Hard Deck

The three of you landed out, Charlie. You're not allowed to do your own energy management.
The hard deck allows you to store energy as height, but doesn't take energy stored as velocity into account.
Jim


On Saturday, January 27, 2018 at 8:28:39 AM UTC-8, Charlie M. (UH & 002 owner/pilot) wrote:
OK, question for everyone to ponder.

Many years ago we had a "backside of the ridge" day at Ridge Soaring. Last turnpoint was Williamsport, return to Ridge Soaring.
Just before the airport, the ridge rises a bunch, but we were on the wrong side (KS in the lead, SM second, me a little behind and a little lower.....).
Suddenly, KS made a hard right turn towards the ridge followed by SM. I figured they knew something I didn't so, either we get through or 3 broken ASW-20's in one spot.
There was a low saddle just before the rising terrain, with some ridge speed (which we all had) it was to make sure you cleared the clothesline in someone's side yard.
Then, terrain follow down the backside to the finish, from memory, we were likely 800' above the airport 1-2 miles from the finish with plenty of speed.

No issues, perfectly safe.
If the current idea of a hard deck was in place, would we all be landed out?
Ground clearance was "maybe" a wingspan but with plenty of "zoomie speed" if need be.

Just asking.......;-)

On Saturday, January 27, 2018 at 8:28:39 AM UTC-8, Charlie M. (UH & 002 owner/pilot) wrote:
OK, question for everyone to ponder.

Many years ago we had a "backside of the ridge" day at Ridge Soaring. Last turnpoint was Williamsport, return to Ridge Soaring.
Just before the airport, the ridge rises a bunch, but we were on the wrong side (KS in the lead, SM second, me a little behind and a little lower......).
Suddenly, KS made a hard right turn towards the ridge followed by SM. I figured they knew something I didn't so, either we get through or 3 broken ASW-20's in one spot.
There was a low saddle just before the rising terrain, with some ridge speed (which we all had) it was to make sure you cleared the clothesline in someone's side yard.
Then, terrain follow down the backside to the finish, from memory, we were likely 800' above the airport 1-2 miles from the finish with plenty of speed.

No issues, perfectly safe.
If the current idea of a hard deck was in place, would we all be landed out?
Ground clearance was "maybe" a wingspan but with plenty of "zoomie speed" if need be.

Just asking.......;-)

Without knowing more, hard to say. It is interesting that you thought you might die, but followed them anyway . "No issues, perfectly safe" - after the fact. In a ridgey area, the ridges would typically be poking up through the hard deck, so crossing one would not be a violation. Low saves on the top of ridges are not what the hard deck is intended to non-reward. If the hoped for lift does not materialize, you can normally dive away to either side and safety. Low saves in the bottom of a rocky or forested valley are the target. That is simply Roulette - if the hoped for lift materializes you survive and win the day, if not you break the glider and yourself. I don't care (in the abstract) about the latter, but the former is a reward for risk.

I made it sound a bit dramatic, my bad.
If you know the site, I assumed we would ridge run around the high point and then pop over and to the airport. The debrief later stated that it would make for a "too fast" decent that close to the airport (sorta like New Castle coming up from Blacksburg on the ridge, don't terrain follow to the deck since you WILL exceed redline).
Where we went over, we could have comfortably cleared the higher bits on either side of the saddle, the saddle allowed no slowing down and a shallower decent on the back side.
The post was more of a, would we be landed?

Anyway, got an answer, thanks.

No. Proposed hard deck is over the valley floor. Ridges stick out, and you're free to do what you want over the hills. The hard deck fairs in to the finish cylinder if there is one, or has a hole in it allowing line finish if not. I can't think of a simple implementable way to remove contest point incentive for silly stuff in the mountains.

For others who might be inspired by this story, one should point out that shooting saddles with a wingspan or less, using stored energy, is generally a dicey maneuver, and many contest pilots have come to grief or an untimely end trying it. Following great pilots just a little bit lower, when you don't know their plan, and when those pilots clear obstacles by a wingspan or less, is also an iffy tactic. If you following KS and SM, recognize that they often know of one field up around the corner up ahead, which has room for one glider. You don't know where that field is.

John Cochrane

On Saturday, January 27, 2018 at 8:28:39 AM UTC-8, Charlie M. (UH & 002 owner/pilot) wrote:
I figured they knew something I didn't so,
either we get through or 3 broken ASW-20's in one spot.

Absolutely incredibly stupid.

On Saturday, January 27, 2018 at 12:42:33 PM UTC-5, jfitch wrote:
It is interesting that you thought you might die, but followed them anyway .

On Saturday, January 27, 2018 at 12:48:16 PM UTC-5, John Cochrane wrote:
Following great pilots just a little bit lower, when you don't know their
plan, and when those pilots clear obstacles by a wingspan or less, is also
an iffy tactic.

If you are not absolutely clear how people get killed blindly following
other pilots, you may want to read:
http://www.nadler.com/public/Nadler_...g_May_1987.pdf

PS: One of the experts mentioned above was the pilot that made a wee mistake
about which ridge was which in the above-linked article...

