Does How a (Sailplane) Pilot Thinks, Matter?

On 4/5/2016 1:59 PM, wrote:
Which is safer; a conservative pilot who thinks they are safe, or a pilot
aware of their inclination to push things but thinks themselves switched on
enough to pull it off?


Excellent, thought-provoking, question! Particularly if we place "reasonable
mechanical competency" in both pilots' cockpits.

Probably not (yet?) answerable, though...

Judging from this millennium's NTSB statistics, the MUCH larger proportion of
fatalities have (apparently, so it seems to me) come from the "not obviously
actively pushing things" group of pilots, regardless of whether they may have
been "conservative" or "inclined to push physics' dangerous limits."

By way of example, one (cartwheeling, apparently) fatality involved an attempt
to land on a road, when the NTSB noted (they thought? a glider pilot thought?)
a perfectly landable field was less than half a mile away. I choose to imagine
this pilot thought success chances were better on a
"should-be-via-routine-driving-observationally-known-rife-with-obstructions"
road than going into a "surface-maybe-not-so-observationally-known-smooth"
field. FWIW, the "roads are good" misconception was common among 20+ years'
worth of new-to-XC pilots from our Club at a site in the (flat, huge fields
common, sparsely settled) panhandle of Texas. Memory sez the idea had to be
disabused each year, when it arose during formal/informal training/bull
sessions. No one ever did land a glider on a road, and so far as I know there
was never any OFL damage EVER incurred between 1989 and 2009, the only camp
years I had direct exposure to. Funnily enough, there *were* a few minor -
e.g. gear-ups - landing damages occurred at the (ex-WW-II) camp airports. Many
a club member made their first-ever OFL at that camp.

Back to the question above, I'm inclined to think "limits awareness" is a
better way to approach piloting than not, just as (say) it's better when
driving on highways. While (as someone noted earlier this thread) "There's no
fixing stupid," I believe lack of "pushing limits" awareness IS fixable.

Bob W.

On Sunday, April 3, 2016 at 8:31:04 PM UTC-7, BobW wrote:
On 4/3/2016 7:12 PM, 2G wrote:
On Sunday, April 3, 2016 at 5:32:27 PM UTC-7, BobW wrote:
On 4/3/2016 7:07 AM, N97MT wrote:
I think that it is ironic that we as CFI's are tasked with turning the
"fear and anxiety" bit into what I would call "healthy respect" so
that real learning can take place. But in the process of beating the
fear out of (or shall I say, selling safety to?) the student we
abstract out a real and potentially life-saving emotion which may be
the only thing keeping an otherwise competent pilot from his own
demise.

Maybe this aspect of flight training is where's Mr. Spock's mind-meld
abilities would prove really useful! (For kids too young to remember the
original TV program "Star Trek," presumably somewhere on YouTube can be
found links to the "Mr. Spock" mind meld reference above...)

Might not a worthy goal for instruction be transitioning from the "fear
and anxiety" stage to the "healthy respect" stage withOUT heading down
the emotionally-numbing abstraction road? How would Joe CFIG be able to
gauge success? Your abstraction point above had not before occurred to
(non-instructor) me even as a possibility. Definitely food for thought,
though. Thanks!

I raised this at a seminar once when someone was describing a
pre-flight student simulating a spin/crash on Condor. In a hall full of
150 people and many CFI's in attendance I asked "but did the student
realize that at this point he is dead?" I only got silence and blank
stares in response.

Oh, for group mind-meld capability! Wouldn't you've liked to have known
with certainty the thoughts inside the heads of your fellow seminarians
at that moment?

Bob W.

Your original question was if low saves was a necessary XC skill. A "low
save" is technically the same as a high save; the only difference is
lowering your personal minimums. I have seen pilots die from attempting
this, so I MUST ask the question: what is the perceived benefit from
putting your life at risk?

In a contest it might mean placing a few positions higher, a meaningless
benefit for all but a very few. Or it might mean saving you and your crew
from a long and tiring retrieve, maybe even a overnight experience. Are you
willing to trade 20-50 years of lifetime for this inconvenience? I would
hope that most pilots - and their crew whom are usually their loved ones -
would say, emphatically, NO!


No offense intended, but I disagree with the paraphrase of my initial post as
stated in your first sentence, and for those who may not have been following
this thread from the beginning, immediately below is a cut-n-paste from that
initial post (the quoted paragraphs were separated by intervening paragraphs):

"In one corner of the thought ring we have "Sensible Caution," while in the
other corner we have "Dangerously (some will say, "Irresponsibly"!)
Encouraging Personal Limits Expansion." The topic itself is LOW SAVES - are
they Killers or are they a Usefully Necessary XC Skill?...

"Let's keep the discussion focused by considering ONLY the topic of "low
altitude saves," sooner or later something every XC-considering sailplane
pilot - having the slightest of imaginations - will consider, and (by
definition) will soon actually have to DO, once undertaking XC, whether such
XC occurs pre-planned or not."

Also, for the record, nowhere throughout the thread have I - or anyone else
that I can recall - attempted to numerically define "low save" (e.g. via an
agl number). In my case the omission was intentional. Why? Because one
person's "low save" may well be another's "routinely necessary XC skill," as
is easily seen when considering (say) Joe Average Sailplane Pilot's first
XC-to-undesired-outlanding vs. (say) his 20th. The mindsets on these flights
will be significantly different. The relative stress levels as J.A.S. Pilot
descends relentlessly - even though maybe not continuously - down, away from
his previously exulting "high on course" mindset present earlier in the
flight, will be significantly different. I seriously doubt a sailplane pilot
exists who will claim to be as "systemically stressed" on his 20th XC OFL (or
even his 20th XC *flight*) as on his first. Certainly,not me! On my very first
(unintentional) XC-to-landing, by the time I was down to ~2,000' agl I was
SERIOUSLY stressed, for beaucoup reasons, the only weather-related one being
that the boisterous climbs experienced in thermal #1 off tow, #2 used to go to
#3 one (1-26) thermal away from the field, and #3, seemed to exist now only as
memory. In other words, #4, the sole stepping stone I figured to need to get
back, simply didn't seem to be in the cards. (Yeah, I learned that day
something about differing airmasses!)

