Number of active soaring pilots in the US?

I am trying to get a handle on the number of active soaring pilots in
the US for some statistical studies. In 2003 John Roake from New
Zeeland stated in a table he developed that the number was 29390. He
also stated that the FAA and SSA numbers were not representative. I am
looking for ideas on how to firm up these numbers so they make sense.
The SSA membership numbers were less than half the developed numbers.
I know that you don't have to be a member of the SSA to be a soaring
pilot in the US but to claim that half the soaring pilots in the US do
not fly at established sites seems a fair stretch. Any ideas?

Bob

On May 15, 7:30*am, Bob wrote:
I am trying to get a handle on the number of active soaring pilots in
the US for some statistical studies. In 2003 John Roake from New
Zeeland stated in a table he developed that the number was 29390. He
also stated that the FAA and SSA numbers were not representative. I am
looking for ideas on how to firm up these numbers so they make sense.
The SSA membership numbers were less than half the developed numbers.
I know that you don't have to be a member of the SSA to be a soaring
pilot in the US but to claim that half the soaring pilots in the US do
not fly at established sites seems a fair stretch. Any ideas?

Bob

I'm trying to get a reliable count of glider pilots as well. Here's
some things to think about.

Until recently the FAA determined if you were an active pilot by
whether you hold a medical certificate. That played havoc with
counting active glider pilots who aren't required to have one.

A large minority of glider certificate holders are just "rating
collectors" who will probably never fly a glider again after getting
their rating but are counted in the FAA numbers as "glider pilots".

Some fraction of SSA members no longer fly but maintain their
membership for the magazine. A fairly large number - perhaps half -
of active glider pilots are not SSA members. The non-SSA member
pilots probably fly with glider FBO's since most, but not all, clubs
are SSA chapters with SSA insurance.

All of the above make it hard to come up with a reliable number of
'active' pilots. At least, we have to agree on what 'active' means.
One fairly consistent number is that ~ 50% of dues paying club members
and glider FBO customers will have flown at least once in the past 12
months.

Lets get together by email to exchange numbers.

Bill Daniels
Chairman, SSA Growth and Development Committee

My WAG would be about 5-6 thousand. Defining active is tricky,
say at least one flight per year as PIC or actively training. Iirc
there are about 5k gliders in the US, some shared some parked
indefinitely. Why not ask the SSA to add 'how many glider
flights last year' question to their renewal form. Getting a list of
SSA members and checking it against a list of glider owners you
could get an idea of likely active non SSA members.

At 14:39 15 May 2009, bildan wrote:
On May 15, 7:30=A0am, Bob wrote:
I am trying to get a handle on the number of active soaring
pilots in
the US for some statistical studies. In 2003 John Roake from
New
Zeeland stated in a table he developed that the number was
29390. He
also stated that the FAA and SSA numbers were not
representative. I am
looking for ideas on how to firm up these numbers so they
make sense.
The SSA membership numbers were less than half the
developed numbers.
I know that you don't have to be a member of the SSA to be
a soaring
pilot in the US but to claim that half the soaring pilots in the
US do
not fly at established sites seems a fair stretch. Any ideas?

Bob

I'm trying to get a reliable count of glider pilots as well. Here's
some things to think about.

Until recently the FAA determined if you were an active pilot
by
whether you hold a medical certificate. That played havoc
with
counting active glider pilots who aren't required to have one.

A large minority of glider certificate holders are just "rating
collectors" who will probably never fly a glider again after
getting
their rating but are counted in the FAA numbers as "glider
pilots".

Some fraction of SSA members no longer fly but maintain
their
membership for the magazine. A fairly large number -
perhaps half -
of active glider pilots are not SSA members. The non-SSA
member
pilots probably fly with glider FBO's since most, but not all,
clubs
are SSA chapters with SSA insurance.

All of the above make it hard to come up with a reliable
number of
'active' pilots. At least, we have to agree on what 'active'
means.
One fairly consistent number is that ~ 50% of dues paying
club members
and glider FBO customers will have flown at least once in the
past 12
months.

Lets get together by email to exchange numbers.

Bill Daniels
Chairman, SSA Growth and Development Committee

On May 15, 9:00*am, Gregg Ballou wrote:
My WAG would be about 5-6 thousand. *Defining active is tricky,
say at least one flight per year as PIC or actively training. * Iirc
there are about 5k gliders in the US, some shared some parked
indefinitely. *Why not ask the SSA to add 'how many glider
flights last year' question to their renewal form. *Getting a list of
SSA members and checking it against a list of glider owners you
could get an idea of likely active non SSA members. *

A little insight here. The FAA civil airman statistics office has a
newish director, following a 14 year run by her predecessor. Back in
2002, glider ratings sans medical were finally counted. The
'sanitized' 2008 year-end numbers have only now been posted on the FAA
web site and list 29,214 Estimated Active Glider Pilots. This varies
only slightly from the 29,192 ratings I reported to John Roake in
January (for the World Gliding Report) based on the January public
releasable database. This is much closer than prior years, which
differed by 500 to 1000 between what's available in January and what's
published in May.

