Wing Launch - Can it pull your wings off?

Be careful of statistics - but agreed that recent winch safety has been
excellent for most of Europe (at least it appears to be so from what we
can see reported.)

Interestingly my club includes a lot of expatriate Germans, and a
similar group of expatriate English pilots. I have not seen any major
difference between them in approach or safety.

Glad to see we agree on the rest - primacy is important. When something
puts pressure on a pilot we tend to revert to what we first learned.
Make sure it is sensible.

Interestingly I wonder how much of the relative safety of launches in
the USA vs Germany / France/ England is the way soaring is administered.
The US way of licensing and having the proficiency standards and
examinations mandated and by the FAA is not ideal. Tom Knauf makes a
strong argument for doing it better.

As to the safety aspect - all launch methods intrinsically involve risk,
and decisions about how much risk to accept, and how you manage the risk
you take. Some communities take higher risk, and have consequentially
higher incident rates. (For example the one way strip in the vineyards)
The take away for me is to be aware of the situation and make sure you
have thought through the possible eventualities, and what you can and
should do in the event one of them occurs. Instinctive responses are
very useful up to a point. In an unusual situation, they had better be
tempered by rational processes. Attitude and preparation are most
important. The flying skill required should not be unusual - but the
necessary speed of decision making can exceed peoples capabilities. I
helps to have thought things through.

Cheers
Bruce

On 2010/08/15 4:34 PM, bildan wrote:

"The BGA statistics, taken from the UK and continental Europe,
unfortunately are unequivocal that winch launching was responsible for a
disproportionate number of fatalities"

BGA statistics on Continental Europe are seriously in error. You're
just trying to say that everybody else is a bad as the UK - they
aren't.

I have obtained accident statistics from Germany for 2009. More than
1.5 million winch launches resulted in just 17 accidents (13 of which
were really landing accidents since the glider was in a position for a
safe landing with good height and airspeed.) There were three
fatalities.

That's an absolutely extraordinary safety record - far, far better
than aero tow in the US or winch launch in the UK. The SSF says the
US lost 12 people on aero tow in 2009.

If winch launch is done competently, as it is in Germany, it's orders
of magnitude safer than aero tow as practiced in the US. I strongly
advise adopting the training methods and operating techniques used in
Germany.

John Smith's point is not about the infallibility of pilots, (fools
will find a way) it's that a winch operation should never put a pilot
in a situation where more than basic flying ability is required to
recover from a rope break. This goes for aero tow operations as well.

As an instructor, I can tell if a pilot has to think through a
recovery or is doing it instinctively. I train until it's
instinctive. If they maintain that level of competency, rope breaks
will never be a hazard for them.


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