Even though I was a raw beginner, and even though I'd cleared the flight with
my (former) instructor, me now a 1/3 partner with him in the 1-26 he'd built
from a kit, I was already fighting "I can't believe this is happening!"
thoughts as I "ratty-teasers" descended down to 2,000' agl. And though I
suspect I'd've been able to climb away from (say) 1200' agl had I actually
encountered "usable lift" (like those first three thermals) at that altitude,
I'll never know. I had, well before then, picked out where I was likely going
to end up setting the ship down, but I *really* didn't want to have to.
Eventually, from my instructed pattern height, I did, successfully, and that
was that. By landout #20, my mindset was *any* landout ought to be no more
mentally stressful than a routine landing at my home field...if anything less
so, because I had only to "do the field selection thing" and not have to deal
with "the multiple runways at a busy GA airport" thing (far more potential
gotchas, IMO).

By landout #20 I'd also experienced plenty of opportunities to - gradually and
"acceptably-personally-stressfully" - lower my "comfortable thermalling
minimums" to my by then routine pattern entry height agl. Point being, "low
thermalling stress" is a hugely relative concept. Sure the ground clearance
margins are higher for "an equivalent stress level" for Joe Newbie XC pilot
compared to Joe Cool-w.-XC pilot, even if Joe Cool never performs a "low save
by Joe Reader's "even lower definition." Point being, that I'll dispute any
claim that "some definitional safety altitude" will always prove life-saving.
Pilots continue to kill themselves through unintended departures from
controlled flight even during benign-weather, flying "what should be routine"
landing patterns. Ignoring practical considerations mitigating against it,
would universally raising landing pattern altitudes end such departures from
controlled flight? I think not.

I'm not trying to weasel out of what may have been (an understandable)
difference in perception between "low save" as I had in mind in my initial
post, and "low save" as you interpreted it. I was - and am - more interested
in the mindsets that pilots who indulge in what *they* consider to be low
saves may have, and how those mindsets may - or may not - affect how they
mentally approach flight in conditions of intentionally-thinned margins.
Because, to my way of thinking, thin margins are an absolute. They respect no
one and no level of experience. Physics doesn't care; physics just is (am?).
It's up to Joe Pilot to deal with physics.

For the record, I've had "pretty well known to me friendly soaring
acquaintances" die from "unintentionally thinned to zero" margins, ranging
from "a (probably) stressed-like-me-newbie" trying to return from the local
ridge (benign day; hit a tree), to someone who somehow or other managed to
spin to the ground from an estimated 2,000' above a knife-edged ridge (3500+'
agl above the adjoining plains) in utterly benign conditions in a
within-CG-range glider, which one of his partners (a good friend of mine) said
flew like a pussycat. Fuzzy memory says the latter pilot had landed off-field,
but in any case how he encountered the original departure from controlled
flight must remain a mystery. Both pilots were in their later twenties. There
have been more...

But to explicitly address the question you've posed, i.e.: "I have seen pilots
die from attempting this ["a low save"], so I MUST ask the question: what is
the perceived benefit from putting your life at risk?"

That, to me, is the million dollar question. I wouldn't bet against someone
replying to the effect that even to indulge in soaring is "putting your life
at risk," but should they, I'd respond along the lines that life itself is a
risk, and that to not indulge in personally rewarding, voluntary activities
(which is just about everything beyond working to earn one's
food/clothing/shelter keep) would be a gray life indeed, arguably, one hardly
worth living.

To my way of thinking, how one chooses to go about approaching soaring flight
with voluntarily thinning/thin margins is an intensely personal thing, with
potentially "friends-n-family-affecting" negative consequences. I doubt anyone
really needs to have that aspect pointed out to them, when premature death is
on the talking table...but I could be wrong. It's how we - J.A.S. pilot; the
sailplane piloting community at large; CFIGs - mentally approach those higher
danger zones that is of genuine interest to me. I just don't see "hard limits
defined by someone else" as an unarguably, universally,
always-safety-enhancing, good thing. The individual ALWAYS has a say (and a
vote) in how they approach flight. As I gained soaring flight experience, my
own thinking tended to evolve toward thinking it "CERtainly better for me, and
probably better for Joe Every Other Pilot" to embrace the outlook that
sensibly expanding one's flight skills is a good thing...key word being
"sensibly."

In an earlier post in this thread I mentioned I'd recently looked at every
U.S. sailplane fatality this century in the NTSB's database. Ignoring those
presently lacking an NTSB-considered "Probable Cause" and some 20+ I tossed
out as too easily rationalizable as "geezer-related" or "out-of-hand stupid,"
of the roughly 55 remaining deaths "only" 4 *might* be attributable to "low
thermalling," in the "low save" sense of things, with "low" being defined as
"obviously/apparently below routine ground clearances for a normal pattern."
And to obtain 4, I had to infer one Sierra fatality. That's 4 too many, and at
least one of those deaths happened in a setting with many witnesses (and
families), undoubtedly searing its way into many minds which would prefer not
to be so burdened. There were 17 (!) "routine pattern" unintended departures
from controlled flight resulting in fatalities, including two with instructors
on board in G-103s. (IMO, perhaps only the 2-33 is a more benign,
routinely-used-in-the-U.S., training ship.) There were additional "should have
been routinely executable" landing patterns (with "departure from controlled
flight deaths") downstream of premature terminations of tows for various
reasons. (I haven't attempted to "hard categorize" every fatality with a fine
brush, broad-brushing satisfying my curiosity. I'm uninterested in "debating
about trees" regarding "category buckets." However, for anyone seriously
interested in discussing things with me on this front, feel free to do so
offline, but understand you'll first need to go through the NTSB records for
yourself...tedious, it is.)

If I'm limited to a single point from the preceding paragraph, it'd be simply
that this century's statistical risk from "low saves" is way out on one tail,
probably regardless of how one chooses to categorize all the fatalities. By
far, many more "average sailplane pilots" die from "routine flight conditions"
than while "obviously pushing this particular limit."

