chga@mail.folkriver.com
Saturday crashLauren Tjaden - 2004/04/25 13:11:16 UTC
Though not a comp day (for the regionals), Saturday's forecast looked more promising than Sunday's, so Paul and I swapped our day off and aimed to go out and have some fun. Finally bet that Ridgely would have the best conditions. The Pulpit looked cross from the right, and besides, the Temporary Flight Restrictions are in place for High Rock, so cross country of any length would be impossible.
First time I towed, I struggled to stay up 15 minutes, and no-one else excelled, either. But the 2nd time I found a line of lift. Very odd working it. Turbulent, impossible to core. I was about to give up when it occurred to me that it might be the edge of the thermal that was so rough, that the thermal might just be huge. I flew in a straight line -- gaining altitude -- for a couple of minutes. To my surprise, I was right. I reached a smooth core and then it all became easy.
Paul joined me, and at 3500 we decided to leave the airport. I have never flown XC with anyone before. Turned out with the light lift (no more than 400 up per minute, at best) we made a good team. Paul hollered at me from above when I veered off course, which I found easy to do in the blue conditions (and being a left-handed dyslexic). However, with my slow speeds and light feel, I often found lift Paul missed. I was extremely pleased to be able to contribute to the flight and get us up a couple of times, instead of just slowing Paul down.
I was afraid to cross the Choptank River, but Paul laughed and pointed out that with our 4500 feet of altitude, we could glide for miles. This flight as much fun as I've ever had. We spiraled together for an hour, helped each other, shouted encouragement, located lift.
Somewhere between 15 and 20 miles out we lost the lift big time and began to plummet towards the earth. I couldn't believe when a thermal bubbled up under my wings at only 1000 feet, over a field I had choosen to land in. Paul tried to join me but he was 500 feet lower and didn't have a chance. I watched him land as I nursed the little bubble to 1700.
Paul beaked on landing, but then his glider didn't move. I radioed but heard nothing. I began to scream for Paul and started down but still heard nothing. Finally the glider moved a foot or two, and Paul came on the radio. He said he was badly hurt and I needed to land.
Good old adrenilin; I landed 10 feet from Paul perfectly -- never hit a spot like that in my life before. Paul was really scared. He couldn't feel his arm at all when he touched it and it hung behind him at a weird angle. I was trying to unhook and turn around my glider so it wouldn't blow away, and rush to Paul, all at the same time.
Called 911 but the GPS -- for the first time ever -- had wrong mapping info and the ambulance couldn't find us. I finally bolted across the field and found a farmer who gave me the real address. In the meantime, the emergency folks sent out a helicopter to look for us. The helicopter landed about the same moment that the police and the ambulance arrived. What a circus. Cindy and George and John Muldoon and PK all drove over with our truck and helped me pack up (oh, I owe you guys forever). Paul got packed into the ambulance and driven to Seaport hospital.
Long story made shorter. Bad spiral fracture of the upper arm. Paul's probably out of riding and flying for 6 months. No immediate surgery, but the docs had to knock him out to get the cast on, so we hung out until really late. Arrived home at 300 AM. We'll see what our Orthopedic doc says.
So, I'm sorry to have lost my flying buddy when we just started to have so much fun together, but I am grateful he will be better and fine and everything can be fixed. Paul is tough, already making jokes about how he had to go break his arm just to keep me from outflying him. Good attitude. He will be fine soon. He is sleeping, is very drugged. Will have to sleep sitting up for 3 months, apparently. Interesting day, huh?
I am so tired I am hallucinating, but better get some work done here. Speck out today, fly safe.
chga@mail.folkriver.com
http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=25536Paul Tjaden - 2004/04/26 17:01:06 UTC
Hi everyone,
Hope all of you don't mind receiving a group mailing thanking you for your kind thoughts regarding my recent misfortune. It's a bit uncomfortable sitting at the keyboard for too long and typing with one hand is even slower than my usual snail's pace.
