight but you can see
the trace at the end where the video shows the final moments.http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0....html?flightId...

Thanks for watching and hope you enjoy.

Bruno Vassel IV - B4http://www.youtube.com/user/bviv

Nice installation Bruno. 3.5 miles, dang! I think my closest this
year was 3.3 miles. also had a 4ish mile on the return from a Diamond
Goal attempt. Looks like you even got the obligatory lift at pattern
height that just might let you drift back to the airport if only you
can hang on for a little while longer. Looks like plenty of great
landout options in the valley there though. I also noticed that my
Cherokee II landout video was second on the "suggested" list to the
right. Thanks for doing the video thing, its a great learning tool!

On Oct 18, 1:03*pm, Bruno wrote:
Hey everyone. We had a fun weekend up in Utah with many gliders up in
the air enjoying the amazing fall colors and mountain scenery. *At the
end of Friday's flight I decided to extend the flight and go play out
in the weak wave lift in the valley northeast of the Logan airport. It
was fun until it stopped being fun...

For those of you who have not yet enjoyed an off-field landing, this
video shows the final 6 minutes before the landout and then landing in
the farmer's alfalfa field. It does a good job of showing the desire
to try to stretch and make it home but in the end making the correct
decision and landing safely short of the airport in a good field.
Please note the field was chosen and looked over well before the gear
came down.

Other than a few green leaves that needed to be washed away from the
bottom of the glider it was no worse for wear and I am thrilled to
have the video to share with others of what the experience of landing
in a field is like.

Please watch the video in the highest resolution your computer and
connection can handle. *It was shot in 1080HD and at that resolution
you should be able to read all the numbers on the instruments. *The
camera is a Canon HF20 with a fish eye lens which does a great job of
distorting my face... *It is mounted on 1" ball RAM mount
adjustable arms. *I have a custom voltage reducer to take a full 12
volt 7 amp/hr battery and lower it to 8.4 volts so I get 7+ hours of
battery life. The standard camera batteries only last a few hours max
so this is necessary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfNA5nhGQM&hd=1

Here is the igc file - it wasn't an impressive flight but you can see
the trace at the end where the video shows the final moments.http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0....html?flightId...

Thanks for watching and hope you enjoy.

Bruno Vassel IV - B4http://www.youtube.com/user/bviv

Excellent video. Wish I had this available last month when I was
giving a land out
talk. There's a few things that you should learn from the experience,
though
(shouldn't there always be?), as suggested by the likes of Tim Welles
and
Kai Gertsen:

1. turn off the radio when you're low -- it's just a distraction.
Also,
as Doug Jacobs likes to say, if you can do anything else while
thermalling,
you're not thinking about thermalling hard enough. You can turn it
back
on after you land and tell everyone you're all right.
2. pick the field while you still have room to change your mind, and
when
you can see it properly. You picked a field ahead of yourself a ways,
and lucked
out that it was a good field (it was into the sun, too, so it had to
be hard to
see it well). I tried that last year and landed in chest-high barley
(ouch).
3. pick the field at a more reasonable altitude. 300 feet (100m for
the rest
of the world) is more like the altitude you should be turning base to
final.
It's a little hard to see, but it seems you had good fields under you
at 800 feet,
and you had a good chance to look at them while you were scratching
(which is a good exception to DJ's rule).

There's a bunch of good presentations on off field landings (and lots
of
other great soaring stuff) at Doug Jacob's collection of stuff for
the
US Team camps:
http://www.dragonnorth.com/djpresentations/index.html

-- Matt

On Oct 18, 2:03*pm, mattm wrote:
On Oct 18, 1:03*pm, Bruno wrote:



Hey everyone. We had a fun weekend up in Utah with many gliders up in
the air enjoying the amazing fall colors and mountain scenery. *At the
end of Friday's flight I decided to extend the flight and go play out
in the weak wave lift in the valley northeast of the Logan airport. It
was fun until it stopped being fun...

For those of you who have not yet enjoyed an off-field landing, this
video shows the final 6 minutes before the landout and then landing in
the farmer's alfalfa field. It does a good job of showing the desire
to try to stretch and make it home but in the end making the correct
decision and landing safely short of the airport in a good field.
Please note the field was chosen and looked over well before the gear
came down.

Other than a few green leaves that needed to be washed away from the
bottom of the glider it was no worse for wear and I am thrilled to
have the video to share with others of what the experience of landing
in a field is like.

Please watch the video in the highest resolution your computer and
connection can handle. *It was shot in 1080HD and at that resolution
you should be able to read all the numbers on the instruments. *The
camera is a Canon HF20 with a fish eye lens which does a great job of
distorting my face... *It is mounted on 1" ball RAM mount
adjustable arms. *I have a custom voltage reducer to take a full 12
volt 7 amp/hr battery and lower it to 8.4 volts so I get 7+ hours of
battery life. The standard camera batteries only last a few hours max
so this is necessary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfNA5nhGQM&hd=1

Here is the igc file - it wasn't an impressive flight but you can see
the trace at the end where the video shows the final moments.http://www..onlinecontest.org/olc-2.....html?flightId...

