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#21
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tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...
On Jul 11, 9:49*pm, Frank Paynter wrote:
On Jul 11, 7:58*pm, Bart wrote: On Jul 11, 2:38*pm, wrote: On July 7, 2011 at Nowy Targ in southern Poland, glider Puchacz crashed during training flight 2/3 mile from the airport. The instructor (~64-67) and the student pilot (~18-19) are dead. *It was a tow rope brake practice flight with down wind turn for down wind landing from about 130-150 m of altitude (400 feet). What can we learn from this? Not much. Rope break at 400 feet should be a non-event. There must be something about this accident that we do not know yet. Are these training flights mendatory under FAA rules? Can pilot request opt-out from "rope brake" during Biennial Flight Review to avoid getting killed? FARs do not require rope breaks during a flight review, so it is up to the instructor you fly with. Personally, if I was an instructor, I would not sign off anyone who is not comfortable flying a simulated rope break. Weather permitting, of course. By the way, what seems to be a typical BFR - three flights, one of which is a rope break - is actually illegal. Or, to be more precise, it does NOT met the BFR requirements specified by the FARs: "Glider pilots may substitute a minimum of three instructional flights in a glider, each of which includes a flight to TRAFFIC PATTERN ALTITUDE, in lieu of the 1 hour of flight training required..." Bart This discussion reminds me of similar discussions surrounding spin training in the power world. *So many students and instructors were killed during spin 'training' that the maneuver was eventually banished from the required training curriculum. *We in the soaring community should be taking a very hard look at how many pilots are injured killed in actual PTT (Premature Termination of Tow) events vs how many are injured/killed in SRB (Simulated Rope Break) events. *I would be willing to bet real money that the statistics do not support the continued use of SRBs in training and/or BFRs. *We don't do base- to-final turn stall/spin recovery training for obvious reasons (so the saying goes, "You can only do a base-to-final-turn stall/spin demonstration ONCE"), and SRBs are just slightly less dangerous. BTW, at the risk of starting a religious war, rope breaks, spins, and other dangerous maneuvers can be simulated realistically, at any altitude and weather configuration in Condor. *If we feel we must continue to do SRBs as part of a training/review curriculum, they should ONLY be done in Condor. *The military, GA, and corporate/ airline communities figured this out a long time ago, and now that we have a realistic soaring simulator, we should be doing it too. *If you haven't tried this in Condor, you should. TA- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - I completely disagree. Condor can be useful for many things but I do not see how it will simulate the real world stress that occurs during an emergency situation. My experience is that most pilots will make at least one important mistake during their first PTTT. Some of these include. 1- Not having a plan in mind that is correct and ready to implement- the "what would I do?" scenario. 2- Many turn the "wrong " direction- most commonly to the right because "that's what we always do". 3- Failure to recognize the situation in the first place- "why are his wings rocking?" 4- Not establishing the correct attitude to maintain control with adequate margins. It's not just nose down. 5- Failure to clear for traffic on return. 6- Not establishing proper glide slope back to safe landing point. 7- Huge tunnel vision due to surprise and related stress. 8- Release when tug rudder is wagged to indicate "something is wrong with your glider". 9- Failure to recognize thr transition point from "I don't have enough energy margin to return to the field" to "Now I can return". Take off/ launch accidents are a significant portion of our losses. We must continue to train and retrain these skills. UH |
#22
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tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...