Bob W.

A "low save" is one where spin recovery is not likely.

If you want to think that the statistical probability of dying while executing low saves is diminishingly small, so be it. When you know the pilot who died, as I do, it becomes more personal and real.

I don't particularly care what risks you are willing to take; my intended audience are those other low time pilots who might be reading this and acting on the advice.

Tom

The topic of low altitude flying and beat-ups (high speed, low level passes) comes up on a nearly weekly basis on a general aviation forum I frequent.
There are two well defined groups who each defend their position with passion.
The first group insists that low level flying is 100% safe if done correctly by someone experienced while the second group insists that the closer to the ground one flies the higher the risk regardless of skill level.

Invariably every few months there is another fatal accident which removes someone from the first group. The chatter online nearly always points out that the deceased was an experienced and low risk pilot. I've lost count of the fatalities due to flights into power lines, beat-ups with wing over manoeuvres into the ground, etc.
Clearly the closer one flies to the ground, the less time and space there is for recovery regardless of skill level.
The further I stay away from that dead man's zone the better. The air space between the ground and 1000 feet AGL is strictly reserved for takeoffs and landings in my book.

On Thursday, April 7, 2016 at 8:59:14 AM UTC+3, 2G wrote:
A "low save" is one where spin recovery is not likely.

If you want to think that the statistical probability of dying while executing low saves is diminishingly small, so be it. When you know the pilot who died, as I do, it becomes more personal and real.

Seems like a flat land flier's definition.

Those flying in mountains are constantly taking thermals from a few hundred feet above peaks and ridges -- or from below the ridge.

The key is to make sure you *don't* spin. Fly at all times at LEAST at landing approach speed (in the given wind conditions), not at the speed you use for thermalling at 2000 ft. And add a bit onto that. I'm talking about 60 or 65 or even 70 knots, instead of 45 or 50 knots.

Yeah, you might decrease your chance of being able to climb in a weak or small thermal, but you also vastly decrease your chance of dying.

On Thursday, April 7, 2016 at 2:48:22 AM UTC-4, Surge wrote:
The topic of low altitude flying and beat-ups (high speed, low level passes) comes up on a nearly weekly basis on a general aviation forum I frequent.

Apologies for not cutting this down to size, but I happen to think some of the
thoughts expressed in it are important, perhaps even crucial to some
RASidents' continuing existence?

"This reply" will be found at the bottom of the post...

On 4/6/2016 11:59 PM, 2G wrote:
On Sunday, April 3, 2016 at 8:31:04 PM UTC-7, BobW wrote:
On 4/3/2016 7:12 PM, 2G wrote:
On Sunday, April 3, 2016 at 5:32:27 PM UTC-7, BobW wrote:
On 4/3/2016 7:07 AM, N97MT wrote:
I think that it is ironic that we as CFI's are tasked with turning
the "fear and anxiety" bit into what I would call "healthy respect"
so that real learning can take place. But in the process of beating
the fear out of (or shall I say, selling safety to?) the student
we abstract out a real and potentially life-saving emotion which
may be the only thing keeping an otherwise competent pilot from his
own demise.

Maybe this aspect of flight training is where's Mr. Spock's
mind-meld abilities would prove really useful! (For kids too young to
remember the original TV program "Star Trek," presumably somewhere on
YouTube can be found links to the "Mr. Spock" mind meld reference
above...)

Might not a worthy goal for instruction be transitioning from the
"fear and anxiety" stage to the "healthy respect" stage withOUT
heading down the emotionally-numbing abstraction road? How would Joe
CFIG be able to gauge success? Your abstraction point above had not
before occurred to (non-instructor) me even as a possibility.
Definitely food for thought, though. Thanks!

I raised this at a seminar once when someone was describing a
pre-flight student simulating a spin/crash on Condor. In a hall
full of 150 people and many CFI's in attendance I asked "but did
the student realize that at this point he is dead?" I only got
silence and blank stares in response.

Oh, for group mind-meld capability! Wouldn't you've liked to have
known with certainty the thoughts inside the heads of your fellow
seminarians at that moment?

Bob W.

Your original question was if low saves was a necessary XC skill. A
"low save" is technically the same as a high save; the only difference
is lowering your personal minimums. I have seen pilots die from
attempting this, so I MUST ask the question: what is the perceived
benefit from putting your life at risk?

In a contest it might mean placing a few positions higher, a
meaningless benefit for all but a very few. Or it might mean saving you
and your crew from a long and tiring retrieve, maybe even a overnight
experience. Are you willing to trade 20-50 years of lifetime for this
inconvenience? I would hope that most pilots - and their crew whom are
usually their loved ones - would say, emphatically, NO!


No offense intended, but I disagree with the paraphrase of my initial
post as stated in your first sentence, and for those who may not have
been following this thread from the beginning, immediately below is a
cut-n-paste from that initial post (the quoted paragraphs were separated
by intervening paragraphs):

"In one corner of the thought ring we have "Sensible Caution," while in
the other corner we have "Dangerously (some will say, "Irresponsibly"!)
Encouraging Personal Limits Expansion." The topic itself is LOW SAVES -
are they Killers or are they a Usefully Necessary XC Skill?...

"Let's keep the discussion focused by considering ONLY the topic of "low
altitude saves," sooner or later something every XC-considering
sailplane pilot - having the slightest of imaginations - will consider,
and (by definition) will soon actually have to DO, once undertaking XC,
whether such XC occurs pre-planned or not."