New pilots have had the option of withholding their social security
numbers when applying for a student certificate and when achieving a
rating for some time now. This will make it increasingly difficult
(by their own admission) for the FAA to reconcile their records with
the SSA (Social Security Admin) should a pilot expire. Several
expired pilots are always in the publicly releasable database. The
monthly publicly releasable pilot database does not include those
pilots who've requested to restrict release of their contact
information. By name and rating, they are still listed in the online
search. As pilots are moving from the paper to plastic certificates,
they are also given the opt-out option again from the public release
of their contact information. Some have been checking this, some
without realizing they've done so. I've asked. The FAA says 7% of all
rated pilots have opted for non-release. When asking for the total
number of glider ratings on the fly, the FAA reports back about
37,000, but clearly this differs from the year end reports because it
also includes foreign addresses holding US glider ratings. That
number is approximately 7900 and also available from the FAA in a
releasable format.

This says nothing of actual activity. The COBM response was that
operational stats are unlikely to be forthcoming from commercial
operators. That may be based on markets where there are commercial
options for pilots. At least one SSA region doesn't have a single
commercial operator, with chapters providing both public and member
services. Other commercial operators are perhaps a bit more exclusive
on the actual type and level of training they'll provide, as Bill
Daniels discovered. So the information may be considered proprietary
by some number of commercial operators. Chapter numbers are also a
bit difficult to come by as 2/3 of the clubs and chapters are not very
forthcoming with information of any sort, let alone operational
statistics. Then there are about a dozen clubs that don't have an SSA
affiliation as an entity and an unknown number of commercial
operations. So, unlike countries that do have authoritative oversight
of their soaring groups, we have to rely of the voluntary interest and
submission of such data.

That said, there are approaches we might consider to really start
collecting such data (anonymously perhaps) as a voluntary, non-profit,
member and member-services organization and doing so with chapter and
business member enhancements and not burdening the operators. Happy
to discuss this elsewhere and I highly encourage you and other SSA
members consider volunteering with a committee of interest.

Very best regards,

Frank Whiteley
Chair, SSA State Governors and Record Keepers Committee
SSA Clubs & Chapters Committee
SSA Growth & Development Committee
SSA Growth Task Force
SSA Governor, Colorado
www.coloradosoaring.org
970-330-2050

My personal back of the envelope estimates are pretty close to your
WAG of 5-6 thousand. The 29 thousandish estimates are clearly insane
for any reasonable definition of an active pilot.

Personally, I like to look at how many clubs and commercial operations
there are (since these are easier to count), and then guestimate
roughly how many ACTIVE pilots there are at each. Having spent time
at a number of clubs and some of the larger commercial FBOs, I have a
feeling for what are reasonable numbers of active pilots at an
operation. I really have a tough time coming up with more than five-
seven thousandish active pilots. If there are more, then where are
they hiding?


On May 15, 7:00*am, Gregg Ballou wrote:
My WAG would be about 5-6 thousand. *Defining active is tricky,
say at least one flight per year as PIC or actively training. * Iirc
there are about 5k gliders in the US, some shared some parked
indefinitely. *Why not ask the SSA to add 'how many glider
flights last year' question to their renewal form. *Getting a list of
SSA members and checking it against a list of glider owners you
could get an idea of likely active non SSA members. *

At 14:39 15 May 2009, bildan wrote:On May 15, 7:30=A0am, Bob *wrote:
I am trying to get a handle on the number of active soaring
pilots in
the US for some statistical studies. In 2003 John Roake from
New
Zeeland stated in a table he developed that the number was
29390. He
also stated that the FAA and SSA numbers were not

representative. I am

looking for ideas on how to firm up these numbers so they
make sense.
The SSA membership numbers were less than half the
developed numbers.
I know that you don't have to be a member of the SSA to be
a soaring
pilot in the US but to claim that half the soaring pilots in the
US do
not fly at established sites seems a fair stretch. Any ideas?

Bob

I'm trying to get a reliable count of glider pilots as well. *Here's
some things to think about.

Until recently the FAA determined if you were an active pilot
by
whether you hold a medical certificate. *That played havoc
with
counting active glider pilots who aren't required to have one.

A large minority of glider certificate holders are just "rating
collectors" who will probably never fly a glider again after
getting
their rating but are counted in the FAA numbers as "glider
pilots".

Some fraction of SSA members no longer fly but maintain
their
membership for the magazine. *A fairly large number -
perhaps half -
of active glider pilots are not SSA members. *The non-SSA
member
pilots probably fly with glider FBO's since most, but not all,
clubs
are SSA chapters with SSA insurance.

All of the above make it hard to come up with a reliable
number of
'active' pilots. *At least, we have to agree on what 'active'
means.
One fairly consistent number is that ~ 50% of dues paying
club members
and glider FBO customers will have flown at least once in the
past 12
months.

Lets get together by email to exchange numbers.

