http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=57778
The Swiss Hang and Paragliding Federation is to investigate
Davis Straub - 2018/11/29 15:27:40 UTC
40,000 paragliding and hang gliding tandem flights a year
http://xcmag.com/news/swiss-hang-gliding-federation-to-investigate-swiss-mishap
Swiss Federation to investigate 'Swiss Mishap' | Cross Country Magazine - In the Core since 1988
The Swiss Hang and Paragliding Federation is to investigate the circumstances around the commercial tandem hang-gliding flight in Interlaken that saw US tourist Chris Gursky hanging on for his life.
Published on YouTube yesterday by Gursky, the clip was picked up by media around the world and clocked up more than a million views in its first 24 hours online. It is well on its way to becoming the most watched hang gliding video on YouTube ever.
He said: "In principle hang gliding isn't a dangerous sport. Every year there are thousands of commercial tandem flights in Interlaken, without the slightest incident."
However, he added, "On the video a mistake is clearly visible. This should never have happened.
"The preflight check is an elementary and important routine of every flight, and is part of [basic] training. It's really tragic that in this case it obviously wasn't done properly."
Stocker praised the pilot's actions after take-off. "The pilot's reaction after the take-off was very good. Without any jerky movement - which would have ended fatally - he steered the glider as smoothly and quickly as possible towards the landing."
He added: "Because it is a serious incident we will continue the investigation."
Interlaken, where the "Swiss Mishap" occurred, is a popular site for commercial tandem flights. It sees an estimated 40,000 paragliding and hang gliding tandem flights a year.
Pnadams - 2018/11/30 15:22:57 UTC
40,000 tandem flights?
If you assume 180 flyable days per year and 8 hours launch window per day, that would be a launch every 2 minutes all day, every flyable day.
I think 40,000 tandem flights per year is a made up number.
What the hell. Hang and Para gliding both operate on made-up aeronautical theory, equipment performance certifications, administrator and instructor qualifications, incident reports. Why do anything to fuck up the consistency?
David Gerdes - 2018/12/01 03:06:21 UTC
Where the hell is the like button..
George Sychrovsky - 2018/12/01 03:37:30 UTC
The guy is getting a lot of flak , But he put up that video instead eating the memory chip, and it has tremendous educational value...
Sure it does. Something we can all learn from - again.
...as it creates awareness...
Wow! An unhooked launch! In hang gliding! And a tandem no less! Who'd have ever thunk? Thank God we've had this one for everyone to learn from - again. (Fuckin' Groundhog Day.)
...and the outcome turned ok so the way I see it he kinda redeemed himself
And when Jim Keen-Intellect Rooney failed to check his hook-in status on a tandem thrill ride in the Swizerland of the Southern Hemisphere; held onto the control bar; dove the glider, himself, his passenger into the powerlines he didn't need to do anything to redeem himself. He got all the Davis Show Members-In-Good-Standing to understand that the only viable defense against unhooked launches was to have one's friends catch the error. And thus he was off the hook 'cause he didn't have any friends. Probably why after 2016/09/29...
08-19
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...he abruptly quit flying anything. Couldn't get any friends anywhere for any price. Hell, people might even feign friendship in order to be able to distract and unhook him. And lotsa hang glider people are pretty good at feigning friendship - 'cause that's what droves of them were doing when he was driving the 914 Dragonflies with the cavitating props they needed to get airborne.
Davis Straub - 2018/12/01 04:29:21 UTC
The tandem passenger put up the video.
Maybe if you stopped banning all the people with their shit together...
Ben Reese - 2018/12/01 08:32:21 UTC
...and put your sewer off limits to total morons...
The video camera mounting hardware and most likely the camera was the pilots stuff.
It definitely was after this:
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point.
He most likely included the memory chip with the flight and handed it over to the passenger.
And a thirty percent discount for his next flight* (*not transferable, to expire ninety days from the date of issue, other restrictions may apply.).
It also makes sense that the pilot agreed to the posting and asked passenger to exclude his name. He respectfully left the posting decision up to the passenger since it was his death defying flight. The passenger may have decided not to post it for many reasons I can imagine?
Later he did post it after considering the value of cementing the idea of making proper preflight checks in the future.
Goddam right. Each and every one of the pilots who's screwed this particular pooch has done so due to lax attitudes with respect to proper preflight checks. And/Or not treating the harness is part of the aircraft. End of story.
I can't imagine he just rushed off to post it without thinking it over. This story benefits all flyers in tandem flights.
Fuck yeah. None of these assholes every properly appreciated the importance of having people securely attached before running off a half mile high mountain before this one. We have just seen the last one of these within our lifetimes. Might even get a significant reduction in solo incidents.
No doubt he made this discussion with Hang Glider pilots prior to release. Evidence of that conclusion is his lack of malice towards the pilot.
Maybe he doesn't bear much in the way of malice towards the pilot 'cause he's not as much of a stupid hypocritical shithead as most of the people inside the sport are.
Others who saw the video prior to release helped to plant the idea that the pilot did a good flying job under extreme circumstances.
Oh bullshit. It's fuckin' obvious that there'd have been a much better outcome if he'd spun the glider around right after launch and crashed it downwind into the trees.
Passenger obviously feels he owes his life to the pilots flying skill.
Show me the part at which he did something SKILLFUL. Hell, doesn't even make the slightest effort to execute a perfectly timed landing flare.
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Rolls it in like a girl and leaves Chris with the impression that it's the PROPER way to land. What if that Happy Acres putting green had been a narrow dry riverbed with large rocks strewn all over the place?
The passenger knows the pilot screwed up so much that he can't add anything to it. The video tells us all we will ever need to know about his screwup.
