"Outlandings" discussion

On Jan 28, 2:38*pm, Mike the Strike wrote:
I'm with Andy & Kirk - if I don't make it back to my home field and my
beer cooler it's an outlanding. *I have also landed in easy fields and
at difficult narrow strips and don't believe you should categorize one
as necessarily easier than the other.

Maybe it's no coincidence that the three of us have all flown a lot in
Arizona and the southwest USA where we have some really tricky strips.

Mike

Yep, I agree, if you're buying the beer etc. it's an "Official
Landout" and I agree the SW strips can be sporty

2007 was a banner year for me with 7 landouts, a personal best, I even
had three in a row, a "hat trick" so I'm told.

2 - At a private sectional noted dirt AP, long strip but cut into the
side of a sizable hill with some pine trees & cross winds to be aware
of. W/ one aero retrieve and one call your buddies / beer retrieve.
About 17 miles from my home AP.
2 - At a sloping farmers field about 12 miles from my Home AP, beer
etc. retrieve.
1 - At a new but previously unknown until I was 1500 over it grass/
dirt strip, but entertaining with a tree on one side in the middle,
irrigation piping along the other side, yes to miss the tree I had to
put my wing over the irrigation pipe and just to keep it interesting
an active tractor blocking one end. The very friendly owner flew me
back to my AP in his plane so I could PU my Truck and self retrieve.
Beers all around! 25 miles from my home AP.
1 - At a sloping grass field sandwiched between a T-storm out flow
and class B, with surface wind 25kts & gusting, 25 miles from my home
AP, no damage to my ship but a very tough day for many.
1 - On a dirt road, that once was also used as a private strip and
noted on the local TP list as such, but it had a few steel posts to
avoid, so good thing I always go for the short roll. This was after
passing on another private strip noted on the TP list as a private
strip possibility but found to have hazards in the middle of the
strip. About 50 miles from my home AP.

All of the above landing locations in my opinion contained the
standard risks of an off airport landing, so I'll count them all as
adding seven more to my next contest entry questionair. No damage to
my ship in any of the above noted landouts but the potential is always
in you rmind. If you're lucky enough to be setting it down on a Big ol
Asphalt 100' wide with a 5,000' runway then it's not a true off
airport landing, but if it's not your home AP then your still buying
the beer etc. so...

21
Colorado

On Jan 27, 7:07*am, "
wrote:
So, what do you call an outlanding?

I log a "landout' any time I fail to land back at my point of takeoff,
or at my goal on rare straight out flights. I log off airport
landings separately as a subset of landouts. In my book every off
airport landing is a landout but the converse is not true.

I also keep track of landouts more than 50NM from point of departure.
FAA seems to attach more value to those than completed flights and
they saved me a bunch of money for my airplane commercial.

More than once I have arrived at an airport and elected to land in an
adjacent field because I thought it was safer.

Andy

On Jan 27, 8:07*am, "
wrote:
So, what do you call an outlanding? \

To me an outlanding is a landing where no one has landed an aircraft
before. If it's an airport than it's not an off airport landing
(which is what "outlanding" means to me). Landing at another airport
is no big deal unless it's some rarely used dirt strip with no known
characteristics or facilities and no sane pilot has landed there in
years and years. We don't have many of those in my usual terratory,
the midwest. Off airport landing causes the original Star Trek theme
to start playing in my head on final approach, "to boldly go where no
one has gone before". Once down it's up to me to make tie downs,
determine location and access, and deal with onlookers and crew. It's
an entirely different experience than landing at an airport. In
training I consider landing away at another airport just about useless
in preparing a student for "off airport" landing. Knowing it's an
airport eliminates a lot of doubt and stress. Once a student lands at
an unprepared field selected "on the fly" they know they are truly
ready to take on the challenge of cross country soaring.

MM

On Jan 27, 9:07 am, "
wrote:
So, what do you call an outlanding? If you land at an established
airport/airfield is this an "Outlanding"? Or is it an uncompleted
flight into an airport. I have read a lot of club SOP's that recommend
a "planned" outlanding into an airport as training for a real
outlanding! Not the same thing. Is this a recipe for trouble? Now I
know some of you fly where the only safe outlanding opertunities are
established airfields, i.e. the western portion of the US, but for the
rest of us these can be the choice of last resort. I I live and fly in
Sourthern Germany where outlanding fields are numerous and in the
Northern Alps the outlanding fields are identified and catalouged
(http://www.streckenflug.at/index.php?p=w_inhalt).

Bob
Waiting on the wave!

On a somewhat related note: the SSA contest application form
asks how many outlandings the pilot has done. Is this asking
for actual "non-airport" fields landed in, or airports other than
the intended destination?

I have to add that I know of several landouts by friends last year.
The only two that resulted in damaged gliders were both at
airports marked on the charts (one was being redeveloped for
housing, and the other had not been mowed all summer).

mattm wrote:

I have to add that I know of several landouts by friends last year.
The only two that resulted in damaged gliders were both at
airports marked on the charts (one was being redeveloped for
housing, and the other had not been mowed all summer).