Also, for the record, nowhere throughout the thread have I - or anyone
else that I can recall - attempted to numerically define "low save" (e.g.
via an agl number). In my case the omission was intentional. Why? Because
one person's "low save" may well be another's "routinely necessary XC
skill," as is easily seen when considering (say) Joe Average Sailplane
Pilot's first XC-to-undesired-outlanding vs. (say) his 20th. The mindsets
on these flights will be significantly different. The relative stress
levels as J.A.S. Pilot descends relentlessly - even though maybe not
continuously - down, away from his previously exulting "high on course"
mindset present earlier in the flight, will be significantly different. I
seriously doubt a sailplane pilot exists who will claim to be as
"systemically stressed" on his 20th XC OFL (or even his 20th XC *flight*)
as on his first. Certainly,not me! On my very first (unintentional)
XC-to-landing, by the time I was down to ~2,000' agl I was SERIOUSLY
stressed, for beaucoup reasons, the only weather-related one being that
the boisterous climbs experienced in thermal #1 off tow, #2 used to go
to #3 one (1-26) thermal away from the field, and #3, seemed to exist now
only as memory. In other words, #4, the sole stepping stone I figured to
need to get back, simply didn't seem to be in the cards. (Yeah, I learned
that day something about differing airmasses!)

Even though I was a raw beginner, and even though I'd cleared the flight
with my (former) instructor, me now a 1/3 partner with him in the 1-26
he'd built from a kit, I was already fighting "I can't believe this is
happening!" thoughts as I "ratty-teasers" descended down to 2,000' agl.
And though I suspect I'd've been able to climb away from (say) 1200' agl
had I actually encountered "usable lift" (like those first three
thermals) at that altitude, I'll never know. I had, well before then,
picked out where I was likely going to end up setting the ship down, but
I *really* didn't want to have to. Eventually, from my instructed pattern
height, I did, successfully, and that was that. By landout #20, my
mindset was *any* landout ought to be no more mentally stressful than a
routine landing at my home field...if anything less so, because I had
only to "do the field selection thing" and not have to deal with "the
multiple runways at a busy GA airport" thing (far more potential gotchas,
IMO).

By landout #20 I'd also experienced plenty of opportunities to -
gradually and "acceptably-personally-stressfully" - lower my "comfortable
thermalling minimums" to my by then routine pattern entry height agl.
Point being, "low thermalling stress" is a hugely relative concept. Sure
the ground clearance margins are higher for "an equivalent stress level"
for Joe Newbie XC pilot compared to Joe Cool-w.-XC pilot, even if Joe
Cool never performs a "low save by Joe Reader's "even lower definition."
Point being, that I'll dispute any claim that "some definitional safety
altitude" will always prove life-saving. Pilots continue to kill
themselves through unintended departures from controlled flight even
during benign-weather, flying "what should be routine" landing patterns.
Ignoring practical considerations mitigating against it, would
universally raising landing pattern altitudes end such departures from
controlled flight? I think not.

I'm not trying to weasel out of what may have been (an understandable)
difference in perception between "low save" as I had in mind in my
initial post, and "low save" as you interpreted it. I was - and am - more
interested in the mindsets that pilots who indulge in what *they*
consider to be low saves may have, and how those mindsets may - or may
not - affect how they mentally approach flight in conditions of
intentionally-thinned margins. Because, to my way of thinking, thin
margins are an absolute. They respect no one and no level of experience.
Physics doesn't care; physics just is (am?). It's up to Joe Pilot to deal
with physics.

For the record, I've had "pretty well known to me friendly soaring
acquaintances" die from "unintentionally thinned to zero" margins,
ranging from "a (probably) stressed-like-me-newbie" trying to return from
the local ridge (benign day; hit a tree), to someone who somehow or other
managed to spin to the ground from an estimated 2,000' above a
knife-edged ridge (3500+' agl above the adjoining plains) in utterly
benign conditions in a within-CG-range glider, which one of his partners
(a good friend of mine) said flew like a pussycat. Fuzzy memory says the
latter pilot had landed off-field, but in any case how he encountered the
original departure from controlled flight must remain a mystery. Both
pilots were in their later twenties. There have been more...

But to explicitly address the question you've posed, i.e.: "I have seen
pilots die from attempting this ["a low save"], so I MUST ask the
question: what is the perceived benefit from putting your life at risk?"

That, to me, is the million dollar question. I wouldn't bet against
someone replying to the effect that even to indulge in soaring is
"putting your life at risk," but should they, I'd respond along the lines
that life itself is a risk, and that to not indulge in personally
rewarding, voluntary activities (which is just about everything beyond
working to earn one's food/clothing/shelter keep) would be a gray life
indeed, arguably, one hardly worth living.

To my way of thinking, how one chooses to go about approaching soaring
flight with voluntarily thinning/thin margins is an intensely personal
thing, with potentially "friends-n-family-affecting" negative
consequences. I doubt anyone really needs to have that aspect pointed out
to them, when premature death is on the talking table...but I could be
wrong. It's how we - J.A.S. pilot; the sailplane piloting community at
large; CFIGs - mentally approach those higher danger zones that is of
genuine interest to me. I just don't see "hard limits defined by someone
else" as an unarguably, universally, always-safety-enhancing, good thing.
The individual ALWAYS has a say (and a vote) in how they approach flight.
As I gained soaring flight experience, my own thinking tended to evolve
toward thinking it "CERtainly better for me, and probably better for Joe
Every Other Pilot" to embrace the outlook that sensibly expanding one's
flight skills is a good thing...key word being "sensibly."

In an earlier post in this thread I mentioned I'd recently looked at
every U.S. sailplane fatality this century in the NTSB's database.
Ignoring those presently lacking an NTSB-considered "Probable Cause" and
some 20+ I tossed out as too easily rationalizable as "geezer-related" or
"out-of-hand stupid," of the roughly 55 remaining deaths "only" 4 *might*
be attributable to "low thermalling," in the "low save" sense of things,
with "low" being defined as "obviously/apparently below routine ground
clearances for a normal pattern." And to obtain 4, I had to infer one
Sierra fatality. That's 4 too many, and at least one of those deaths
happened in a setting with many witnesses (and families), undoubtedly
searing its way into many minds which would prefer not to be so burdened.
There were 17 (!) "routine pattern" unintended departures from controlled
flight resulting in fatalities, including two with instructors on board
in G-103s. (IMO, perhaps only the 2-33 is a more benign,
routinely-used-in-the-U.S., training ship.) There were additional "should
have been routinely executable" landing patterns (with "departure from
controlled flight deaths") downstream of premature terminations of tows
for various reasons. (I haven't attempted to "hard categorize" every
fatality with a fine brush, broad-brushing satisfying my curiosity. I'm
uninterested in "debating about trees" regarding "category buckets."
However, for anyone seriously interested in discussing things with me on
this front, feel free to do so offline, but understand you'll first need
to go through the NTSB records for yourself...tedious, it is.)

