In wave, in blue hole at cloud level, hole closes, in IMC, then what?

torstai 16. huhtikuuta 2015 6.19.30 UTC+3 Bob Whelan kirjoitti:
Unintended flight into IMC is seriously bad news to Joe Unprepared Pilot's
near-term future health. In my book, the concept of "the benign glider spiral"
- which has received much print exposure, including from at least one highly
experienced, paid, triple diamond, test pilot (Einar Enevoldsen) - isn't
anything I'd be willing to bet MY life on. I think of it as an intellectually
and quite possibly "plaything-interesting," attribute which has some small
possibility of saving my bacon (by buying me some time) if I'm so bold or so
unfortunate as to unintentionally go IMC. Short of being able to test fly
every flavor of glider mentioned by others in this thread as having some
amount of "benign spiral ability" (ranging from "none" to "lots") to convince
oneself the posters are accurate in their shared information, all one can
reasonably do is infer from others experiences. I infer "the benign spiral" is
a pretty thin hook from which to hang my life.


Exactly. Way glider usually goes out of control in cloud is when bank angle increases and pilot fails to counter that with aileron or pulling to keep nose up. It takes only few seconds to end up in violent spiral, nose down and steep bank.

In addition, in actual imc there is turbulence, and inadverted imc means you are out of control to begin with. It is a whole different thing putting your glider to "uncontrolled bening spiral" in calm air and vmc than inside cloud, hanging up in harness with no visual reference. Just open airbrakes, wait and pray (you might change the sequence of last two items, but not the first).

Here's what the FAA says about the chances of a non-instrument rated
pilot in IMC:
http://www.aopa.org/AOPA-Live.aspx?w...AD4074403E0%7D

Regarding temperature, oxygen, etc., you have a better chance with a
bail out than riding to the ground.

I recall from my military training that the descent rate in a C-9, 28
foot round canopy was 19 feet/second. I'm pretty sure my 280 sq ft ram
air parachute has a much lower descent rate, but it has a much better
forward speed and controllability. I think basic situational awareness
(and I realize that a lot of people these days lack it) would have me
aware of cloud base and thickness during a wave flight so I wouldn't be
concerned about free falling through the clouds if that was required.

If you think about it, it's really pretty hard to get sucked up into a
cloud without first putting yourself into the situation. Not so for
having a cloud form around you, but even then you should know of the
possibility and plan accordingly.

On 4/15/2015 7:31 PM, son_of_flubber wrote:
On Wednesday, April 15, 2015 at 6:49:48 PM UTC-4, bumper wrote:
I cheated death one day in an Aeronca Champ, real low maybe 200 feet over the ocean scud running then suddenly into the soup . . .
I've been reading up on VMC -- IMC and 'horizon disappears' gets mentioned, for example over the ocean... and even before you enter the soup, you become disorientated.

I'm pretty sure that the horizon has disappeared on me in flight (other than the common case of landing in a valley below close-in hills/mountains.) How pernicious is the disappearing horizon? Is it a matter of you're okay, until you're not okay? What are the 'gotchas'?

And getting back to the original scenario... I'm turning in the blue hole and when I face the downwind cloud, there is nothing but cloud in my visual field. And how about when diving through the cloud deck, down through a blue hole. Am I'm falsely confident to think that I have had a firm grasp of where up and down are relative to my wings?



--
Dan Marotta

IMC conditions can sneak up on you even when you aren't near clouds. Where I fly in southeastern IL final glides tend to be to the West - often directly into the Sun, late in the afternoon. Combine that with a really hazy late summer day and maybe some dust on your canopy and you can end up gliding into the proverbial milk bowl - no horizon, just the Sun above and some terrain features directly below. Thermalling in this situation can be interesting - when you are facing away from the Sun the horizon reappears, then it gradually blends away as you turn through west. Without an attitude indicator, I found speed control while thermalling had to be maintained by observing the height of the Sun when the horizon was gone!

A bit creepy, especially since while it was technically VMC, it was practically IMC, and "see and avoid" pretty much a joke. Thank goodness for GPS and PCAS!

Bottom line - use what you have, but don't even THINK you can casually escape from inadvertent flight in IMC conditions without training and gyro instruments (or terminal velocity brakes).