On Jul 12, 8:34*am, wrote:
On Jul 11, 9:49*pm, Frank Paynter wrote: On Jul 11, 7:58*pm, Bart wrote: On Jul 11, 2:38*pm, wrote: On July 7, 2011 at Nowy Targ in southern Poland, glider Puchacz crashed during training flight 2/3 mile from the airport. The instructor (~64-67) and the student pilot (~18-19) are dead. *It was a tow rope brake practice flight with down wind turn for down wind landing from about 130-150 m of altitude (400 feet). What can we learn from this? Not much. Rope break at 400 feet should be a non-event. There must be something about this accident that we do not know yet. Are these training flights mendatory under FAA rules? Can pilot request opt-out from "rope brake" during Biennial Flight Review to avoid getting killed? FARs do not require rope breaks during a flight review, so it is up to the instructor you fly with. Personally, if I was an instructor, I would not sign off anyone who is not comfortable flying a simulated rope break. Weather permitting, of course. By the way, what seems to be a typical BFR - three flights, one of which is a rope break - is actually illegal. Or, to be more precise, it does NOT met the BFR requirements specified by the FARs: "Glider pilots may substitute a minimum of three instructional flights in a glider, each of which includes a flight to TRAFFIC PATTERN ALTITUDE, in lieu of the 1 hour of flight training required..." Bart This discussion reminds me of similar discussions surrounding spin training in the power world. *So many students and instructors were killed during spin 'training' that the maneuver was eventually banished from the required training curriculum. *We in the soaring community should be taking a very hard look at how many pilots are injured killed in actual PTT (Premature Termination of Tow) events vs how many are injured/killed in SRB (Simulated Rope Break) events. *I would be willing to bet real money that the statistics do not support the continued use of SRBs in training and/or BFRs. *We don't do base- to-final turn stall/spin recovery training for obvious reasons (so the saying goes, "You can only do a base-to-final-turn stall/spin demonstration ONCE"), and SRBs are just slightly less dangerous. BTW, at the risk of starting a religious war, rope breaks, spins, and other dangerous maneuvers can be simulated realistically, at any altitude and weather configuration in Condor. *If we feel we must continue to do SRBs as part of a training/review curriculum, they should ONLY be done in Condor. *The military, GA, and corporate/ airline communities figured this out a long time ago, and now that we have a realistic soaring simulator, we should be doing it too. *If you haven't tried this in Condor, you should. TA- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - I completely disagree. Condor can be useful for many things but I do not see how it will simulate the real world stress that occurs during an emergency situation. My experience is that most pilots will make at least one important mistake during their first PTTT. *Some of these include. 1- Not having a plan in mind that is correct and ready to implement- the "what would I do?" scenario. 2- Many turn the "wrong " direction- most commonly to the *right because "that's what we always do". 3- Failure to recognize the situation in the first place- "why are his wings rocking?" 4- Not establishing the correct attitude to maintain control with adequate margins. It's not just nose down. 5- Failure to clear for traffic on return. 6- Not establishing proper glide slope back to safe landing point. 7- Huge tunnel vision due to surprise and related stress. 8- Release when tug rudder is wagged to indicate "something is wrong with your glider". 9- Failure to recognize thr transition point from "I don't have enough energy margin to return to the field" to "Now I can return". Take off/ launch accidents are a significant portion of our losses. We must continue to train and retrain these skills. UH Hank, Well, there is a huge body of evidence from GA, airline, corporate aviation, and military aviation that indicates that ground-based simulation is very a very effective training tool for emergency procedures, and is MUCH safer than airborne training. In a simulator, bad situations and/or bad decisions by the student can be allowed to play out to bad endings, something that can't be done safely in flight and is usually much more effective in getting the point across. You may make the point that since the student knows he can't die in a simulator, the real stresses can't be duplicated. However, I would argue that with airborne training most students think they can't die because there is an instructor right there to save them, so the same argument applies. A student can practice realistic rope breaks in Condor by having an assistant hit the release unexpectedly, just as in real life. The student must perform exactly the same functions (lower the nose, establish a bank in the proper direction, look for an appropriate landing area, etc) as in real life. I can pretty much guarantee you that the first few times the student does this, their reaction will be indistinguishable from their reaction in real life. Moreover, the situation in Condor can be easily configured so the student has no hope of returning to the field, and therefore must accomplish a safe off-airport landing - try that in real life! After 10 or 20 (or 100) SRBs in Condor, a student will be very well-drilled in rope-break procedures for a wide variety of situations, much more so than a corresponding real life only student who typically is exposed to only a few well-planned and very safe SRBs. For less than $300 (assuming you already have a decent PC) you can have a training tool that has been shown over and over again to be effective in saving lives. Need I say more? TA |
#23
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tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...
