Landout at Class C or D tower-controlled airport?

Gliders without adsb must conduct operations

(1) Outside any Class B or Class C airspace area;

(2) Below the altitude of the ceiling of a Class B or Class C airspace area designated for an airport, or 10,000 feet MSL, whichever is lower.

You can request ATC permission to deviate from these requirements; " For operation of an aircraft that is not equipped with ADS-B Out, the request must be made at least 1 hour before the proposed operation" (91.225g2).

I doubt that this one hour requirement would be strictly enforced in a land out situation!

On Tuesday, June 2, 2020 at 5:48:20 AM UTC-7, Kristin Nowell wrote:
Gliders without adsb must conduct operations

(1) Outside any Class B or Class C airspace area;

(2) Below the altitude of the ceiling of a Class B or Class C airspace area designated for an airport, or 10,000 feet MSL, whichever is lower.

You can request ATC permission to deviate from these requirements; " For operation of an aircraft that is not equipped with ADS-B Out, the request must be made at least 1 hour before the proposed operation" (91.225g2).

I doubt that this one hour requirement would be strictly enforced in a land out situation!

You can get any of these restrictions waived by declaring an emergency, but you will likely have to explain to an FAA examiner how you got yourself into the emergency in the first place. The examiner probably will not have dealt with gliders before, so you will have to explain all of the basics, including what thermals are and how unpredictable they are.

Tom

Well done!

I had similar back in the 70s in my Air Force days.Â* I was flying a
contact check ride in a T-33a and my final maneuver was to be a short
field landing.Â* As I approached the base, the tower cleared an RC-135
for take off and he taxied out forgetting to release his parking brake
and resulting in several blown tires.Â* He shut down on the runway to
await maintenance and tower asked, "Muff 91, what are your intentions?"Â*
I replied, "Muff 91 will land opposite direction", to which I received a
"Stand by" from the tower.

As I watched, the entire crew of the 135 bailed out and ran for the
sidelines, after which I was cleared to land.Â* I landed on the numbers,
opposite direction, on the 13,500' runway and took the first taxiway to
clear.Â* Just one more "war story"...

On 6/1/2020 5:52 PM, wrote:
On Monday, June 1, 2020 at 9:40:38 AM UTC-4, Rob wrote:
On Saturday, May 30, 2020 at 12:47:41 PM UTC-7, Charles Ethridge wrote:
Hi all.

I've done thousands of landings in all kinds of airplanes at tower-controlled airports (now called Class B, C and D), but I've never seen a glider land at one.

Does ATC frown upon this (unless one declares an emergency in which case you have a new problem) or to they take this in stride and accommodate us gliders as an unusual but accepted part of their workday?

Faced with the choice of this or a field, what would insurance say if I broke the glider landing in the field? Might insurance deny my claim since there was a perfectly good tower-controlled airport within gliding distance?

If this is an accepted practice at tower-controlled fields, how do you get the glider off the taxiway? Do they have an FBO come out and tow you off?

Ben
I just had this happen.

Me: "Tower, Glider Nxxxx"
Twr:"Glider Nxxxx, go ahead"
Me: "Glider Nxxxx, 7 miles SW of the field at x,xxx feet looking for lift. If I can't find any, I plan on landing there."
Twr: they'll give you the weather say runway requested.
Me: "Hopefully none, but will keep you posted and monitor tower frequency."
Twr: "Roger. Keep us posted."

About 10 minutes later...

Me: "Tower, glider Nxxxx is climbing out of x,xxx in good lift. Will be departing the area to wherever. Thanks for your help."
Twr: "Glider Nxxxxx, frequency change approved, have a nice flight."

It's as simple as that.

As for landing out, I landed out at an uncontrolled airport. I stopped right by a taxiway, got out of my glider and pushed it past the hold short line, turned it around and called for the aero retrieve. Again, nonevent. Takes a little coordination if there's traffic to get you onto the runway, hook up and go, but it's really a non-event.
I had this happen a couple of years ago: I was getting low, so headed to the small, uncontrolled, single-runway airport that we often land at when we can't make it back to our gliderport from the mountains. Saw that another glider has landed there already and was parked near the South end of the runway. There isn't a lot of room there to the side of the runway, so it was jutting into the runway a bit.

Then on the airport frequency I heard a powered plane, a Grumman Cheetah IIRC, announce they're in the pattern to land to the North. So I tell them on the radio to watch out for the glider parked on the South end of the runway.

Now the (light) wind was from the South, and it's a bit downhill to the North, and Cheetahs are fast but don't slow down well. So they approach too hot and go around. Meanwhile I am scratching at about 1200 AGL watching the show. They make a big pattern and several minutes later return for another try. Same result. And I am slowly getting lower.

On the third try they manage to stop at the North end of the runway, after a long ground roll. By then I'm at 800 AGL. So I say on the radio: Grumman xxxx, glider yyyyy will be landing to the South over your head, please stay where you are. So they do, and I do, landing long and joining the other glider pilot at the South end, waiting for aero-retrieve.

Another day at the airport...

--
Dan, 5J

On Saturday, May 30, 2020 at 3:47:41 PM UTC-4, Charles Ethridge wrote:
Hi all.

I've done thousands of landings in all kinds of airplanes at tower-controlled airports (now called Class B, C and D), but I've never seen a glider land at one.

Does ATC frown upon this (unless one declares an emergency in which case you have a new problem) or to they take this in stride and accommodate us gliders as an unusual but accepted part of their workday?

