Most common HG injury... spiral fracture of the humerus.
...so many people aren't being taught that as Hang Zeros.
2. Not grabbing the fuckin' downtubes in the first place prevents spiral fractures thirty times better. I learned this as a Hang Four after about a quarter century of watching spriral fractures left and right and asking myself "Why the fuck are we landing this way?"
3. Kinda like letting go of the rattler often greatly improves your chances of not suffering serious, long term, and/or permanent medical issues. But there was almost always a much better option available a short time prior.
P.S. You didn't answer any of my questions about the likelihood of a good outcome for a carrier landing versus a hang glider foot landing in the Crestline primary.
- It's nothing that a good Day One student couldn't pull off.
- It's slow and real low in the safety margins department and he will not be able to keep getting away with it in the long run.
- It serves no useful purpose coming into that field - which is pretty much the same as any other field for which anyone can produce a video.
- It's a cute stunt that Mother Nature's allowing him to get away with in order to lull him into a false sense of security.
I refuse to come in with both hands on the downtubes ever again. I have had some very powerful thermals and gusts kick off and lost control of the glider due to hands on the downtubes. I prefer both hands on the control bar all the way until trim and ground effect. I have been lifted right off the deck in the desert and carried over 150 yards.
I like what Steve Pearson does when he comes in and may adapt something like that.
I can't control the glider in strong air with my hands at shoulder or ear height and I'd rather land on my belly with my hands on the basetube than get turned downwind.
...at shoulder or ear height where he wouldn't be able to control the glider in strong air...
Now, one task into the meet we are all hanging our heads as we just get confirmation about the fatal accident of Croatian team pilot Ljubomir Tomaskovic. He apparently encountered some strong turbulences on his landing approach. He got pitched up and turned around from a strong gust at low altitude, then impacted tailwind into some treetops from where he fell hard onto the ground.
...and be able to prevent it from being turned downwind.
is an ADEQUATE landing. And in aviation ANYTHING that's...
miguel - 2013/04/19 04:11:25 UTC
A prudent pilot will have adequate foot landing skills.
miguel - 2013/04/12 15:08:32 UTC
Brian's students all have solid basic skills. They launch with nose down and a hard run. They are aware of other gliders in the air. They land with good airspeed and a crisp flare. They also can fly the glider from the downtubes with adequate control.
Try the 130 test "kite" string. It's 8 strand poly weave I think. Worked for 5 years flawlessly on solo AT with a 150+ foot poly towline, center of mass open V bridle with primary and secondary releases.600 tows without a hitch.
miguel wrote:Letting go of the downtubes prevents spiral fractures. I learned this as a H-0 after watching a double spiral fracture.
Letting go of the downtubes is a strategy for minimizing bodily harm during a crash, yet you continue to profess this crash survival strategy in a topic labeled "landing". This behavior is leading me to believe that you are confused about the difference between landing or crashing.
Given that so many foot landings result in crashes and injuries, I almost understand your apparent difficulty differentiating between what should be two vastly different concepts.
Have you considered starting a new thread and sharing more of your knowledge about how to minimize injury when crashing hang gliders?
hook-in check = hang check
LZ = narrow dry riverbed with large rocks strewn all over the place
landing = crash
weak link = release = pitch and lockout limiter = Pilot In Command
chief safety officer = corporation lawyer
Training has been both a frustrating and rewarding experience. I have found that I retained little from the training I took twenty years ago. I was foot landing back then, but for reasons I will attribute to age, it took quite a few flights to get back to that on any consistent basis... and it's still not that good.
Don't worry, One. If you're like everybody else it never will be.
Anywhooo, this is my first flight from the big training hill.
...I really like the way you demonstrated your confidence that you were connected to your glider for the entire thirty-four second period between your hang check and commitment to launch. That's a good start towards the five, ten, fifteen minute delays you'll be needing after you've graduated to the ramp.
And I failed to stick the landing, much to my chagrin.