If I'm limited to a single point from the preceding paragraph, it'd be
simply that this century's statistical risk from "low saves" is way out
on one tail, probably regardless of how one chooses to categorize all the
fatalities. By far, many more "average sailplane pilots" die from
"routine flight conditions" than while "obviously pushing this particular
limit."

Bob W.

A "low save" is one where spin recovery is not likely.

If you want to think that the statistical probability of dying while
executing low saves is diminishingly small, so be it. When you know the
pilot who died, as I do, it becomes more personal and real.

I don't particularly care what risks you are willing to take; my intended
audience are those other low time pilots who might be reading this and
acting on the advice.

Tom


For clarity in this particular post, "We can agree," on the above definition
of "low save" (with the caveat noted in the first "bullet" below).

I understand - and can relate to - the sentiment expressed in your middle
paragraph. In a perfect world, neither of us would have to feel as we do. It
is, in fact, "needless deaths" which have long-sparked my interest in flight
safety.

And hoping I'm not whipping a downed horse, perhaps in my attempts to convey
nuance in writing I've been less clear than I'd wish, so allow me an attempt
to be succinct:

- Nowhere throughout this thread have I advised glider pilots to practice low
saves (let's assume above flatlands, simply to avoid the very real
geographical complexities associated with mountain/ridge flying). I simply
chose to use the topic of low saves as a focused topic by way of opening a
larger discussion/"thought experiment".

- In another thread (and link) I admit to (once) having thermalled away from
650' (flatland) agl, and once having entered the landing pattern at 400'
(flatland) agl. I well remember both instances because both pushed my "those
days' sensible" personal limits, not because both were fraught with imminent
(non-margin-related) peril. Under other circumstances, both may easily have
been "stupidly foolish".

- I *have* (and do) encourage every glider pilot to *sensibly* expand their
personal limits, throughout their flying "careers" whether or not they choose
to use "hard safety limits."

- Thin margins are thin margins, regardless of geography or PIC experience.

- Pilots need to *always* be aware when they are thinning their margins
(whether intentionally or otherwise), and fly accordingly, lest lack of such
awareness leads to (say - by way of but one example) attempting a "low save"
in the same manner as they might routinely thermal at (say) 2,000' agl.

- I'm of the opinion that how a sailplane pilot thinks *does* matter, even
though I can't prove it.

Respectfully,
Bob W.

On Thursday, April 7, 2016 at 9:27:16 AM UTC-7, BobW wrote:
Apologies for not cutting this down to size, but I happen to think some of the
thoughts expressed in it are important, perhaps even crucial to some
RASidents' continuing existence?

"This reply" will be found at the bottom of the post...

On 4/6/2016 11:59 PM, 2G wrote:
On Sunday, April 3, 2016 at 8:31:04 PM UTC-7, BobW wrote:
On 4/3/2016 7:12 PM, 2G wrote:
On Sunday, April 3, 2016 at 5:32:27 PM UTC-7, BobW wrote:
On 4/3/2016 7:07 AM, N97MT wrote:
I think that it is ironic that we as CFI's are tasked with turning
the "fear and anxiety" bit into what I would call "healthy respect"
so that real learning can take place. But in the process of beating
the fear out of (or shall I say, selling safety to?) the student
we abstract out a real and potentially life-saving emotion which
may be the only thing keeping an otherwise competent pilot from his
own demise.

Maybe this aspect of flight training is where's Mr. Spock's
mind-meld abilities would prove really useful! (For kids too young to
remember the original TV program "Star Trek," presumably somewhere on
YouTube can be found links to the "Mr. Spock" mind meld reference
above...)

Might not a worthy goal for instruction be transitioning from the
"fear and anxiety" stage to the "healthy respect" stage withOUT
heading down the emotionally-numbing abstraction road? How would Joe
CFIG be able to gauge success? Your abstraction point above had not
before occurred to (non-instructor) me even as a possibility.
Definitely food for thought, though. Thanks!

I raised this at a seminar once when someone was describing a
pre-flight student simulating a spin/crash on Condor. In a hall
full of 150 people and many CFI's in attendance I asked "but did
the student realize that at this point he is dead?" I only got
silence and blank stares in response.

Oh, for group mind-meld capability! Wouldn't you've liked to have
known with certainty the thoughts inside the heads of your fellow
seminarians at that moment?

Bob W.

Your original question was if low saves was a necessary XC skill. A
"low save" is technically the same as a high save; the only difference
is lowering your personal minimums. I have seen pilots die from
attempting this, so I MUST ask the question: what is the perceived
benefit from putting your life at risk?

In a contest it might mean placing a few positions higher, a
meaningless benefit for all but a very few. Or it might mean saving you
and your crew from a long and tiring retrieve, maybe even a overnight
experience. Are you willing to trade 20-50 years of lifetime for this
inconvenience? I would hope that most pilots - and their crew whom are
usually their loved ones - would say, emphatically, NO!


No offense intended, but I disagree with the paraphrase of my initial
post as stated in your first sentence, and for those who may not have
been following this thread from the beginning, immediately below is a
cut-n-paste from that initial post (the quoted paragraphs were separated
by intervening paragraphs):

"In one corner of the thought ring we have "Sensible Caution," while in
the other corner we have "Dangerously (some will say, "Irresponsibly"!)
Encouraging Personal Limits Expansion." The topic itself is LOW SAVES -
are they Killers or are they a Usefully Necessary XC Skill?...

"Let's keep the discussion focused by considering ONLY the topic of "low
altitude saves," sooner or later something every XC-considering
sailplane pilot - having the slightest of imaginations - will consider,
and (by definition) will soon actually have to DO, once undertaking XC,
whether such XC occurs pre-planned or not."