, I'm landing NOW". Each step of each flight, think "Where's the next field, and how far can I go before I might not be able to reach it ?" This is pretty basic, but we haven't been flying this way."

Dave thanks for posting your article. I had read it before bur forgot about it's existence. Fantastic practical insight directly applicable.

If I was to try and distill one single reason for why we see guys getting themselves in a pickle today, irregardless of soaring location, and irregardless of the forensics of their accident be it stall spin or connecting with a rock face, I would have to say it is because of the tremendous performance of our midern ships.

Many of the guys racing today have never experienced what its like to race a low/mid performance machines, and hence they have been so conditioned to the great long legs and benign handling of modern ships that they have never learned the lessons needed when flying those poorer ships. Namely, before committing to a path, always having a way out (a field, an option, an alternative), learning to outland with minimum energy and minimum rolling distance. Expecting the unexpected, "what do I do if that ridge isn't working?" Etc.

Secondly, due to "perceived" performance, guys either don't know how to "change gears" or put it off till no options exist. The last resort gear change I am referring to is pure survival mode. Yes guys mostly know how to slow it up when conditions get iffy, but do they know how to give-it-up while not giving up on flying the bird. Theres a time to stop racing and start scratching, theres a time to stop scratching and start landing, and if both of those times have past unrecognized, theres a time to put her down in a CONTROLLED MANNER with minimum energy knowing your gonna bust up the machine seriously, but you may save your ass in the process.

I have found that pilots who have a healthy amount of xc experience in lesser performing ships tend to be safer more conservative fliers once they upgrade (exceptions exist). They have mostly had to forsee getting across rough stretches of terrain with crappy L/D. They have experienced a bunch of true outlandings, I'm talking about bean fields not away-from-home airports, and they have been forced to make "gear changing" decisions much earlier and much more frequently than is necessary with the better performing ships.

All of this experience has conditioned them to make better, earlier decisions.
Dan

Thanks for clarifying. It sounded like a bail over the back to land because the ridge quit situation. Now I get it -- you guys had plenty of energy and took a somewhat straighter line to finish saving a few seconds. As pointed out before, a hard deck would not cause any trouble there.

John Cochrane

.....PS: One of the experts mentioned above was the pilot that made a wee mistake
about which ridge was which in the above-linked article...

Dave I'd go easy on the naming of names here. You might end up with a few fingers pointed back your way regarding "wee little mistakes" made in the past lol.

On 1/27/2018 12:00 PM, Dave Nadler wrote:

Germane lead-in info snipped...

If you are not absolutely clear how people get killed blindly following
other pilots, you may want to read:
http://www.nadler.com/public/Nadler_...g_May_1987.pdf

Well worth (re-)absorbing; I just did it for about the tenth time. And at the
(probably WAY too high) risk of having sardonic humor be completely
misinterpreted...arithmetic says there was a 1.8% *improvement* from 1985 to
1986 in that particular regional contest's broken ship safety stats. (1985 -
4/31; 1986 5/45) So today, 30-some years later and continuing the same
improvement rate, that particular contest should be darn near 60%
"ship-safer," no? Insurance rates plummet wildly!!! (Not!)

More seriously, IMO the rather amorphous thought, "I NEED to make an active
decision!" if incorporated into every soaring pilot's general arsenal, would
go a long way to improving our collective safety record. (I forget whether it
was former World Champion AJ Smith or George Moffat who pithily said
[paraphrasing]: If you're not making at least one active decision every 60
seconds, you're [losing time, screwing the pooch, etc.].)

*Actively* making the decision to (say) switch from "doing something else" to
"entering my pre-planned pattern for my pre-selected field NOW!" is the
pilot's responsibility...to him/herself, to their family, to their friends, to
the soaring community at large, to the ship. (Even so, I doubt whether repair
shop proprietors need fear going out of business from lack of work.) Whether
"NOW" occurs at (say) 800' agl above the home field or somewhere else is by
comparison relatively unimportant. Hard deck (whether yours or contest
management's), terrain-induced concern or fear, instructor's number, whatever
- getting into the habit of ALWAYS making that sort of in-flight decision
each flight - maybe even more than once, as you scratch along - surely is more
safety important (to Joe Pilot anyway) than is not forgetting to lower the
gear, something about which every retract pilot tries to obsess over at one
time or another in their flying career. Who'd'a thunk a shoe company ad would
ever have real-world applicability to the soaring world? Just do it! :-)

Bob W.

---
This email has been checked for viruses by AVG.
http://www.avg.com

(Not really a contest pilot here, so read with a grain of salt.)

I can see that the rules make the game and the current rules might encourage some folks to be unsafe. A hard deck data base with penalties seems a possible way to help this, but getting the details right for a hard deck database seems problematic if it is not to significantly limit strategy options.

Perhaps a simpler alternative would be a list of designated landing sites for a contest day.

Penalties would be accessed for not always keeping at least one under you according to some simple equation. (Perhaps looking at only L/D, minimum energy over terrain, and safety altitude.)

The goal is to not fix everything, but at least nudge strategic thinking in a safer direction.