On Jul 12, 6:55*am, Andreas Maurer wrote:
On Mon, 11 Jul 2011 18:49:36 -0700 (PDT), Frank Paynter wrote: BTW, at the risk of starting a religious war, rope breaks, spins, and other dangerous maneuvers can be simulated realistically, at any altitude and weather configuration in Condor. Bullsh**. Andreas Have to agree - if you aren't there, you aren't there. HOWEVER, I do have some difficulty with trying to come up with a bunch of canned answers on how to handle each emergency. In fact, I would suggest that the cure is worse than the disease. Too many variations of problems. I have had personal involvement in, or first hand knowledge of, at least 6 events that could have been very serious. The solution to each emergency was "fly the airplane-save yourself". After that is established, say inside the first 2 seconds, the next common denominator is "get rid of the rope". To heck with signals. In many cases there is no way for the rope to back release. I have personally witnessed a case where this was the difference between life and death. Life won. I have personally been involved in a case where if the rope had not released we would have been in big, big trouble. Signals in NONE of these events would have had any effect on a safe outcome, in fact they would have likely been detrimental due to the short time limit involved. I might emphasize - the same "save yourself first" applies to BOTH ends of the rope. |
#24
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tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...
An excellent discussion following a tragic event.
As a part time tow pilot, I've seen uncountable practice rope breaks, all of which ended successfully. I also had one of our CFIs in his own Libelle have an actual rope break at about 250 ft on departure; surprised us both! ....But he bade a textbook turn back and landing. I saw about 10 feet of rope dangling from his nose but decided not to distract him by letting him know. Instead, when I landed, I thanked him for bringing back the Tost ring. My only other actual rope break was at about 2,500' AGL due to an incredibly ham fisted retired commercial pilot. He also brought back about 25 feet of rope wrapped over the right wing of the G-103. That was also a no-op. On my commercial glider check ride some 25 years ago, there was a 25 kt wind directly down the runway and the FAA examiner pulled the release at 200 feet while we were flying straight out. I made a successful turn back in the twin Lark (unlandable ahead) and landed about mid field, continued off the end of the runway, used up all the grass in the field at the end, put a wing on the ground, full rudder, and ground looped just short of the barbed wire. He just said, "Nice job." I thought it was an unsafe maneuver .. |
#25
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tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...
On Jul 12, 8:43*am, Frank Paynter wrote:
On Jul 12, 8:34*am, wrote: Frank, Hank: You're both right. The key here is to separate the two things that are learned by this training 1) practicing the maneuvers you will execute to recover from a low-altitude rope break or other PTT event 2) understanding and practicing the psychological part of reacting to any emergency situation. Hank's right that #2 is really not well simulated in Condor. But Frank is right that #1 can be practiced a lot in Condor, and then executing maneuvers will be much easier in the air. The same approach is useful, I think, for flight training. At our club, most of our instructors no longer do a lot of unannounced 200 foot rope breaks. This mixes #1 and #2, creating a "real" emergency. Instead, we brief, demonstrate and have students practice 200 foot rope breaks, so they are comfortable with the maneuver required. Believe me, the first 4-5 times, "you're going to do a 200 foot rope break on this flight" keeps the adrenaline level up high enough! We also give them lots of practice with unplanned emergencies, but all at reasonable altitude. 500' rope breaks, engine failures, spoilers coming out; "ok the spoiliers are stuck out/closed, now land it", pretending half the runway is suddenly unusable, and so on are all great exercises. If you've got the mechanical skills to do a planned 200 foot break flawlessly, and the emergency-handling skills to do all the higher- altitude emergencies with aplomb, you're fairly prepared. We can discuss whether practicing an actual combination, an unplanned 200' rope break, is a useful final sanding, or an invitation to practice stall/spin recovery from 200 feet. But at least we should get to that point by practicing the mechanical skill and the emergency-handling skill separately. John Cochrane |
#26
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tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...