Yeah, that was disgraceful.
You can see me push out, then decide "no, too early", and pull back in... well, when I pushed back out my airspeed had dumped that quick; it was too late and I landed on my knees.
What if you had just landed on your wheels?
Critique and pointers welcome!
From everyone Jack allows to post anyway. That's a really good thing though - you don't ever wanna be listening to anything The Extremist One Percent have to say.
Paul Hurless - 2013/04/21 17:52:29 UTC
You started your flare and then pulled back in and then flared, weakly, again. You need to do it in one strong, continuous motion.
Why does he need to start it at all?
AndRand - 2013/04/21 18:23:28 UTC
Poland
On my training I had situation that I backed up to upright harness from prone...
aaaand it was pain in a$$ as I tried repeatedly to level flight before flare and kept sinking with belly landing... till I figured out that when with upright harness drag slowers me so much that leveling is not a thing to do.
It is minimum speed approach with flare just after touching ground.
Ain't it great the way we stick the students with the pain in the ass stuff...
If he had landed on his wheels it would've been perfect.
Now, relax and repeat another hundred times or so and you are on yer way.
And after another thousand times or so he'll still be on his way.
The bearded one is one of the best instructors you could ever hope to have-
Yes, they all suck.
- There's not all much to this game and anybody with an IQ over the low double digits will go insane with boredom on the training hill well before the season's out.
Daniel, Linda, and I are driving up to Blue Sky flight park this morning to see Steve and to drop off Bill's Sport 2. The glider is in good shape - no tears in the sail, no noticeable breaks or bends in the airframe. Lots of scuffs on the leading edge, tangled VG lines, but nothing Steve couldn't easily fix. (As I mentioned earlier, gliders don't land hard with nobody in them.)
...pretty well even with nobody clipped into them.
...what is he telling you to do?
1. Always do a thorough hang check and assume you're hooked in from that point on.
2. Land on your feet at all costs. NEVER - under ANY circumstances - consider bellying in.
Welcome back to both of you !
And don't forget to post videos of your foot landings after excellent Lockout Mountain instructor has guided you to perfection.
John Caldwell - 2013/04/21 19:58:35 UTC
Augusta
Hey- glad you're back in it. That first flare actually looked like "the time".
How might it have looked if it had been gusting?
It did look like if your hands were a shade higher you might have had more "flare authority". Practice makes perfect...
Yeah, One. Keep practicing this until you've perfected it. Then you'll be good to go for taking your wheels of and bailing out in the Big T wash.
and I take it you did nothing to interfere with your next flight- no bones sticking out or visible (or invisible) bleeding.
Most common HG injury... spiral fracture of the humerus.
...yet.
Janica Lee - 2013/04/21 20:05:00 UTC
California
Second Guest's plea - share the bearded one's wisdom?
He's totally devoid of any.
Best advice I got regarding landings was to "push the bush."
Banana-peel-arch your back (don't withdraw your crotch from the approaching ground as instinct would have you do) then flare.
How 'bout just landing on the fuckin' wheels?
Christopher Albers - 2013/04/21 20:43:08 UTC
Lawrenceville, Georgia
Christian's advice is...
Is this Mavi Gogun Christian?
...airspeed is your friend, pull in after take off, let the glider do the flying, learning when to flare takes practice, we get the feel of when, do so with authority.
I commented to him that I thought I should have stuck with that first flare attempt and that worst I would have parachuted in... he agreed.
See the kind of quality you can only get from one of the best instructors you could ever hope to have?
K C Benn - 2013/04/22 03:13:03 UTC
Ogden
Take it easy on yourself. I have been flying for 38 years with thousands of landings. Yesterday I brought the T-2 in and decided to do a wimpy flare and ended up doing the same thing you did except I was going 3X as fast.
Any comment on John's bullshit about practice making perfect?
WAAACK. My knee hit my base tube and I am going to ice it down again tonight.