Thanks for watching and hope you enjoy.

Bruno Vassel IV - B4http://www.youtube.com/user/bviv

Excellent video. *Wish I had this available last month when I was
giving a land out
talk. *There's a few things that you should learn from the experience,
though
(shouldn't there always be?), as suggested by the likes of Tim Welles
and
Kai Gertsen:

1. turn off the radio when you're low -- it's just a distraction.
Also,
as Doug Jacobs likes to say, if you can do anything else while
thermalling,
you're not thinking about thermalling hard enough. *You can turn it
back
on after you land and tell everyone you're all right.
2. pick the field while you still have room to change your mind, and
when
you can see it properly. *You picked a field ahead of yourself a ways,
and lucked
out that it was a good field (it was into the sun, too, so it had to
be hard to
see it well). *I tried that last year and landed in chest-high barley
(ouch).
3. pick the field at a more reasonable altitude. *300 feet (100m for
the rest
of the world) is more like the altitude you should be turning base to
final.
It's a little hard to see, but it seems you had good fields under you
at 800 feet,
and you had a good chance to look at them while you were scratching
(which is a good exception to DJ's rule).

There's a bunch of good presentations on off field landings (and lots
of
other great soaring stuff) at Doug Jacob's collection of stuff for
the
US Team camps:http://www.dragonnorth.com/djpresentations/index.html

-- Matt

Also, I don't want to sound negative in all this. You did do stuff
right, too --
checklist, take the safe option to go into the field (rather than
stretching
too far), and local field knowledge. As you said on the radio, you
were very
close to glide slope, but you broke off while you still had time to
maneuver.
There's too many NTSB reports of pilots just hoping for that last 80
feet to
materialize...

-- Matt

Thanks for posting this, love the videos.

Just one question: What ever happend to this?

Decision Altitudes
Below 3000’ agl – Be in an area with landing possibilities
2000’ agl – Select several fields with potential
2000’- 1500’ agl – Choose a field(s) / Search for thermals
1500’- 1200’ agl – Position the upwind leg of chosen field
1000’ agl – Be established in the upwind leg
800’- 600’ agl – Established on downwind leg

On Oct 18, 11:03*am, Bruno wrote:
Hey everyone. We had a fun weekend up in Utah with many gliders up in
the air enjoying the amazing fall colors and mountain scenery. *At the
end of Friday's flight I decided to extend the flight and go play out
in the weak wave lift in the valley northeast of the Logan airport. It
was fun until it stopped being fun...

For those of you who have not yet enjoyed an off-field landing, this
video shows the final 6 minutes before the landout and then landing in
the farmer's alfalfa field. It does a good job of showing the desire
to try to stretch and make it home but in the end making the correct
decision and landing safely short of the airport in a good field.
Please note the field was chosen and looked over well before the gear
came down.

Other than a few green leaves that needed to be washed away from the
bottom of the glider it was no worse for wear and I am thrilled to
have the video to share with others of what the experience of landing
in a field is like.

Please watch the video in the highest resolution your computer and
connection can handle. *It was shot in 1080HD and at that resolution
you should be able to read all the numbers on the instruments. *The
camera is a Canon HF20 with a fish eye lens which does a great job of
distorting my face... *It is mounted on 1" ball RAM mount
adjustable arms. *I have a custom voltage reducer to take a full 12
volt 7 amp/hr battery and lower it to 8.4 volts so I get 7+ hours of
battery life. The standard camera batteries only last a few hours max
so this is necessary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfNA5nhGQM&hd=1

Here is the igc file - it wasn't an impressive flight but you can see
the trace at the end where the video shows the final moments.http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0....html?flightId...

Thanks for watching and hope you enjoy.

Bruno Vassel IV - B4http://www.youtube.com/user/bviv

On Oct 18, 3:29*pm, glider12321 wrote:
*Thanks for posting this, love the videos.

Just one question: What ever happend to this?

Decision Altitudes
Below 3000’ agl – Be in an area with landing possibilities
2000’ agl – Select several fields with potential
2000’- 1500’ agl – Choose a field(s) / Search for thermals
1500’- 1200’ agl – Position the upwind leg of chosen field
1000’ agl – Be established in the upwind leg
800’- 600’ agl – Established on downwind leg

On Oct 18, 11:03*am, Bruno wrote:

Please review the IGC file, you will see that Bruno did overfly the
landing site a few minutes earlier and spent time thermalling over the
field at 1000 feet. It is also noted in the video that he had checked
the field.

As for your numbers for 1500 feet and lower, those numbers depend on
the pilot and skill level. A new pilot may use the numbers you
propose, more experienced pilots may adjust those numbers down to
their own comfort level and the type of terrain they are over.

Tim Taylor wrote:
As for your numbers for 1500 feet and lower, those numbers depend on
the pilot and skill level.

And the landscape below you. There are regions where I never fly outside
of the gliding range of a known outlanding field, and there are other
regions where I just go and fly ahead until the wheel rolls.

On Oct 18, 10:03*am, Bruno wrote:
Hey everyone. We had a fun weekend up in Utah with many gliders up in
the air enjoying the amazing fall colors and mountain scenery. *At the
end of Friday's flight I decided to extend the flight and go play out
in the weak wave lift in the valley northeast of the Logan airport. It
was fun until it stopped being fun...