Also, for the record, nowhere throughout the thread have I - or anyone
else that I can recall - attempted to numerically define "low save" (e..g.
via an agl number). In my case the omission was intentional. Why? Because
one person's "low save" may well be another's "routinely necessary XC
skill," as is easily seen when considering (say) Joe Average Sailplane
Pilot's first XC-to-undesired-outlanding vs. (say) his 20th. The mindsets
on these flights will be significantly different. The relative stress
levels as J.A.S. Pilot descends relentlessly - even though maybe not
continuously - down, away from his previously exulting "high on course"
mindset present earlier in the flight, will be significantly different.. I
seriously doubt a sailplane pilot exists who will claim to be as
"systemically stressed" on his 20th XC OFL (or even his 20th XC *flight*)
as on his first. Certainly,not me! On my very first (unintentional)
XC-to-landing, by the time I was down to ~2,000' agl I was SERIOUSLY
stressed, for beaucoup reasons, the only weather-related one being that
the boisterous climbs experienced in thermal #1 off tow, #2 used to go
to #3 one (1-26) thermal away from the field, and #3, seemed to exist now
only as memory. In other words, #4, the sole stepping stone I figured to
need to get back, simply didn't seem to be in the cards. (Yeah, I learned
that day something about differing airmasses!)

Even though I was a raw beginner, and even though I'd cleared the flight
with my (former) instructor, me now a 1/3 partner with him in the 1-26
he'd built from a kit, I was already fighting "I can't believe this is
happening!" thoughts as I "ratty-teasers" descended down to 2,000' agl..
And though I suspect I'd've been able to climb away from (say) 1200' agl
had I actually encountered "usable lift" (like those first three
thermals) at that altitude, I'll never know. I had, well before then,
picked out where I was likely going to end up setting the ship down, but
I *really* didn't want to have to. Eventually, from my instructed pattern
height, I did, successfully, and that was that. By landout #20, my
mindset was *any* landout ought to be no more mentally stressful than a
routine landing at my home field...if anything less so, because I had
only to "do the field selection thing" and not have to deal with "the
multiple runways at a busy GA airport" thing (far more potential gotchas,
IMO).

By landout #20 I'd also experienced plenty of opportunities to -
gradually and "acceptably-personally-stressfully" - lower my "comfortable
thermalling minimums" to my by then routine pattern entry height agl.
Point being, "low thermalling stress" is a hugely relative concept. Sure
the ground clearance margins are higher for "an equivalent stress level"
for Joe Newbie XC pilot compared to Joe Cool-w.-XC pilot, even if Joe
Cool never performs a "low save by Joe Reader's "even lower definition.."
Point being, that I'll dispute any claim that "some definitional safety
altitude" will always prove life-saving. Pilots continue to kill
themselves through unintended departures from controlled flight even
during benign-weather, flying "what should be routine" landing patterns.
Ignoring practical considerations mitigating against it, would
universally raising landing pattern altitudes end such departures from
controlled flight? I think not.

I'm not trying to weasel out of what may have been (an understandable)
difference in perception between "low save" as I had in mind in my
initial post, and "low save" as you interpreted it. I was - and am - more
interested in the mindsets that pilots who indulge in what *they*
consider to be low saves may have, and how those mindsets may - or may
not - affect how they mentally approach flight in conditions of
intentionally-thinned margins. Because, to my way of thinking, thin
margins are an absolute. They respect no one and no level of experience.
Physics doesn't care; physics just is (am?). It's up to Joe Pilot to deal
with physics.

For the record, I've had "pretty well known to me friendly soaring
acquaintances" die from "unintentionally thinned to zero" margins,
ranging from "a (probably) stressed-like-me-newbie" trying to return from
the local ridge (benign day; hit a tree), to someone who somehow or other
managed to spin to the ground from an estimated 2,000' above a
knife-edged ridge (3500+' agl above the adjoining plains) in utterly
benign conditions in a within-CG-range glider, which one of his partners
(a good friend of mine) said flew like a pussycat. Fuzzy memory says the
latter pilot had landed off-field, but in any case how he encountered the
original departure from controlled flight must remain a mystery. Both
pilots were in their later twenties. There have been more...

But to explicitly address the question you've posed, i.e.: "I have seen
pilots die from attempting this ["a low save"], so I MUST ask the
question: what is the perceived benefit from putting your life at risk?"

That, to me, is the million dollar question. I wouldn't bet against
someone replying to the effect that even to indulge in soaring is
"putting your life at risk," but should they, I'd respond along the lines
that life itself is a risk, and that to not indulge in personally
rewarding, voluntary activities (which is just about everything beyond
working to earn one's food/clothing/shelter keep) would be a gray life
indeed, arguably, one hardly worth living.

To my way of thinking, how one chooses to go about approaching soaring
flight with voluntarily thinning/thin margins is an intensely personal
thing, with potentially "friends-n-family-affecting" negative
consequences. I doubt anyone really needs to have that aspect pointed out
to them, when premature death is on the talking table...but I could be
wrong. It's how we - J.A.S. pilot; the sailplane piloting community at
large; CFIGs - mentally approach those higher danger zones that is of
genuine interest to me. I just don't see "hard limits defined by someone
else" as an unarguably, universally, always-safety-enhancing, good thing.
The individual ALWAYS has a say (and a vote) in how they approach flight.
As I gained soaring flight experience, my own thinking tended to evolve
toward thinking it "CERtainly better for me, and probably better for Joe
Every Other Pilot" to embrace the outlook that sensibly expanding one's
flight skills is a good thing...key word being "sensibly."