Well, the important thing is that you didn't hit any of the large rocks strewn all over the place in that narrow dry riverbed into which you were coming down.
I am surprised I didn't take out a down tube.
I'm ALWAYS surprised when people do foot landings and don't take out downtubes.
The camera helps us see our mistakes.
It helps SOME people see their mistakes. But when you're locked into bogus fundamental assumptions it does no good whatsoever. One made two mistakes which have gotten people a thousand times more experienced than he is killed - and nobody's commenting on them.
The pain reminds me I am always a student.
1. EVERYBODY who elects to foot land is CONSTANTLY a student - who never learns anything really useful.
2. Does the pain remind you that if you had deliberately rolled it in you'd have been perfectly fine and there'd have been no concern whatsoever about the downtube? Just kidding.
John Jaugilas - 2013/04/22 03:53:49 UTC
Colorado
Welcome back to flying and stay with it. Just need to get used to a few things.
I think he's getting used to things just fine. I'm sure he'll fit right in no problem.
Once you do start to flare, Never back it down unless you are twenty plus feet high.
And Never worry about gusts, airspeed, headings. Just follow that rule and you'll always be perfectly OK.
OR...
You could just skip the fuckin' flare altogether and keep flying the glider until it stops - but that just wouldn't be hang gliding.
Talk to your instructor about this.
Tell your instructor to go fuck himself.
You will stall or whack if you do.
And you'll ALWAYS be JUST FINE if you DON'T. It's physically impossible for anything bad to happen after punching an early - or on time - flare.
If you are a little early you need to hold it, wait, then flare hard at the end, looking up and trying to kick the keel with your heels. You can recover from early flares but only if you hold it, wait, then finish it. If you pull in, well... I guess you know what happens.
Land on the fuckin' wheels and dedicate to time and focus you're wasting on hang checks and foot landings to shit that makes piloting SAFER *AND* MORE ENJOYABLE - hook-in checks, turns, flying.
miguel wrote:Letting go of the downtubes prevents spiral fractures. I learned this as a H-0 after watching a double spiral fracture.
Steve wrote:Letting go of the downtubes is a strategy for minimizing bodily harm during a crash, yet you continue to profess this crash survival strategy in a topic labeled "landing". This behavior is leading me to believe that you are confused about the difference between landing or crashing.
Oh! Oh! Oh! I am starting to see the light
Steve wrote:Given that so many foot landings result in crashes and injuries, I almost understand your apparent difficulty differentiating between what should be two vastly different concepts.
thank you for your enlightenment.
Land on wheels. Perfect landings every time! Setup to land on your feet, you have departed from controlled flight and are soon to crash.
flawless logic.
I have seen one wheel landing where the pilot got his bell rung loudly by hitting a hidden large rock with his head. I am sure there are other wheel landings with less than optimal results.
Steve wrote:Have you considered starting a new thread and sharing more of your knowledge about how to minimize injury when crashing hang gliders?
Learn and return.
Again...A prudent pilot will develop adequate foot landing skills.
Why limit your skillset? Why limit your lz prospects?
Training hill + practice = improved landing skills
Hang gliding involves a launch and a landing. A mistake on either can cost you life or limb.
Want to cut the odds?
Setup to land on your feet, you have departed from controlled flight and are soon to crash.
Less control = Greater chance of crash.
flawless logic.
Common sense for anyone with a sense of self preservation.
I have seen one wheel landing where the pilot got his bell rung loudly by hitting a hidden large rock with his head. I am sure there are other wheel landings with less than optimal results.
I have seen one foot landing where the pilot got his arm broken by hitting a non-hidden large rock (Earth) with his control frame. I am sure there are other foot landings with less than optimal results.
Really dude, kudos to you for surviving all that, but have you put as much time into avoiding those crashes altogether as you have into finding a way to survive them?
Thanks for the link, but I'll continue to put my time into avoiding those crashes altogether rather than finding ways to survive them, because...