Faced with the choice of this or a field, what would insurance say if I broke the glider landing in the field? Might insurance deny my claim since there was a perfectly good tower-controlled airport within gliding distance?

If this is an accepted practice at tower-controlled fields, how do you get the glider off the taxiway? Do they have an FBO come out and tow you off?

Ben

Hi,

I operate a self launch ship out of a Class D airport (Worcester, MA) which has class C and B airspace nearby. I totally agree with ROY's comments regarding operating in or around controlled airspace. Using proper phraseology, knowing what you need and having a plan before contacting ATC will make a huge difference when you need ATC's help or a possible landout at a C or D airport. Making the first radio call low, straight in to the primary runway with possible conflicting high speed traffic will make the pilot (and every glider pilot to follow) very unpopular. If possible, do some homework on the class C and D airports you might land out at or pass through near your home airport, knowing the airport layout could save lots of confusion at a critical time for you and ATC. Call ATC EARLY, let them know where you are and that you might need to land, expect a discreet transponder code. If possible use the secondary runway. At my airport nearly all traffic uses runway 29, I almost always land on runway 33 and make sure I roll through the intersection to the taxiway so I don't disrupt the normal traffic. Do not ask to land on the grass or a taxiway, ATC considers this a very abnormal or emergency operation. If you can't roll out to a taxiway consider getting out of the cockpit and moving your ship well back from the runway, the runway will be considered 'open' if you can get back beyond the 'safety area' (equivilent of the hold short lines). Expect airport authority or police to show up PROMPTLY, the FBO can usually get escorted to help. Many glider pilots have limited experience communicating with ATC and feel uncomfortable with it, the answer.. do it. Consider getting flight following for a while on your next flight it will sharpen your ATC comm skills and improve the soaring community's relationship with your local ATC. You might have to explain stopping to thermal, but they seem to appreciate gaining the knowledge. Overall I enjoy operating out of a Class D airport and always call about 20 minutes out to get an idea of traffic, ATC knows that once I'm in the pattern I'm committed to land and won't deploy the engine. I have yet to have a conflict in my 4th season and many flights although I have scurried in to land or found another thermal to delay my landing to accommodate other traffic.

Everyone seems to know that most accidents happen during the landing phase. However, did you know that nearly 50% of glider landing fatalities happen during off-airport landings? That's really incredible when you consider how rarely we land off-airport.

Since off-airport landings are high-risk, I'll always land at a suitable airport if I have the choice. The tower will almost certainly be accomodating. If not, I'd rather declare an emergency, than make a completely avoidable landout.

By the way, someone mentioned keeping a tow rope in the glider. I think that's a great idea! I was just admiring how compact a length of 2mm Spectra is. I think I'm going to add some to my landout kit.

David:
What is the source or reference for this statement?

"did you know that nearly 50% of glider landing fatalities happen during off-airport landings"

I've studied glider accidents for years and have not seen that - unless you are calling low level thermalling stall/spin ins, ridge terrain strikes, and similar accidents as "off airport landings"

Admittedly, a properly executed pattern,approach and landing into a soft field can cause glider damage - but a fatality? Those (in the hundreds of cases I have studied) are quite rare. What I have seen is that the real killer in our sport is low level thermalling - especially in wind/gusty conditions. But that's not a "landing accident".
ROY

But that's not a "landing accident".

Anymore than dying from cancer is a COVID death if you tested positive.

On Monday, June 1, 2020 at 11:47:33 AM UTC-4, son_of_flubber wrote:
On Monday, June 1, 2020 at 9:50:46 AM UTC-4, wrote:
If you land in the auto parking lot it will surely be reported as an aircraft accident with all that that implies, crash crew, security, etc.

Part of the plan would be to get a landing clearance from ATC for the long term parking lot.

They would never clear you to land there. It is not their airspace.
Dumbest idea I have seen here in a while.
UH

wrote on 6/3/2020 5:31 AM:
But that's not a "landing accident".

Anymore than dying from cancer is a COVID death if you tested positive.

Not Washington State.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to email me)
- "A Guide to Self-Launching Sailplane Operation"
https://sites.google.com/site/motorg...ad-the-guide-1

On Wednesday, June 3, 2020 at 5:10:30 AM UTC-7, Roy B. wrote:
David:
What is the source or reference for this statement?

"did you know that nearly 50% of glider landing fatalities happen during off-airport landings"

I've studied glider accidents for years and have not seen that - unless you are calling low level thermalling stall/spin ins, ridge terrain strikes, and similar accidents as "off airport landings"

Admittedly, a properly executed pattern,approach and landing into a soft field can cause glider damage - but a fatality? Those (in the hundreds of cases I have studied) are quite rare. What I have seen is that the real killer in our sport is low level thermalling - especially in wind/gusty conditions. But that's not a "landing accident".
ROY

My observation came from Soaring Safety Foundation Safety Reports. In most years, we have slightly more on-airport landing accidents than off-airport. In more recent times, there have been a few years where off-airport landing accidents actually exceeded on-airport accidents. For example in 2017/2018, the SSF reported that "more landing accidents occurred during off airport landings (62%) than landings at the home field (38%). https://www.soaringsafety.org/accide...ual_report.pdf

SSF statistics aside, I think it's pretty intuitive that landing at an airport is safer. Therefore, I'd always choose a suitable runway (wide enough!) over an off-airport landing.

I think that many glider pilots are unfamiliar and uncomfortable with towered airports. Please know that public airports are there for all pilots, even glider pilots, to use. You won't discover a ditch or fence on short final.... you won't damage any crops... you won't have any trouble getting the glider out.