BGA and licensing

I saw on the BGA website the BGA changed the spin training
requirements. No more required low altitude
spins. Good job, guys. I'm glad they changed it.
I'm over 4000 miles away and I was cringing...

On another note, the site seems to indicate that 20 flights
minimum are required to solo, but that there is no license required.
Is this true? Is there no govt. licence? Then who enforces
the 20 flights? What prevents someone from legally
buying a glider and just hopping in it?

Granted, there is the issue of launching, but one can still
just roll down a hilltop, right? :P

I'm wondering if gliders in Britain are treated similarly to
ultralights in the USA, very little official regulation...

Can someone please write a little about how gliding is
regulated in Europe (including Britain) and how hard or easy
it is for a US chap to come over the pond and glide?

I've prepared a little. So I know not to swat anyone on
the fanny, and I purchased a can of bugger repellent.
Beyond that I could use some advice...
--

------------+
Mark Boyd
Avenal, California, USA

An US FAA glider licence is sufficient to fly gilders legally in Germany.

Best Regards

Hans

On Fri, 20 Aug 2004 19:02:01 UTC, (Mark James
Boyd) wrote:

: What prevents someone from legally
: buying a glider and just hopping in it?

Nothing whatsoever. As long as you obey the appropriate bits of teh
law (mainly the Air Navigation Order) then anyone can fly any
unpowered aircraft in the UK. No licence, no certificate of
airworthiness, no training, no nothing.

However, you do, as you pint out, have to get the thing into the air
and since all gliding clubs in the UK are BGA-affiliated and follow
BGA rules (as far as I know - there have been a couple of independents
in the past) all pilots effectively have to comply as well. That said,
I have never, ever been asked to show my C of A or insurance
certificate at any gliding club I've visited. But then, there is a lot
to be said for self-regulation, and I don't think we kill
significantly more people through gliding than more tightly regulated
countries do.

Ian

--

My God, what an incredibly civilized attitude!

I am going to HAVE to glide Europe at some point soon...

In article cCUlhtvFIYkV-pn2-Zn2Mu8eOp2xB@localhost,
Ian Johnston wrote:
On Fri, 20 Aug 2004 19:02:01 UTC, (Mark James
Boyd) wrote:

: What prevents someone from legally
: buying a glider and just hopping in it?

Nothing whatsoever. As long as you obey the appropriate bits of teh
law (mainly the Air Navigation Order) then anyone can fly any
unpowered aircraft in the UK. No licence, no certificate of
airworthiness, no training, no nothing.

However, you do, as you pint out, have to get the thing into the air
and since all gliding clubs in the UK are BGA-affiliated and follow
BGA rules (as far as I know - there have been a couple of independents
in the past) all pilots effectively have to comply as well. That said,
I have never, ever been asked to show my C of A or insurance
certificate at any gliding club I've visited. But then, there is a lot
to be said for self-regulation, and I don't think we kill
significantly more people through gliding than more tightly regulated
countries do.

Ian

--



--

------------+
Mark Boyd
Avenal, California, USA

To give you a practical example, this is how my own UK club (Rattlesden in
Suffolk) would be likely to deal with your arrival, wanting to fly:

1. Who flies and what restrictions they are subject to is entirely up to the
discretion of the duty instructor. What usually happens is you produce your
logbook, talk through your experience, and then decide together what flying
you should do.

2. If you want to fly our club gliders you'll almost certainly take a check
flight with the duty instructor. If you've brought your own glider, your
logbook shows currency and you're OK on launch type, the instructor might
dispense with this. My experience of flying at other clubs is similar. We're
a flatland club, so the only likely difficulty might be no winch launching
experience (but we can aerotow you if you don't want to learn the winch).
However, if I went to a hill or mountain site I would expect (and ask for)
at least one check flight before flying my own glider, as I have a total of
two hours on ridges (Southdown near Brighton, which I guess might be the
most benign ridge site in the world!). In difficult conditions, I would
expect them to tell me if they thought I was safe to fly my own glider, and
wouldn't complain if they said no - if I crash, they have to file the
accident reports and sweep up the pieces.

3. If you're OK to fly solo, we'll let you fly whichever of our gliders is
available and suits your experience (i.e. if your only single-seat
experience is an I-26 you almost certainly won't fly the Pegase).

4. The two restrictions on XC flying are (a) do you have the BGA
Cross-Country Endorsement (obviously not, being US-based, so can the duty
instructor recognise some equivalent? I've no idea how this would work out,
so if you want to fly XC in the UK it would be worth contacting the BGA to
get some kind of advance ruling - I can't imagine a Sunday phone call to the
BGA would find more than an answering machine), and (b) is someone else
waiting to fly the glider after you, in which case we'll give you a time
limit. In practice there is a third restriction - can you persuade someone
to come and fetch you if you land out.