Allen Sparks - 2011/02/11 02:26:07 UTC
My main strategy is to avoid having any more crashes. because...
I'm not so sure I'll always have much control over the outcome...
...I'm damn sure I won't have much control over the outcome.
Again...A prudent pilot will develop adequate foot landing skills.
A prudent pilot will develop an ability to think and reason for himself.
Why limit your skillset?
Why whipstall an aircraft near the ground when you don't need to?
Why limit your lz prospects?
I suspect your definition of "lz" different from mine.
Training hill + practice = improved landing skills
As long the "practice" doesn't result in shattered arms, bilateral humerus fractures, and radial nerve trauma.
Hang gliding involves a launch and a landing. A mistake on either can cost you life or limb.
A mistake prior to a launch can cost you life or limb and devastation to your family and friends.
I FL trained at LMFP and really never gave it much thought about why landing on your wheels was not encouraged. Instead, landing upright was required as far as I know. To move from their small hill to the big hill you had to demonstrate landing upright on your feet. Think of the time saved during training if landing on wheels was the requirement. I know landing upright can be beneficial if flying into a very small LZ or you find yourself in a rocky creek bed. I think knowing both are a good thing but wheel landings are much easier and safer.
Steve wrote:As long the "practice" doesn't result in shattered arms, bilateral humerus fractures, and radial nerve trauma.
Repeat along with me...
Let go of the downtube.
Let go of the downtube.
Let go of the downtube.
Let go of the downtube.
Let go of the downtube.
Let go of the downtube.
Let go of the downtube.
If you watch the tandem flights at Ridgely... Yeah, that's pretty much the case.
Set up to land on your feet, you have departed from controlled flight and are soon to crash.
No...
miguel - 2013/04/12 15:08:32 UTC
They also can fly the glider from the downtubes with adequate control.
You will have ADEQUATELY controlled flight. And it's the Ridgely solo gliders coming in for landings under adequately controlled flight that get everyone's attention - 'cause everyone knows that watching tandems coming in under optimally controlled flight is really boring.
I have seen one wheel landing where the pilot got his bell rung loudly by hitting a hidden large rock with his head.
1. So what is somebody landing in that can conceal a rock large enough to ring a bell loudly?
2. How good an idea is it to foot land on a surface which conceals rocks large enough to ring a bells loudly?
I am sure there are other wheel landings with less than optimal results.
Steve Elliot got killed on an aerotow dolly launch - but that didn't prompt a trend of aerotow foot launching.
Definitely. A must read for every chronic pooch screwer with a keen interest in how best to crash - and little to no interest in how not to crash.
Learn and return.
I did. I, in fact, harvested the thread in preparation for a good hatchet job. And I found half a dozen descriptions of very serious incidents - all of them EASILY avoidable.
Again...A prudent pilot will develop adequate foot landing skills.
At least one of them precipitated by adequate foot landing skills.
Why limit your skillset?
If you're more likely to break an arm in DEVELOPING a skill than you are to PREVENT breaking an arm by HAVING the skill then it's extremely stupid to develop the skill - and sociopathic to coerce others into developing it.
Training hill + practice = improved landing skills
= increased likelihood of crashing glider and breaking downtube
= increased likelihood of breaking arm
= landing skill responsible pilots never need
= landing skill irresponsible pilots rarely need
= landing skill no one should ever rely on to prevent breaking an arm
= lost opportunities to experience soaring flight
Hang gliding involves a launch and a landing.
And when the launches and landings are executed on wheels - or skids, skis, pontoons - like sailplanes, ultralights, and virtually all conventional aircraft, the probability of success goes up by a factor of fifty.
A mistake on either can cost you life or limb.
And THE biggest mistake in hang gliding, the one most likely to get a glider crashed, injured, crippled, killed, is to...
Jim Rooney - 2011/06/12 13:57:58 UTC
Most common HG injury... spiral fracture of the humerus.