Kirk
66

how about a ballistic chute for the plane?

Might even want the option to cut the chute away if you came out the bottom and still had enough altitude/clearance to recover from a "freefall" launch from 0 airspeed.

Kind of off topic but not really, can you still purchase a boli (spelling?) compass?

On Wednesday, April 15, 2015 at 7:32:00 PM UTC-6, son_of_flubber wrote:
On Wednesday, April 15, 2015 at 6:49:48 PM UTC-4, bumper wrote:
I cheated death one day in an Aeronca Champ, real low maybe 200 feet over the ocean scud running then suddenly into the soup . . .

I've been reading up on VMC -- IMC and 'horizon disappears' gets mentioned, for example over the ocean... and even before you enter the soup, you become disorientated.

I'm pretty sure that the horizon has disappeared on me in flight (other than the common case of landing in a valley below close-in hills/mountains.) How pernicious is the disappearing horizon? Is it a matter of you're okay, until you're not okay? What are the 'gotchas'?

And getting back to the original scenario... I'm turning in the blue hole and when I face the downwind cloud, there is nothing but cloud in my visual field. And how about when diving through the cloud deck, down through a blue hole. Am I'm falsely confident to think that I have had a firm grasp of where up and down are relative to my wings?

There are, in fact, piles of smashed aluminum resulting from "flatlanders" attempting to fly in Colorado mountains without a proper checkout.

A "lost horizon" when flying in a deep valley is often a problem for pilots who learned to fly with sole reference to the actual horizon as seen from over the Great Plains. Easterners who learned in haze and westerners who learned in mountains seem to do OK since they learned right from the beginning of their training to use airspeed to control pitch attitude. Every pilot has a "comfort zone".

I've seen pilots who keep pulling the nose higher and higher so it pointed at the line between the rocks and sky even though those rocks were on top of a 14,000' mountain. When I took the controls to save us and levelled the airplane, they said it looked to them as if we were diving since the windshield was completely filled with mountain. It ain't Kansas anymore, Dorothy.

Total loss of all visual references is significantly different from a partial loss. Even small peripheral cues are enough to get a sense of the aircraft's attitude but beware of erroneous, misleading cues such as cloud tops. More than one wave pilot has stalled when gliding toward a lennie as they unconsciously kept the nose aimed at the cloud top as the glider descended.. Tilted cloud layers or tilted terrain also provide false cues to the unwary pilot.

A sudden transition to "blind flying" can also be disorientating. I recall sucking in my breath the first time I took off from a remote airport on a dark, overcast night. When the bright airport lights were replaced by total darkness as I passed over the departure end is seemed as if I have flown into a black hole. Although it was technically VMC, the airplane could only be flown by instruments. I've learned to take a deep breath, wiggle my toes and "settle down" on instruments before punching into cloud.

It's sometimes said that pilots who can't fly solely with reference to instruments have not completed their training. Considering the weirdness out there, that's probably true.

I recall sucking in my breath the first time I took off from a remote airport on a dark, overcast night. When the bright airport lights were replaced by total darkness as I passed over the departure end is seemed as if I have flown into a black hole. Although it was technically VMC, the airplane could only be flown by instruments. I've learned to take a deep breath, wiggle my toes and "settle down" on instruments before punching into cloud.

It's sometimes said that pilots who can't fly solely with reference to instruments have not completed their training. Considering the weirdness out there, that's probably true.

When renewing my single-engine licence in Arizona, I discovered the joys of what is euphemistically called "Night VFR" when overflying Sky Harbor and then disappearing into the dark desert towards Gila Bend. No moon, no lights on the ground - this was full instrument flying! Only in the USA!

Mike

On Friday, April 17, 2015 at 12:42:08 PM UTC+12, Mike the Strike wrote:
I recall sucking in my breath the first time I took off from a remote airport on a dark, overcast night. When the bright airport lights were replaced by total darkness as I passed over the departure end is seemed as if I have flown into a black hole. Although it was technically VMC, the airplane could only be flown by instruments. I've learned to take a deep breath, wiggle my toes and "settle down" on instruments before punching into cloud.