Thought I'd try to explain why this happened. As Lauren, wrote in her earlier post, we were having a ball working the light lift as we flew downwind together. Lauren had more than held up her end on several occasions and we were doing quite well with gains to just under 4,800 msl. I't's hard to explain how much joy there is in flying and working the sky together thousands of feet in the air with your Honey and life partner. Definitely the high point of my flying career. Anyway, we were just past 15 miles out and getting quite low for the first time. With my faster glider, I had taken the lead looking for lift and Lauren was following a couple hundred yards to my right when she radioed she had something she thought was workable. I immediately turned back towards her but hit outrageous sink as I attempted to reach her location. I managed to make it to her but had lost too much altitude and at 400 feet was unable to get back up.
There was a friendly field just below me but I could see the grass and small weeds blowing dramatically as the thermal Lauren was climbing in pulled air in from nearby. I chose the side of the field away from this disturbance and started an uneventful approach to an obvious upwind landing. Everything seemed quite normal until just before I started my round out. At that time I felt a sudden acceleration and drop and my groundspeed increased dramatically. Can't be certain, but I think it may have been the rush of air going outward from the sink usually found on the outer edge of thermals. At any rate, I suddenly found myself in a strong downwind situation. Never really had time to flare, just found myself being pounded in to the ground at fairly high speed. The soil was too soft and sandy for my wheels to roll and I whacked hard. The glider never went over on top and I didn't break or bend any aluminum so it must have not been that extreme but apparently I was thrown through the control frame violently enough to cause a spiral fracture of my left humerous.
When the dust settled, I found it difficult to get the glider off of me and to get on my feet. It was then I realized I couldn't use or feel my left arm. Looking over my left shoulder, I saw it hanging behind me at a ridiculous angle. I reached over with my right hand and grabbed my left wrist to pull it forward and, to my horror, it honestly felt like a limp peace of meat. Now don't laugh here but for a while I thought I had mangled it so badly that it was only being held on by my jacket and some sinew. It really scared the hell out of me. Apparently, the main nerve runs along the broken bone and was so traumatized that it shut down for a while. I was not completely convinced it was still attached until the feeling started returning and Lauren was able to help me out of my jacket.
About this time, I heard Lauren frantically calling to see if I was OK. I told her I was hurt badly and needed her help. She flew out of her lift at 1,700 feet and dropped in for a perfect landing not 20 feet away. Don't know what I'd have done without her. I guess I eventually would have gotten my phone out and called for help but it sure was nice having her to care for me and arrange help. Something to think about when we fly XC alone.
Guess you know the rest from Lauren's post. Looks like I'll be out of commission for some time and back to my old job as retrieve driver.
Regarding how this could have been avoided, I'm not sure what to say. When Lauren landed, the winds had returned to normal, and she touched down with a nice, steady head wind. Perhaps I kept fighting too long and should have given up at a higher altitude but that would not have changed my choice of a landing location and would have probably changed my time of landing by only a few seconds. My approach was not hurried and I felt completely organized until the final seconds. It's always exciting to land where a thermal is kicking off but we've all done it before with much better outcomes than this. Perhaps I'll have to put it down to s--t happens but considering the results, I'd sure like to think I could control this situation better should it occur again. Maybe some of you have ideas. I'd love to hear them.
Thanks again for all your posts. Yawl be careful out there and...'I'll be back''.
Whoops! Snapped another tip wand :-O
NMERider - 2012/03/14 15:17:14 UTC
Jim Rooney threw a big tantrum and stopped posting here.
His one-technique-fits-all attitude espoused on the Oz Report Forum has become tiresome to read. It does not work in the fucked-up world of XC landings and weary pilots.
Christopher LeFay - 2012/03/15 05:57:43 UTC
January's canonization of Rooney as the Patron Saint of Landing was maddening. He offered just what people wanted to hear: there is an ultimate, definitive answer to your landing problems, presented with absolute authority. Judgment problems? His answer is to remove judgment from the process - doggedly stripping out critical differences in gliders, loading, pilot, and conditions. This was just what people wanted - to be told a simple answer. In thanks, they deified him, carving his every utterance in Wiki-stone.