ANY report of ANY unhooked launch tells us all we will ever need to know...
The United States Hang Gliding and Paragliding Association, Inc. - 1981/05
With each flight, demonstrates a method of establishing that the pilot is hooked in just prior to launch.
...about the screwup
Forever, he will be both a nemesis and a hero.
Probably.
Score Card is -1 and +2
-1 Forgot to hook in passenger
+1 Flew smoothly and quickly to landing
+1 Helped facilitate the video release
________________________________
+1
Bull fucking shit. Never once in his entire fucking career performed anything remotely resembling a hook-in check. -1000.
Looking at this as a score card for Hang Gliding and publicity generated..
And like virtually every other asshole who's screwed this pooch will do absolutely nothing to help us get anything remotely resembling a hook-in check implemented on any scale.
JD Guillemette - 2018/12/03 04:34:20 UTC
Ben,
I respectfully don't agree with your score card.
I respectfully don't have a dust particle's worth of respect for either one of you fucking dickheads.
Forgetting to hook up the passenger is -100 or more.
Forgetting to hook up the passenger is something that WILL occur periodically at random in any culture that depends on any preflight procedure to ensure that everyone's hooked in at the moment of launch.
In no way does it have equal weight plus or minus to anything during the entire incident.
Fuck. Give him the points. Within this culture the unhooked launch itself occurred simply due to a bad roll of the dice.
I also don't give the pilot a +1 for flying to the LZ. He had no idea how long that guy could hang on and if he could make it to the LZ before the guy lost his grip.
Yeah, you'd have handled this one SO much better and gotten SO much better results - woudn't ya, pigfucker?
IMO the pilot should have immediately tuned back into the hill and taken a forced landing even with the potential to injury himself or the passenger.
1. And there's no fuckin' way an injury incurred after tuning back into the hill to either party could've have been as severe as a fatal or quad.
2. ALL hang glider landings are FORCED landings. What one gets after tuning back into the hill is called a CRASH - dickhead.
3. The sky's the fuckin' limit with respect to potential injuries to the pilot and/or passenger in hang glider CRASHES.
Flying to higher AGL and extending the flight to a suitable LZ only put his passenger at greater risk...
Suck my dick, JD. Chris letting go at THIS:
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point could've been fatal. He was at risk of dying or worse for virtually the entire flight. So shove your risk graduation scale back up your ass and leave there where it belongs.
...with no additional risk to himself.
Yeah, let's have him shot for cowardice.
Had the passenger lost his grip 10 seconds before he did and died, would you still give him credit for flying smoothly and quickly to the LZ?
Yeah. There's no tandem driver from the history of the sport we can't give credit for trying to salvage the best possible outcome from one of these situations. Jon Orders would probably have had a better outcome for his would-be passenger if he'd turned back into launch - but ain't 20/20 hindsight really wonderful.
The only person who gets any positive score card marks and praise is the passenger who saved the situation by being able to hold on as long as he could.
Took guts.
The passenger - Chris Gursky - is the world's Number One authority on the best course of action to have been taken on this one. He's the only one who knows what it felt like during this particular flight given his particular physical issues and limitations. And *HE* endorses the course of actions of the Pilot In Command 100.00 percent. And none of you fuckin' Monday morning armchair quarterbacks gets to second-guess shit on this one. So just shut the fuck up about anything and everything that transpired subsequent to commitment.
The passenger also gets full credit for posting the video...
So then what does u$hPa get for recovering and swallowing the Kelly Harrison / Arys Moorhead video?
...and taking such a compassionate and understanding view of just how badly this guy screwed up and almost cost him his life.
But you know so much better than he does, dontchya?
The pilot failed on all accounts as far as I'm concerned and deserves no praise.
Yeah, save all your praise for dispensation on the Jack and Davis Shows Mutual Masturbation Societies.
Davis Straub - 2018/12/03 04:38:05 UTC
Agreed.
Big fuckin' surprise...
http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=18695
How could this accident happen?
Davis Straub - 2010/01/28 06:10:17 UTC
I have tried to launch unhooked on aerotow and scooter tow.
...douchebag. And, by the way Davis... You're the only fuckin' douchebag in the history of the sport who's ever TRIED to launch unhooked - in two different flavors of foot launch towing no less. And that fits right in with your mandatory one-size-fits-all Standard Aerotow Weak Link implementation to sell the most dangerous malfunction possible on a tow as the focal point of your safe towing operations.
Mike Bomstad - 2018/12/03 06:40:00 UTC
How about we put a blind fold on you, or you wife / girlfriend / kids your parents whoever you care about and let them go with this pilot, still going ok with any + whatever scorecard rating?
In a fuckin'...
Rob Kells - 2005/12
Each of us agrees that it is not a particular method, but rather the fear of launching unhooked that makes us diligent to be sure we are hooked in every time before starting the launch run.
...heartbeat.
He had one basic responsibility before anything thing else, passenger safety. That failed before the flight even started.
Pity...
2013/08/18
03-A01714
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05-A04919
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06-A10522
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13-A14319
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...he didn't drag a tip on the ground in the vicinity of one of those sharp rocks we have all over most of our launches while approaching launch, worry that there may have been some damage, lean forward for a better view... Ain't it...
2012/07/06
03-00615
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...Wonder Boy.
The only + was the passenger somehow hung on long enough not to be killed by the pilots negligence.
And the only things keeping you from getting killed by your own negligence, incompetence, stupidity was a rock in the vicinity of the point at which one of your tips touched down and a launch system which forces a hook-in check. How fuckin' hypocritical, holier-than-thou, sleazy, disgusting is it possible for one individual to get?
8.27 million hits.