It's sometimes said that pilots who can't fly solely with reference to instruments have not completed their training. Considering the weirdness out there, that's probably true.

When renewing my single-engine licence in Arizona, I discovered the joys of what is euphemistically called "Night VFR" when overflying Sky Harbor and then disappearing into the dark desert towards Gila Bend. No moon, no lights on the ground - this was full instrument flying! Only in the USA!

Or Australia. Or parts of New Zealand. Probably parts of South America or Africa too, though they are more heavily populated.

I have overflown Wellington airport at 3000 ft heading south at about 4 AM on a moonless and stormy winter night. Nothing except ocean between us and Antarctica or South America (depending on which way you're facing). Ten miles out we started a 180 degree left turn to intercept the ILS for runway 34.. I was hand flying it. The actual pilot suggested I check the missed approach procedure and handed me the book. After a few seconds in which we both studied the page I looked up at the instruments and noticed that the line separating brown and blue was nearly vertical, and the airspeed was increasing rapidly. I started the (correct!) recovery about half a second before the other guy started to go for the controls. I think he was more worried by my sudden control input than by any sensation that anything was wrong. As the aircraft was trimmed I don't think the G loading changed significantly before I started the recovery. We lost 1000 ft very quickly.

I recall sucking in my breath the first time I took off from a remote
airport on a dark, overcast night. When the bright airport lights were
replaced by total darkness as I passed over the departure end is seemed
as if I have flown into a black hole. Although it was technically VMC,
the airplane could only be flown by instruments. I've learned to take a
deep breath, wiggle my toes and "settle down" on instruments before
punching into cloud.

It's sometimes said that pilots who can't fly solely with reference to
instruments have not completed their training. Considering the
weirdness out there, that's probably true.

When renewing my single-engine licence in Arizona, I discovered the joys
of what is euphemistically called "Night VFR" when overflying Sky Harbor
and then disappearing into the dark desert towards Gila Bend. No moon,
no lights on the ground - this was full instrument flying! Only in the
USA!

Or Australia. Or parts of New Zealand. Probably parts of South America or
Africa too, though they are more heavily populated.

Strictly speaking, we're drifting away from "a soaring connection" in the
above replies (and this one, too) but as the Easter Reno AS W-27 breakup
dramatically showed, unintentional flight into IMC can and does occur in our
"strictly VMC world" too. I hope that any readers who may have come to this
thread originally imagining "their skills are somehow special" when it comes
to maintaining control in IMC conditions have begun to grasp reality...which
is continuing controlled flight in IMC conditions is 100% dependent on having
- and being able to effectively use - instrumentation providing an accurate
reference horizon...clouds or not.

In the U.S., this reality began to become apparent - so far as I'm aware -
with a few fortunate airmail pilots in the early 1920s, soon followed by
similarly fortunate military airmen. Jimmy Doolittle is credited with the
first successful 100% blind takeoff, flight, and circuit to a landing without
any outside-the-cockpit visual references (9/24/29). By the mid-30's even "the
average Joe Military pilot" was becoming convinced that no amount of macho
could save their necks in IMC...and it was becoming ever more apparent that
the nighttime "black hole effect" mentioned above by other posters was real.

Kids, IMC is serious stuff...with or without the proper instrumentation and
training.

Bob W.

On Friday, April 17, 2015 at 10:49:38 AM UTC-4, Bob Whelan wrote:

IMC is serious stuff...with or without the proper instrumentation and
training.

IMC is just part of the picture.

1.I'm starting to think that IMC training, currency, and installed instrumentation is a necessary, but not sufficient condition for me to fly in wave (especially wet wave).

But there're other factors:

2.Ability to recover from upset induced by turbulence and/or IMC disorientation. (aka Upset Recovery Training)

3.A glider that is less likely to shed it's wings with the spoilers open and a negative load factor.

4.Readiness to bail out and acceptance of the increased probability of a bail-out in cold, high altitude and turbulent air. Training and confidence in parachuting ability.

5.Ability and instrumentation to descend through IMC without colliding with terrain.

6.Preparedness and willingness to land out well downwind of the departure airport and possibly land in the trees.

All of these factors are relevant in non-wave soaring as well, but the probabilities are less favorable in wave.