In an earlier post in this thread I mentioned I'd recently looked at
every U.S. sailplane fatality this century in the NTSB's database.
Ignoring those presently lacking an NTSB-considered "Probable Cause" and
some 20+ I tossed out as too easily rationalizable as "geezer-related" or
"out-of-hand stupid," of the roughly 55 remaining deaths "only" 4 *might*
be attributable to "low thermalling," in the "low save" sense of things,
with "low" being defined as "obviously/apparently below routine ground
clearances for a normal pattern." And to obtain 4, I had to infer one
Sierra fatality. That's 4 too many, and at least one of those deaths
happened in a setting with many witnesses (and families), undoubtedly
searing its way into many minds which would prefer not to be so burdened.
There were 17 (!) "routine pattern" unintended departures from controlled
flight resulting in fatalities, including two with instructors on board
in G-103s. (IMO, perhaps only the 2-33 is a more benign,
routinely-used-in-the-U.S., training ship.) There were additional "should
have been routinely executable" landing patterns (with "departure from
controlled flight deaths") downstream of premature terminations of tows
for various reasons. (I haven't attempted to "hard categorize" every
fatality with a fine brush, broad-brushing satisfying my curiosity. I'm
uninterested in "debating about trees" regarding "category buckets."
However, for anyone seriously interested in discussing things with me on
this front, feel free to do so offline, but understand you'll first need
to go through the NTSB records for yourself...tedious, it is.)

If I'm limited to a single point from the preceding paragraph, it'd be
simply that this century's statistical risk from "low saves" is way out
on one tail, probably regardless of how one chooses to categorize all the
fatalities. By far, many more "average sailplane pilots" die from
"routine flight conditions" than while "obviously pushing this particular
limit."

Bob W.

A "low save" is one where spin recovery is not likely.

If you want to think that the statistical probability of dying while
executing low saves is diminishingly small, so be it. When you know the
pilot who died, as I do, it becomes more personal and real.

I don't particularly care what risks you are willing to take; my intended
audience are those other low time pilots who might be reading this and
acting on the advice.

Tom


For clarity in this particular post, "We can agree," on the above definition
of "low save" (with the caveat noted in the first "bullet" below).

I understand - and can relate to - the sentiment expressed in your middle
paragraph. In a perfect world, neither of us would have to feel as we do. It
is, in fact, "needless deaths" which have long-sparked my interest in flight
safety.

And hoping I'm not whipping a downed horse, perhaps in my attempts to convey
nuance in writing I've been less clear than I'd wish, so allow me an attempt
to be succinct:

- Nowhere throughout this thread have I advised glider pilots to practice low
saves (let's assume above flatlands, simply to avoid the very real
geographical complexities associated with mountain/ridge flying). I simply
chose to use the topic of low saves as a focused topic by way of opening a
larger discussion/"thought experiment".

- In another thread (and link) I admit to (once) having thermalled away from
650' (flatland) agl, and once having entered the landing pattern at 400'
(flatland) agl. I well remember both instances because both pushed my "those
days' sensible" personal limits, not because both were fraught with imminent
(non-margin-related) peril. Under other circumstances, both may easily have
been "stupidly foolish".

- I *have* (and do) encourage every glider pilot to *sensibly* expand their
personal limits, throughout their flying "careers" whether or not they choose
to use "hard safety limits."

- Thin margins are thin margins, regardless of geography or PIC experience.

- Pilots need to *always* be aware when they are thinning their margins
(whether intentionally or otherwise), and fly accordingly, lest lack of such
awareness leads to (say - by way of but one example) attempting a "low save"
in the same manner as they might routinely thermal at (say) 2,000' agl.

- I'm of the opinion that how a sailplane pilot thinks *does* matter, even
though I can't prove it.

Respectfully,
Bob W.

As I have already said, my comments are directed a towards low-time pilots who are reading this and are formulating their own personal risk/benefit analysis. If you are willing to take calculated risks your assessment of the risk level better be pretty good, which can only be developed after years and, perhaps, thousands of hours of flying. Certainly, your 200 hr pilot will not have those skills. This is the experience level where the accident rate climbs significantly; they overestimate their capabilities.

Statistical analysis can be misleading. The Concord has the best safety record in the industry until one crashed - then they had the worst. The odds of a certain maneuver going wrong after 1000 attempts is the same as the first attempt. A pilot with 10,000 hr will die just as dead as a 100 hr pilot in a stall spin crash.

I have found that there a group of people on this group that are down right antagonistic towards any discussion of safety to the point of being abusive. I know they will always be out there and are not receptive to risk analysis.

I am WELL AWARE that flying involves risks which cannot be eliminated. But they CAN be managed. During the summer I fly in eastern Nevada where afternoon thunderstorms are common and landable fields, let alone airports, are scarce. Some of us have developed our own risk threshold: if the forecast probability of thunderstorms in the area are 30% or higher we don't fly. My simple rule is: I would rather be on the ground wishing I was up flying than be up flying wishing I was on the ground.

Tom

I agree with 2G - I am a low time pilot - I know other LTP's that read this blog and most do not reply, but many believe experienced high skilled guys write.

I have had a few mentors (as I am trying to become a contest pilot) - all of them have given me the same advice - "have a AGL deck where you stop flying and start landing" - and I have been told "I have 10,000 flights and can count on one hand the number of times I have successfully dug out from 400 ft AGL".

For me it is a risk vs. reward - we know the ultimate risk..... the reward is ???? (there are no chicks, money or sponsorship's) - so I guess the reward is having a tale to tell.

My suggestion to LTP's: do what most experienced contest pilots do/tell you - and fabricate a really good story - most people will believe you - and you get to live to tell about it

WH1

On 4/7/2016 2:36 PM, wrote:

I agree with 2G - I am a low time pilot - I know other LTP's that read this
blog and most do not reply, but many believe experienced high skilled guys
write.

I have had a few mentors (as I am trying to become a contest pilot) - all
of them have given me the same advice - "have a AGL deck where you stop
flying and start landing" - and I have been told "I have 10,000 flights and
can count on one hand the number of times I have successfully dug out from
400 ft AGL".

Actually, the longer the conversation continues, the more I think 2G and I are
in fundamental agreement, as I'll touch upon (briefly - honest!) below.