Bill Daniels
Chairman, SSA Growth and Development Committee

It may also depend on how you define "active." There were about 800 US
pilots posting to the OLC last year, and I believe that would cover most
pilots who are "active" in one sense of the word.



wrote:
My personal back of the envelope estimates are pretty close to your
WAG of 5-6 thousand. The 29 thousandish estimates are clearly insane
for any reasonable definition of an active pilot.

Personally, I like to look at how many clubs and commercial operations
there are (since these are easier to count), and then guestimate
roughly how many ACTIVE pilots there are at each. Having spent time
at a number of clubs and some of the larger commercial FBOs, I have a
feeling for what are reasonable numbers of active pilots at an
operation. I really have a tough time coming up with more than five-
seven thousandish active pilots. If there are more, then where are
they hiding?


On May 15, 7:00 am, Gregg Ballou wrote:
My WAG would be about 5-6 thousand. Defining active is tricky,
say at least one flight per year as PIC or actively training. Iirc
there are about 5k gliders in the US, some shared some parked
indefinitely. Why not ask the SSA to add 'how many glider
flights last year' question to their renewal form. Getting a list of
SSA members and checking it against a list of glider owners you
could get an idea of likely active non SSA members.

At 14:39 15 May 2009, bildan wrote:On May 15, 7:30=A0am, Bob wrote:
I am trying to get a handle on the number of active soaring
pilots in
the US for some statistical studies. In 2003 John Roake from
New
Zeeland stated in a table he developed that the number was
29390. He
also stated that the FAA and SSA numbers were not
representative. I am

looking for ideas on how to firm up these numbers so they
make sense.
The SSA membership numbers were less than half the
developed numbers.
I know that you don't have to be a member of the SSA to be
a soaring
pilot in the US but to claim that half the soaring pilots in the
US do
not fly at established sites seems a fair stretch. Any ideas?
Bob
I'm trying to get a reliable count of glider pilots as well. Here's
some things to think about.
Until recently the FAA determined if you were an active pilot
by
whether you hold a medical certificate. That played havoc
with
counting active glider pilots who aren't required to have one.
A large minority of glider certificate holders are just "rating
collectors" who will probably never fly a glider again after
getting
their rating but are counted in the FAA numbers as "glider
pilots".

Some fraction of SSA members no longer fly but maintain
their
membership for the magazine. A fairly large number -
perhaps half -
of active glider pilots are not SSA members. The non-SSA
member
pilots probably fly with glider FBO's since most, but not all,
clubs
are SSA chapters with SSA insurance.
All of the above make it hard to come up with a reliable
number of
'active' pilots. At least, we have to agree on what 'active'
means.
One fairly consistent number is that ~ 50% of dues paying
club members
and glider FBO customers will have flown at least once in the
past 12
months.
Lets get together by email to exchange numbers.
Bill Daniels
Chairman, SSA Growth and Development Committee

On May 15, 12:20*pm, Greg Arnold wrote:
It may also depend on how you define "active." *There were about 800 US
pilots posting to the OLC last year, and I believe that would cover most
pilots who are "active" in one sense of the word.

Not sure, I don't think more than 20% of my club's members post to
OLC, including one who set a NM 1000k speed triangle record last
year. I think SSA-OLC submissions are a good idea, especially for
those flying experimental/racing sailplanes, and for a number of other
reasons.

Respondents (~200) to a continuing survey of lapsed/former SSA members
has consistently shown that about 18% are still flying and 59%
consider themselves temporarily inactive for a variety of reasons.
There are significant numbers of rated private and commercial glider
pilots, including CFI-G's, that have never been SSA members. Can't
put my finger on the number at the moment, but IIRC about 6700 SSA
members were chapter members around the first of the year and most are
actively flying if the chapters I'm most familiar with are any
indication. There are a about dozen non-chapter clubs and another
half dozen operating as business members. My guessimate may be more
like 8500-10,500 active rated pilots. From my days in California/
Nevada, there were a lot of glider pilots with no club affiliations,
though PASCO gatherings were rather club-like. There are many senior
pilots with glider ratings that are no longer active and their numbers
are decreasing a quite a rate and the rate of replacement is not
keeping up with the decline.

See
http://www.soaringchapters.org/think..._1990_2008.pdf

Frank Whiteley

I would be interested to know how many new student glider pilots there
are each year, and how many of those go on to get their private
license, and how many of those remain "active"

Matt

On May 15, 9:48*pm, Matt wrote:
I would be interested to know how many new student glider pilots there
are each year, and how many of those go on to get their private
license, and how many of those remain "active"

Matt

That would be even more difficult as the FAA doesn't track by student
rating in progress, that is, they don't differentiate between a glider
and a power student. Still need to draw some correlations on the
lapsed/former. Of those responding 53% soloed, 31% completed the A,B,
or C badge, 33% completed a private glider rating, 12% a commercial
rating, 12% a bronze badge, and 9% a silver badge. 29% reported
achieving none of the stated achievements, which included other items
up to national records and national team.

Frank