The whole basis of the system is that the CAA (the government body)
delegates control to the BGA, and the BGA delegates most aspects of control
to the clubs, recommending and sometimes mandating procedures. None of us
want the CAA to take over control, so we police ourselves quite firmly. It's
no good saying, "I have a Gold badge, I'm entitled to launch my glider." If
the duty instructor doesn't think that's appropriate, it won't happen. On
the other hand, we (UK clubs) are usually keen to get people airborne. I've
regularly visited other clubs to fly gliders not available at Rattlesden,
and have always found them more than happy for a visitor to enjoy a new
type - other pilots have even let me fly, even though it was their turn
next, because they could fly the aircraft later or another day but I was
only there for the one day. It helps if you join in getting the club set up
and help retrieve gliders etc. At Southdown it can't have hurt that I was
the only one on site who could get the R clips into the hoteliers on their
K21 (hint - practice on an Astir 'cause you can't see the hoteliers and have
to do it by feel).

The biggest difference you see might be the weather - not just its
unpredictability, but also the comparatively weak conditions. Last Saturday
I completed my first 300k under a 3,000 ft cloudbase, rising to 4,000 ft as
the flight progressed, and about 2kt thermal averages. I'd say this was a
slightly worse than average XC day, but by no means particularly difficult
in an Open Cirrus. Other Rattlesden pilots flew XC that day, and I think all
the UK competitions set tasks. Tibenham in Norfolk (past which I flew) set
300k for the 15m ships and 400k for the Open class, and many (most?) of them
completed.

The only time I flew in the US was a couple of weeks after I soloed, at the
Soaring Club of Houston (if I have the name correct). That club worked just
the same way as Rattlesden, but I gather than now it would be much more
difficult for me to fly in the US.

"Mark James Boyd" wrote in message
news:41266cfa$1@darkstar...
My God, what an incredibly civilized attitude!

I am going to HAVE to glide Europe at some point soon...

In article cCUlhtvFIYkV-pn2-Zn2Mu8eOp2xB@localhost,
Ian Johnston wrote:
On Fri, 20 Aug 2004 19:02:01 UTC, (Mark James
Boyd) wrote:

: What prevents someone from legally
: buying a glider and just hopping in it?

Nothing whatsoever. As long as you obey the appropriate bits of teh
law (mainly the Air Navigation Order) then anyone can fly any
unpowered aircraft in the UK. No licence, no certificate of
airworthiness, no training, no nothing.

However, you do, as you pint out, have to get the thing into the air
and since all gliding clubs in the UK are BGA-affiliated and follow
BGA rules (as far as I know - there have been a couple of independents
in the past) all pilots effectively have to comply as well. That said,
I have never, ever been asked to show my C of A or insurance
certificate at any gliding club I've visited. But then, there is a lot
to be said for self-regulation, and I don't think we kill
significantly more people through gliding than more tightly regulated
countries do.

Ian

--



--

------------+
Mark Boyd
Avenal, California, USA

Chris Reed wrote:
To give you a practical example, this is how my own UK club (Rattlesden in
Suffolk) would be likely to deal with your arrival, wanting to fly:

1. Who flies and what restrictions they are subject to is entirely up to the
discretion of the duty instructor. What usually happens is you produce your
logbook, talk through your experience, and then decide together what flying
you should do.

2. If you want to fly our club gliders you'll almost certainly take a check
flight with the duty instructor. If you've brought your own glider, your

Thanks, Chris. In my particular case, I'd likely be much more excited
about flying a two-place than a one for the first few flights.
I know there are US guys who love solo, but I'd want to spend a good
deal of time talking and looking out the window

I know for sure that I will never make a trip to Europe
without at least one trip to a gliderport, though, from all
the things I've read. Soaring seems quite a bit more
popular (per capita) there than here...
--

------------+
Mark Boyd
Avenal, California, USA

Do it soon, EC regulation will make that civilization
a thing of the past before very long.

At 21:42 20 August 2004, Mark James Boyd wrote:
My God, what an incredibly civilized attitude!

I am going to HAVE to glide Europe at some point soon...

In article ,
Ian Johnston wrote:
On Fri, 20 Aug 2004 19:02:01 UTC,
(Mark James
Boyd) wrote:

: What prevents someone from legally
: buying a glider and just hopping in it?

Nothing whatsoever. As long as you obey the appropriate
bits of teh
law (mainly the Air Navigation Order) then anyone can
fly any
unpowered aircraft in the UK. No licence, no certificate
of
airworthiness, no training, no nothing.

However, you do, as you pint out, have to get the thing
into the air
and since all gliding clubs in the UK are BGA-affiliated
and follow
BGA rules (as far as I know - there have been a couple
of independents
in the past) all pilots effectively have to comply
as well. That said,
I have never, ever been asked to show my C of A or
insurance
certificate at any gliding club I've visited. But then,
there is a lot
to be said for self-regulation, and I don't think we
kill
significantly more people through gliding than more
tightly regulated
countries do.

Ian

--



--

------------+
Mark Boyd
Avenal, California, USA