Nimbus 4DT accident 31 July 2000 in Spain.

On the subject of training for Winch failures, personally I found the training
for a winch power failure quite demanding. With a cable break it is a sudden
event you can react instinctively to. With a gradual power loss it is very easy
to get "sucked in" to hanging on too long hoping the winch driver will pick up
speed and then ending up low and quite slow at the wrong end of the runway.

Chris Gadsby

Marian Aldenhövel wrote:
Hi,

Training for wire breaks starts at a high altitude in free flight. The
zooms, simulated break at 60 knots and pushover are repeated many times
until the student performs them instinctively.


Interestingly we don't do it like this where I am learning to fly.

We are taught to plan every launch as featuring a wire break and to
preplan up to what altitudes to land straight, turn back or fly the
pattern as part of the takeoff-check. During training we are to say
these altitudes and actions out loud.

Before soloing we do a minimum of three excercises where the instructor
pulls the knob at some point during the launch. So it's the real thing,
nothing "emergency-like" there. We do not train wire-breaks at altitude.

Still I feel very safe. And I also found pushing over, gaining normal speed
and then attitude the natural thing to do. It helps to have a plan as to
what to do next but up to there it really is instinct. I have not heard
of any of my fellow-students _not_ reacting that way.

Ciao, MM