Andy The pilot that was fatally injured was reportedly a CFIG. *The pilot that was seriously injured was a glider DPE. *It's been reported that it was gusty. *The commercial operation was in its first year of operation from this airfield, which I'm told is tight and tree-lined. No other info. Sorry, replied to the wrong post. My comments are in response to the Montana accident of last Friday. Frank Whiteley Low altitude maneuvers in gusty conditions in a 2-32. Gives me chills to think of it. 2-32's are fun to fly but they are unforgiving b-stards if you get low and slow. Both the accidents being discussed involved gliders with reputations for spinning in. |
#27
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tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...
On Jul 11, 7:11*pm, Tony V wrote:
On 7/11/2011 10:05 PM, Tony V wrote: Forgot point number 3. You can't just point the nose down and start your turn back to the airport. You have to wait until you have enough airspeed to pull that off. Why? If the simulated break is made at normal tow speed there is sufficient speed to start the turn immediately. Andy |
#28
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tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...
On Jul 12, 11:10*am, Berry wrote:
Andy The pilot that was fatally injured was reportedly a CFIG. The pilot that was seriously injured was a glider DPE. It's been reported that it was gusty. The commercial operation was in its first year of operation from this airfield, which I'm told is tight and tree-lined. No other info. Sorry, replied to the wrong post. *My comments are in response to the Montana accident of last Friday. Frank Whiteley Low altitude maneuvers in gusty conditions in a 2-32. Gives me chills to think of it. *2-32's are fun to fly but they are unforgiving b-stards if you get low and slow. Both the accidents being discussed involved gliders with reputations for spinning in. Was about to post the same thing. Was pondering this very issue whilst giving 2-32 rides for the local FBO this weekend. I don't think I'd even contemplate a return to the runway from less than 300 feet in that bird at max gross unless we had TONS of extra airspeed. As mentioned elswhere, there are so many variables to this that each flight requires its own plan. P3 |
#29
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tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...
I agree that this sort of maneuver should be first done in a simulator
(where doing it correctly is not the ONLY option) and then done in real life. I know I would not want to "bet my life" on the student doing it correctly the first time (while under pressure), especially from only 200'. |
#30
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tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...
On Jul 11, 8:11*pm, Tony V wrote:
On 7/11/2011 10:05 PM, Tony V wrote: Students learn several very valuable things during a simulated rope break. 1. they have (at least) a 3 second "oh, ****", factor where they don't do anything until the reality sets in. I had one student that froze and did nothing at all. 2. they don't get the nose down fast enough, far enough - even after they recognize and react to the situation. Forgot point number 3. You can't just point the nose down and start your turn back to the airport. You have to wait until you have enough airspeed to pull that off. Something that gets drilled into every winch student (I hope). Tony Actually a 200 foot AGL rope break on a winch is probably safer since the landing will be straight ahead on the runway. There have been accidents where aero tow trained pilots turned back from a 200 foot winch rope break only to find no runway to land on. Of course, both aero tow and winch recoveries from 200' rope breaks require a fairly high level of stick and rudder skills. Hint to students, if your instructor has his head stuck out of the side window of a 2-33 looking back at the runway, he's probably doing a 'sanity check' before pulling the release. Sanity checks are highly recommenced as it's not always possible to return to the runway. A bit of history; the 200' rope break turn back maneuver was invented in the early 1960's to show aero tow operations from short runways surrounded by trees or other unlandable terrain was 'safe'. Since one can't know what runways a student will fly from in the future, training them in this maneuver makes sense. |
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