As for the advice you're getting, it's: 1) EXCELLENT, and 2) the same I give
everyone, regardless of experience or situation, whenever the topic of "When
should I break it off and land?" arises. Always - and I mean always - have a
height agl in mind at which you are *committed* to landing. That height may
well be lower than that at which you chose your ultimate field/approach (even
in the absence of attempting a "low save" as defined by 2G a few posts ago),
but it's a "hard deck." What it is depends on you, weather, geography...all
the things that go into how you assess your capabilities that time, that day.
And - so sensible pilots all hope! - it's not something you ginned like the
credits on "Monty Python and the Holy Grail"...you know, at great haste and at
the last moment.


For me it is a risk vs. reward - we know the ultimate risk..... the reward
is ???? (there are no chicks, money or sponsorship's) - so I guess the
reward is having a tale to tell.

Worrisomely to say, many's the time an "O'beer Thirty" B.S. session has led me
to seriously wonder if some pilots actually DO "unthinkingly" push their
personal limits primarily with "tale telling" as an (the?) active concept in
the backs of their noodles. Yeah, it scares me to listen to such tales...and
if I can do it without cutting them off at the psychological knees, I
generally look for a way to ask them, "What were you *thinking*?"


My suggestion to LTP's: do what most experienced contest pilots do/tell you
- and fabricate a really good story - most people will believe you - and
you get to live to tell about it

WH1


"What WH1 said!"
- - - - -

From the post to which WHI replied, 2G wrote (with snips):


As I have already said, my comments are directed a towards low-time pilots
who are reading this and are formulating their own personal risk/benefit
analysis. If you are willing to take calculated risks your assessment of
the risk level better be pretty good, which can only be developed after
years and, perhaps, thousands of hours of flying. Certainly, your 200 hr
pilot will not have those skills. This is the experience level where the
accident rate climbs significantly; they overestimate their capabilities.

We're in 100% agreement here! (And for the record, my posts were directed not
at pilots of "a certain experience level" but at pilots of ANY experience
level who maybe have not "sensibly thought through" how they mentally approach
flight at reducing/reduced margins. Again, I'm of the opinion that how they
think about flight in the "thin margin regime" matters.)
- - - - - -


Statistical analysis can be misleading. The Concord has the best safety
record in the industry until one crashed - then they had the worst. The
odds of a certain maneuver going wrong after 1000 attempts is the same as
the first attempt. A pilot with 10,000 hr will die just as dead as a 100 hr
pilot in a stall spin crash.

More 100% agreement!
- - - - - -


I have found that there a group of people on this group that are down right
antagonistic towards any discussion of safety to the point of being
abusive. I know they will always be out there and are not receptive to risk
analysis.

Such, indeed, is the world. Happily, in my experience, this sort of attitude
is far less common in soaring aficionados than in society in general, or (sad
to say) even in certain segments of the aviation community...
- - - - - -


I am WELL AWARE that flying involves risks which cannot be eliminated. But
they CAN be managed. During the summer I fly in eastern Nevada where
afternoon thunderstorms are common and landable fields, let alone airports,
are scarce. Some of us have developed our own risk threshold: if the
forecast probability of thunderstorms in the area are 30% or higher we
don't fly. My simple rule is: I would rather be on the ground wishing I was
up flying than be up flying wishing I was on the ground.

More 100% agreement! "Mentally ACTIVE" management is what I'm advocating for.
My very first - regrettably, not my last - microburst experience was one of
those "I wish I was on the ground!" situations. By the time I'd managed to
work myself onto some semblance of a final approach into a grass strip from
which a C-182 regularly flew, it had occurred to me that if - after the
arrival - I could even *walk* (and SCREW the airframe!), I'd be overjoyed.
That was one of the (very many) days when I learned something(s) about weather
I've yet to find in a book, namely that microbursts don't require massive
thunderstorms (or even thunderstorms at all), high cloudbases, or "obviously
menacing" weather. None of those existed that day.

Bob W.

On Thursday, April 7, 2016 at 1:36:03 PM UTC-7, wrote:
For me it is a risk vs. reward - we know the ultimate risk..... the reward is ???? (there are no chicks, money or sponsorship's) - so I guess the reward is having a tale to tell.

For those of us who have no crew, the reward can be not spending the night in a field, something which I've done more than once.

The problem here is that off-field-landings are not something that can be realistically taught, particularly in mountainous areas like I often fly in. Some places will provide training in the form of having an instructor talk you through landing in a known unobstructed field large enough to aerotow from afterwards. That is not the sort of field you'll always end up in when you are on your own. So, you end up listening to advice from instructors (who may or may not have ever landed in a field), more "experienced" pilots (who may have gotten into bad habits), reading books, or r.a.s. (there are very experienced and sensible pilots posting here, you have to recognize which ones, though). Oddly enough, in one club I belonged to, just about every time a club glider was broken in a field, a club instructor was onboard.

Do listen to those with local knowledge that know the kinds of issues and obstructions that you are likely encounter, things like how recognize if a field is long enough and which way it may be sloping, how to determine wind direction near ground level, how to recognize where wires and fences may be, what kind of irrigation equipment might be present, how to recognize the different local crops and how tall they are likely to be at that time of year, what to do if animals are present, whether dry lakes are really dry, etc. In the end, though, you really are on your own once you start going cross-country. Each pilot has to develop their own techniques and change them as experience teaches.

Personally, I've landed in actual fields perhaps 20 times in 25+ years of XC flying, and the most damage I've done (so far) is scuffed up the underside of the nose when the field turns out to be soft (I've done more damage landing at airports, but I do that 30X more often). I've always circled a field I'm planning to land in at least twice, looking for things I don't like, and have several times switched to an alternate field, or switched to approaching from a different direction, when I've spotted obstructions. Also, under 1000 ft AGL I'm checking airspeed every few seconds, as in mountainous terrain it's easy to get fooled into flying too slow. I make sure I'm very comfortable slipping close to the ground in any glider before I go cross-country in it (or better yet, have a glider with good drag producing flaps), as I like to make high circular approaches into fields, and keep the airspeed at approach speed or higher.

And, yes, I've climbed away a few times with the gear down from what would normally be a high turn from base to final, but I don't like sleeping in fields. Has worked for me, may not work for anyone else...

Marc