Personally, a "landout" is a field landing, airports are maintained
runways usually intended for public use (though you can have private
airports), airstrip usually means a private grass or dirt strip that may
or may not be well maintained (but you can have public airstrips, like
state emergency fields). Based on my definitions, your friends did not
land at "airports" (the "port" part suggests to me that planes come and
go with some regularity and dependability), but might have qualified for
"landout" status from your description of the fields.

If you land at a towered airport with a 7000 foot long, 100 foot wide
runway, it is definitely NOT a landout! Call it a "landaway", say you
"didn't make it back", but save "landout" for when you have to be picked
out of a farmers field!

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA
* Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly

* Updated! "Transponders in Sailplanes" http://tinyurl.com/y739x4
* New Jan '08 - sections on Mode S, TPAS, ADS-B, Flarm, more

* "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation" at www.motorglider.org

Personally, a "landout" is a field landing, airports are maintained
runways usually intended for public use (though you can have private
airports), airstrip usually means a private grass or dirt strip that may
or may not be well maintained (but you can have public airstrips, like
state emergency fields). Based on my definitions, your friends did not
land at "airports" (the "port" part suggests to me that planes come and
go with some regularity and dependability), but might have qualified for
"landout" status from your description of the fields.

If you land at a towered airport with a 7000 foot long, 100 foot wide
runway, it is definitely NOT a landout! Call it a "landaway", say you
"didn't make it back", but save "landout" for when you have to be picked
out of a farmers field!

Oh yeah? I bet if you landed at ATL (or Edwards AFB) in a glider, it
would be just as exciting as any "field landing"!

To me, any landing that isn't where you wanted to land before takeoff
is a landout. It could (and usually is, in modern glass) be at an
airfield, or it could be an off field landing in a meadow. The
criteria is that I was forced to land by the weather (or other
external factors), not at my predetermined destination.

In southern Illinois where I've been flying lately, there are nice
paved or grass, public or private airfields/airstrips everywhere - it
just doesn't make sense to risk damage by not using them if at all
possible. And a marginal final glide into a private airstrip 5 miles
short of home is a landout!

In Arizona, where I've done a bit of XC, you are foolish to not
landout on an airfield or ranch strip - there often isn't any
alternative. An off field landing in the desert is often accompanied
by one very broken glider...

Seems childish to insist that you have to pass up smarter options in
order to claim a landout! And let's face it, it's an ego thing - "if
you aren't landing out, you aren't trying", etc...

Kirk
66

What's the "usual" cost to the pilot for a retrieval from an land out?

I know it depends on lots of things.

But let's say he lands at an airfield and opts for the trailer rather
than the towplane. Does the pilot owe full dinner? Light hors
d'oeuvres? One beer? A six pack? A promise to wax the retrieval
person's wings? If only one person is needed, but more come, does the
pilot have to "pay" the entire posse?

Now, if the pilot lands out in a pasture out in the boonies and the
gate is locked and nobody has a "master key" (aka bolt cutters) and
several people have to lift the parts over the fence, does the pilot
pay the whole retrieval crew? What "fee?"

Curious (and bored)

Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA

On Feb 22, 1:03 am, rlovinggood wrote:
What's the "usual" cost to the pilot for a retrieval from an land out?

I know it depends on lots of things.

But let's say he lands at an airfield and opts for the trailer rather
than the towplane. Does the pilot owe full dinner? Light hors
d'oeuvres? One beer? A six pack? A promise to wax the retrieval
person's wings? If only one person is needed, but more come, does the
pilot have to "pay" the entire posse?

Now, if the pilot lands out in a pasture out in the boonies and the
gate is locked and nobody has a "master key" (aka bolt cutters) and
several people have to lift the parts over the fence, does the pilot
pay the whole retrieval crew? What "fee?"

Curious (and bored)

Surely that's simple: you "pay" whatever is necessary to ensure they
will come and retrieve you next time.

On Jan 27, 7:07*am, "
wrote:
So, what do you call an outlanding?

Great discussion on this topic. Last year at Region 9 Parowan, the
attending ground crews (SCUM) spontaneously coined a new objective for
their racers on or about the third day of the contest. The goal was to
"land in". That says it all to me. Everything else is a landout.

Horst
L33

On Jan 28, 10:32 pm, wrote:
On Jan 27, 7:07 am, "
wrote:

So, what do you call an outlanding?

Great discussion on this topic. Last year at Region 9 Parowan, the
attending ground crews (SCUM) spontaneously coined a new objective for
their racers on or about the third day of the contest. The goal was to
"land in". That says it all to me. Everything else is a landout.

Horst
L33

How about this one: day 2 at Perry last year. 2 turnpoints in
opposite directions
from the home field. I never could find lift beyond Perry on the way
to turnpoint 2
and wound up landing in front of my trailer. Only distance points as
a result.