For those of you who have not yet enjoyed an off-field landing, this
video shows the final 6 minutes before the landout and then landing in
the farmer's alfalfa field. It does a good job of showing the desire
to try to stretch and make it home but in the end making the correct
decision and landing safely short of the airport in a good field.
Please note the field was chosen and looked over well before the gear
came down.

Other than a few green leaves that needed to be washed away from the
bottom of the glider it was no worse for wear and I am thrilled to
have the video to share with others of what the experience of landing
in a field is like.

Please watch the video in the highest resolution your computer and
connection can handle. *It was shot in 1080HD and at that resolution
you should be able to read all the numbers on the instruments. *The
camera is a Canon HF20 with a fish eye lens which does a great job of
distorting my face... *It is mounted on 1" ball RAM mount
adjustable arms. *I have a custom voltage reducer to take a full 12
volt 7 amp/hr battery and lower it to 8.4 volts so I get 7+ hours of
battery life. The standard camera batteries only last a few hours max
so this is necessary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfNA5nhGQM&hd=1

Here is the igc file - it wasn't an impressive flight but you can see
the trace at the end where the video shows the final moments.http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0....html?flightId...

Thanks for watching and hope you enjoy.

Bruno Vassel IV - B4http://www.youtube.com/user/bviv

Bruno
What kind of camera were you using and how did you have it mounted and
was it wired into the electrical system? Nice work.

On Oct 18, 7:08*pm, mattm wrote:
On Oct 18, 2:03*pm, mattm wrote:





On Oct 18, 1:03*pm, Bruno wrote:

Hey everyone. We had a fun weekend up in Utah with many gliders up in
the air enjoying the amazing fall colors and mountain scenery. *At the
end of Friday's flight I decided to extend the flight and go play out
in the weak wave lift in the valley northeast of the Logan airport. It
was fun until it stopped being fun...

For those of you who have not yet enjoyed an off-field landing, this
video shows the final 6 minutes before the landout and then landing in
the farmer's alfalfa field. It does a good job of showing the desire
to try to stretch and make it home but in the end making the correct
decision and landing safely short of the airport in a good field.
Please note the field was chosen and looked over well before the gear
came down.

Other than a few green leaves that needed to be washed away from the
bottom of the glider it was no worse for wear and I am thrilled to
have the video to share with others of what the experience of landing
in a field is like.

Please watch the video in the highest resolution your computer and
connection can handle. *It was shot in 1080HD and at that resolution
you should be able to read all the numbers on the instruments. *The
camera is a Canon HF20 with a fish eye lens which does a great job of
distorting my face... *It is mounted on 1" ball RAM mount
adjustable arms. *I have a custom voltage reducer to take a full 12
volt 7 amp/hr battery and lower it to 8.4 volts so I get 7+ hours of
battery life. The standard camera batteries only last a few hours max
so this is necessary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfNA5nhGQM&hd=1

Here is the igc file - it wasn't an impressive flight but you can see
the trace at the end where the video shows the final moments.http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0....html?flightId...

Thanks for watching and hope you enjoy.

Bruno Vassel IV - B4http://www.youtube.com/user/bviv

Excellent video. *Wish I had this available last month when I was
giving a land out
talk. *There's a few things that you should learn from the experience,
though
(shouldn't there always be?), as suggested by the likes of Tim Welles
and
Kai Gertsen:

1. turn off the radio when you're low -- it's just a distraction.
Also,
as Doug Jacobs likes to say, if you can do anything else while
thermalling,
you're not thinking about thermalling hard enough. *You can turn it
back
on after you land and tell everyone you're all right.
2. pick the field while you still have room to change your mind, and
when
you can see it properly. *You picked a field ahead of yourself a ways,
and lucked
out that it was a good field (it was into the sun, too, so it had to
be hard to
see it well). *I tried that last year and landed in chest-high barley
(ouch).
3. pick the field at a more reasonable altitude. *300 feet (100m for
the rest
of the world) is more like the altitude you should be turning base to
final.
It's a little hard to see, but it seems you had good fields under you
at 800 feet,
and you had a good chance to look at them while you were scratching
(which is a good exception to DJ's rule).

There's a bunch of good presentations on off field landings (and lots
of
other great soaring stuff) at Doug Jacob's collection of stuff for
the
US Team camps:http://www.dragonnorth.com/djpresentations/index.html

-- Matt

Also, I don't want to sound negative in all this. *You did do stuff
right, too --
checklist, take the safe option to go into the field (rather than
stretching
too far), and local field knowledge. *As you said on the radio, you
were very
close to glide slope, but you broke off while you still had time to
maneuver.
There's too many NTSB reports of pilots just hoping for that last 80
feet to
materialize...

-- Matt- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

If the pilot hadn't rejected some weak lift (by US standards) and then
glid in a straight line rather than faffing around, he might have made
it back!

Derek C

Nice video, thanks for sharing.
There always seems to be somebody who still has lift (and reminds you)
just when you´re about to land out..(4:58)..