http://www.ushawks.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1802
Jean Lake
Sam Kellner - 2015/04/01 02:20:00 UTC
Terrible news
I can see just how deeply affected you've been by this one - just one smiley in the entire post.
Mitch Shipley is doing the investigation.
And then he'll hand things off to the cover-up team.
We met briefly just last year at Big Spring comp.
I'll bet you two hit it off REALLY well.
Without speculating about this horrible incident...
God forbid!!!
...hopefully we can all agree that platform towing clinics should not only be pilot training, crew member training is of equal importance.
Ya...
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8143/7462005802_bbc0ac66ac_o.jpg
...think? And ya think we'll get a first rate "accident" report out of this one?
http://www.ushawks.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=1081
Platform towing /risk mitigation / accident
Sam Kellner - 2012/07/03 02:25:58 UTC
No, you don't get an accident report.
Fuck you, Sam.
Rick Masters - 2015/04/01 02:58:56 UTC
The heart of the problem is a belief that towing is acceptable.
Course it is Rick. YOU just said so.
I have no problem at all.
No, you're absolutely perfect in every way.
I never needed it.
And when was the last time you flew a hang glider, motherfucker?
The sport has a huge problem.
Including, but certainly not limited to, fuckin' assholes such as yourself.
It thinks it needs towing.
Lemme tell ya sumpin', douchebag... I, TAD EARECKSON, INDIVIDUAL HANG GLIDER PILOT, *LOVE* TOWING as a means to get to workable altitude. I *DESPISE* all the bullshit associated with mountain launches. NOBODY taught me to think that way. That was my dream ever since I got into the sport and I got into the sport when they were still towing hang gliders frame only.
Why?
Tell us, oh Holy Sole Source of Sport Aviation Truth.
Experts going for distance out of Big Springs. Okay.
I have ZERO interest in going for distance - and even less in Big Spring.
But being too lazy to find a sandy hillside to teach hang gliding is not a good excuse for killing people.
Right. Those are the only two options. Find a sandy hillside or kill someone.
Towing adds compounding elements of risk that, in my opinion, are generally unacceptable for weight-shift aircraft.
Not interested in your goddam OPINION. You're an arrogant jerk with your head three feet up your ass.
Yes, it is possible for some experts to do it right but I'm not talking about that.
How 'bout THIS:
25-23223
http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3713/9655904048_89cce6423a_o.png
"expert"?
http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3746/13864051003_a820bcf2b8_o.png
Was HE "expert" enough to do it right? Doesn't have shit to do with being an "expert". Any halfway competent and properly equipped Hang Two is expert enough to do this right.
I'm talking about what we've got - people doing it wrong.
Which, of course, NEVER happens in slope launched hang gliding.
It's been this way since the beginning of the sport.
- Well thank you so very much for all the effort you've put into to help get towing done right.
- This sport evolved from a one hundred percent towing origin.
- Bullshit. Towing was done one hundred percent from the frame until the early Eighties.
The fatality lists are filled with towing accidents.
They are so far this year. Course it only took one flight to do that.
Jean Lake is surrounded by hills and mountains.
Can't imagine why they don't fly off of those more.
Here's a photo of a paraglider who launched off one at Jean Lake.
Bullshit. Zoom in and LOOK at what's actually going on.
Looks like a great place to train a student.
What does this topic have to do with training students? We're talking about a tandem thrill ride industry fatal.
Any risk is about as low as it can get.
Unless you're counting heat stroke.
I haven't figured out this "tandem training" BS.
Yeah, I've noticed you're not real quick on the uptake.
I don't know a single person out of hundreds from my era who learned to fly by towing.
Betchya don't know a single person out of hundreds from your era who flew toplesses, called in retrievals using cell phones and GPS, recorded their flights using high resolution GoPro cameras, posted their flights on YouTube either.
Sure, if you don't have any hills, go ahead and rationalize it.
And if you're flying sailplanes you won't have any choice but to rationalize towing - regardless of what's surrounding the flats.
I'll nod my head but "You need a road trip,"...
Fuck road trips. I didn't get into this sport to do road trips. I got into it 'cause I wanted to fly and I wanna fly from as close to my driveway as I can possibly get.
...I'll be thinking.
Starting when? None of us is getting any younger.
He's STANDING ON THE ROAD. He's driven to the downwind edge of the basin for a clean wind exposure to practice KITING.
I ask myself, does U$hPa encourage towing when it is not necessary?
u$hPa encourages high revenue generating tandem thrill ride operations and doesn't give a flying fuck how operations are run.
When towing is not NECESSARY? When did hang gliding start becoming NECESSARY.
It's often part and parcel with tandem "instruction" - perhaps in the majority of cases?
In my neck of the woods there are plenty of advanced pilots who can choose to drive an hour and a half west to the mountains or an hour and a half east to the aerotow park. My educated guess is that they take the latter option the majority of the time. They're not doing that 'cause their arms are being twisted by any evil controlling forces. They're doing that 'cause it's about twenty times easier, cheaper, faster, safer to get airtime.
And this whole deal about not discussing accidents anymore...
We're discussing them here. That's pretty much the primary function here. And over here we don't have any Rooney caliber shits ordering us not to or Jack and Davis caliber shits locking down threads, deleting posts, or banning people who know what the fuck they're looking at and talking about.
Time for a new organization.
Preferably one that doesn't include you or assholes like you.
One with just recreational pilots on the Board of Directors instead of it being dominated with "instructors" out to make a middle-class living or better.
I'm pretty sure we don't have anybody of that description on our list. I'm also pretty confident that nobody of that description would be particularly welcome here.
Maybe just a bunch of people exercising their first amendment rights in pursuit of survival.
Yeah, motherfucker?
http://www.ushawks.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1701
Complaints about Tad
Rick Masters - 2015/01/16 18:59:15 UTC
He has concerns about people trying to muck up the forum, but he has also dealt effectively with Tad.
Tell me a bit about First Amendment rights.
When you get too big, you become a target for lawyers.
Better to structure it as a group of loosely affiliated cells.
That the "instructor" had no business license is mentioned.
This means he took payment. For a joy ride. And killed an innocent child.
Person of a varying age. They're not called children on The Bob Show.
It doesn't get worse than this.
Watch what Bob will be able to accomplish.
This is what I have been warning over and over will destroy the U$hPa and maybe the sport, as well.
Take 'em both down. Then use that history as a model for how NOT to run aviation.
U$hPa is a "support the money" corporation.
What most of you need is a club that supports hang gliding.
We may find that towing and tandem for pay has no insurance coverage, anyway - but negligence has unlimited liability....
Best not to be associated with any of that.
Tell ya sumpin', Rick... If you're hearing about towing generating three times as many crashes as slope it's 'cause towing is generating thirty times as many launches as slope.