PowerFLARM leeching comments

Ok. Just to play Devil’s advocate and stir the pot a bit, if it is SAFETY you are really looking for, then perhaps the SSA and Rules Committee should MANDATE that every pilot have a 3 flight checkout demonstrating proficiency in takeoffs and landings (logged and signed) every 90-120 days with a qualified instructor. Not proficient? Then no sign off and no flying until you do it right. Since only 4% of the soaring accidents occur in air to air collisions and over 65% occur in the pattern, then the OBVIOUS course of action is to spend the $1800+ that PowerFlarm costs on instruction/validation of pilot skills and NOT on hardware/software for anti-collision products. Spread over say 7 years, that equals about $260 per year for instruction in the environment that is killing most of the glider pilots today (and yesterday as well). The results would be staggering in reducing glider deaths and injuries. Once that statistic is reduced, then worry about collision avoidance hardware/software.

Since the latest and greatest technology is assumed by many glider pilots to be the future in gliding and the most prudent course of action for safety, I guess that better airmanship is a stupid and worthless idea in reducing glider accidents. However, I can’t count the number of times I’ve observed world class (not average) pilots make takeoffs and landings that would flunk them in a private pilot check ride.

In business and life, any prudent person would begin with the big picture first. If you are really interested in safety, put your efforts into reducing the number of takeoff and landing accidents.

Craig R.

In business and life, any prudent person would begin with the big picture first. If you are really interested in safety, put your efforts into reducing the number of takeoff and landing accidents.



Craig R.

Actually,I've put together the numbers. Takeoff and landing accidents in US contests are essentially zero. Clem Bowman was the unfortunate exception that proves the rule. Otherwise, zero -- zero -- PTT accidents. Read Tom Knauff in the latest soaring for how that compares with soaring in general.

Landings, back at the airport, following a finish with reasonable energy, have also produced no accidents that I can find from searching NTSB or contest reports. (A few gear up landing sorts of things, but that's it.)

There have been quite a few accidents resulting from approaching the airport with insufficient energy, "low passes" that start at 60 knots and 50 feet, or crashes in fields very close to the home airport.

In contests, the really big accident categories are running in to mountains, and running in to things during off field landings. The latter often started way too low, with far too much thermaling attempt at very low altitude. Midair collisions follow all of these categories, and a long way back.

That's the big picture. If you want safer contests, the main areas to work on are low altitude thermaling, off field landings, running in to mountains, marginal final glides blown just before or just after reaching the home airport, and mid-air collisions.

I'm surprised you think top pilots are lacking in stick and rudder skills that a checkride would notice. Every contest pilot I know is fully aware of these dangers, and would easily pass a checkride. All the pilots I have known who crashed would have passed even more easily. It has happened that a pilot gave the safety talk warning of danger X, and then went and crashed in that exact scenario at the end of the day.

If you want to make contests safer, I think you have to look at dangers other than takeoff and landing accidents -- common in regular soaring, I admit -- and more stringent checkrides.

John Cochrane

So this is how we justify banning FLARM radar mode. We need to focus on takeoff and landing accidents? Two totally UNRELATED different problems.

This conversation has plunged into infantile. Its are to respect this kind of leadership. Sorry.

Ugg.

John, I concur with your comments. My words were for all using PowerFlarm. In our club, few are contest pilots, yet there are many PowerFlarm units installed and in use (tugs too). I don't expect the additional checkrides (unrealistic/very unpopular), but shifting the safety emphasis to takeoff and landing accidents in gliding is very real and needed. We need to bring those numbers down. The big picture is ALL glider pilots and not just comp pilots. An interesting thought, what percentage of accidents occur from pilots that have flown in competition, but not during a competition?

Craig R.

Regarding stick and rudder skills of the top people, anyone, including them, have bad takeoffs and landings. Percentage wise, they will be less than the average pilot, but they are NOT exempt from screwing it up. Again, I have seen top pilots do ugly things in the pattern that would have got them bounced from a checkride. Nobody is perfect. We all make mistakes. It just takes one time to become a statistic.

Craig R

On Monday, October 29, 2012 6:36:26 PM UTC-7, Craig R. wrote:
Regarding stick and rudder skills of the top people, anyone, including them, have bad takeoffs and landings. Percentage wise, they will be less than the average pilot, but they are NOT exempt from screwing it up. Again, I have seen top pilots do ugly things in the pattern that would have got them bounced from a checkride. Nobody is perfect. We all make mistakes. It just takes one time to become a statistic.



Craig R

The difference between midairs and all other cause of accidents is that it is the only type which you can do almost nothing to prevent it, except using flarm. See and avoid fails to prevent midairs. Yet this is the only type of accident which can be avoided by using relatively low cost and easy to install technology.

Ramy

On Monday, October 29, 2012 7:22:20 PM UTC-7, Ramy wrote:

The difference between midairs and all other cause of accidents is that it is the only type which you can do almost nothing to prevent it, except using flarm. See and avoid fails to prevent midairs. Yet this is the only type of accident which can be avoided by using relatively low cost and easy to install technology.

Ramy


Exactly. I'm a bit surprised to see the continuing nit-picking about this.

9B

At 02:22 30 October 2012, Ramy wrote:

The difference between midairs and all other cause of accidents is that
it
=
is the only type which you can do almost nothing to prevent it, except
usin=
g flarm. See and avoid fails to prevent midairs. Yet this is the only
type
=
of accident which can be avoided by using relatively low cost and easy to
i=
nstall technology.=20

Ramy

I sincerely hope that no-one believes the above statement because it is
misguided.
The only way of preventing mid air collisions is for pilots to maintain a
good lookout and situational awareness AT ALL TIMES.
By far the most common scenario for a mid air in a glider is in a thermal,
followed by flying in wave. FLARM was designed to address the second cause,
flying in wave, and it does assist a pilot in that it alerts him where to
look for a threat that he has not seen, in theory. It is reasonably
efficient at this task. FLARM is not particulary good at assisting a piot
in a thermal and the effectiveness reduces as the number of gliders in a
thermal increases. Were are we likely to find large numbers of gliders in
the same thermal? in competitions.
If you are sharing a thermal with other gliders outside competition flying,
being the person able to climb faster is a matter of personal pride, not a
high priority you might think. In the competition scenario being able to
outclimb your opponents is a very high priority, you are there to win after
all. Of course a good lookout and situational awareness are essential when
sharing a thermal with others but is this priority degraded by the need to
get the best out of the thermal so climbing better. No pilot deliberately
degrades his lookout and situational awareness to address other priorities
but the need to out perform is always in the mind, that is the paradox of
competition flying. Does FLARM help in a busy thermal? The good people at
FLARM and many pilots will tell you the answer to that is NO, it was not
designed for that situation and given the heading/track problem it can be a
hinderance rather than a help.
The only way to prevent a mid air in a glider is to maintain a good lookout
and situational awareness and anyone who says otherwise is a asking for
trouble. Training people and emphasising that need is what is needed not a
technology solution that gives pilots the idea that their lookout can be
delegated to a machine that has serious limitations.

Don,

I fully agree that maintaining a good lookout at all times
is a good basis for see-and-avoid.

However, we believe that even the best pilot may occasionally fail to detect traffic.
There are a number of human factors which affect perception
(distraction, selective attention, target merging into background, target not
moving wrt. background, etc).

We have a presentation where on one slide we listed the situations where FLARM
has potentially better and/or earlier chances to detect traffic than the human eye.

These situations a
- Head-on and converging course (both gliders in cruise), especially in the
presence of clouds, snow fields etc.
- One glider circling, another one approaching the same thermal.
- Two gliders circling in opposite directions (yes, we know this shouldn't happen...)

As you say, the fewer gliders in a thermal, the more helpful FLARM can be.

FLARM does help in wave, but the indicated relative bearing to the threat may be strongly biased by wind.

Needless to say, whenever a FLARM warning occurs, the pilot should immediately
try to make visual contact with the threat.

In the Classic FLARM manual, we write:

"Under no circumstances should a pilot or crewmember adopt different tactics or deviate from the normal principles of safe airmanship."

I think that summarizes it quite nicely.

Best
--Gerhard

Gerhard,
fully agree with you, but would like to add one situation where
FLARM is useful. When there is someone on your under or
above, in position where you cannot see the other plane, flying
into the same direction. Can be cloudstreet, competition or just
a friend of your's you fly with.
The LED based FLARM displays used in Europa can only show
one target. If there are several planes around you, this display
does not give you very good situation awareness. That caused
here a midair of two FLARM equipped gliders year ago.
The powerflarm has graphical display, that shows several
targets around you. It also has two receivers and antennas, so
the situation of the midair I mentioned should not occur again.
There was no FLARM warning - looks like the carbon fuselages
dampen the radio signal, and the gliders approached each
others from the dipole antenna's blind spots.
-kimmo

(English language summary on page VII)
http://www.turvallisuustutkinta.fi/Satellite?
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ver&SSURIcontainer=Default&SSURIsession=false&blob key=id&
blobheadervalue1=inline;%20filename=Tutkintaselost us%20B1_
2011L.pdf&SSURIsscontext=Satellite%20Server&blobwh ere=134
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Disposition&ssbinary=true&blobheader=application/pdf

At 15:06 30 October 2012, wrote:
Don,

I fully agree that maintaining a good lookout at all times
is a good basis for see-and-avoid.

However, we believe that even the best pilot may occasionally
fail to
detect traffic.
There are a number of human factors which affect perception
(distraction, selective attention, target merging into
background, target
not
moving wrt. background, etc).

We have a presentation where on one slide we listed the
situations where
FLARM
has potentially better and/or earlier chances to detect traffic
than the
human eye.

These situations a
- Head-on and converging course (both gliders in cruise),
especially in the
presence of clouds, snow fields etc.
- One glider circling, another one approaching the same
thermal.
- Two gliders circling in opposite directions (yes, we know this
shouldn't
happen...)

As you say, the fewer gliders in a thermal, the more helpful
FLARM can be.

FLARM does help in wave, but the indicated relative bearing to
the threat
may be strongly biased by wind.

Needless to say, whenever a FLARM warning occurs, the pilot
should
immediately
try to make visual contact with the threat.

In the Classic FLARM manual, we write:

"Under no circumstances should a pilot or crewmember adopt
different
tactics or deviate from the normal principles of safe
airmanship."

I think that summarizes it quite nicely.

Best
--Gerhard