instructors and other qualified pilot fiends

[Tad Eareckson]

False alarm. Still no sign of Bob though.

[Tad Eareckson]

Hey Jack... Here's your current signature line:

H4, AT, FL, TFL, AWCL, CL, FSL, RLF, TUR, X-C

Virtually certainly the same as it was when you launched your local coffee shop sometime prior to 2006/07/25 16:03:17 UTC.

I had my Four 1991/12/17 - nearly a decade and a half before - and all that other chickenshit stuff and more by 1988/04/24. And when you motherfuckers ended my flying career after 2008/10/12 final flight I was just 26.581 hours shy of my Five - and way over maxed out in tons of requirement categories. I could've knocked that off in a few more AT launches the next season. In fact I might have had it by then anyway minus the carnage of ten seasons of the focal point of Ridgely's safe towing system increasing the safety of their towing operation.

You list your Interests as:

Hang gliding, of course...

If there were ever any evidence of you ever having flown anything since your local coffee shop launch:
- I never saw it; and
- it's long gone now.

We have:

Jack Axaopoulos - 71169 - H4 - John Borton - 2000/11/15 - AT FL TFL AWCL CL FSL RLF TUR XC

So at the very tail end of the last century (and millenium) you had an absolute minimum of the 75 hours required for a Four you've now had nearly twenty seasons to rack up the other 325 (16.25 hours per season).

Interests Hang gliding, of course...

Not bloody likely.

P.S...

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=11497
Aerotow release options?

Jack Axaopoulos - 2009/07/04 12:13:01 UTC

Bullshit.

a) only the pilot can let the angle of attack increase when you lose tension. Thats 100% on the pilot. You are simply wrong and misleading again.

b) "And if your angle of attack was way too high to begin with..." Which should never be the case or youre making a pilot error. Again, you are misleading people.

This is the problem I have with you. You attempt to fallaciously attribute pilot errors to issues of mechanical towing devices or other things.

Sorry... but if you suddenly lose power, your nose just doesnt pop

Smoking gun proof that anybody who ever signed you off on anything was ALSO an incompetent total fucking moron. (Ditto for Bob by the way.)

Poison to the Sport out.

[Tad Eareckson]

http://ozreport.com/24.153
Not too disabled to fly

Davis Straub - 2020/08/06 00:22:58 UTC

Lots of room in that label

http://www.ushpa.org/images/USHPA/Pages/EasyFlyer-DaveAldrich.jpg


In September 2019, USHPA secured a $120,000 U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Adaptive Sports grant. The funding will provide introductory tandem flights and training for military members who qualify for disability benefits, both active duty and veterans.

Hang gliding and paragliding training will be provided for free to qualified participants up to the H2/P2 (novice) level. This level of proficiency allows pilots to fly on their own at H2/P2-rated sites as they work toward more advanced ratings.

USHPA is thrilled to give veterans increased opportunities to experience free flight and become part of our pilot community. The current grant covers training through September 2020.

Mitch Shipley was listed as "disabled" as he left the military. A lot of people with invisible injuries could use a few flying lessons.

Lots of room in that label

Hell yeah.

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=25015
Zippy pounds in

Davis Straub - 2011/09/02 18:37:09 UTC

Concussions are in fact very serious and have life long effects. The last time I was knocked out what in 9th grade football. I have felt the effects of that ever since. It changes your wiring.

But even though you could never learn to spell "carabineer" like a sane person would that never held you back one millimeter from mandating the cheap u$hPa SOPs and FAA regs illegal crap you sell for AT equipment for all US competitions. You mentally alternately abled guys never cease to amaze and inspire us mere muppets.

Mitch Shipley was listed as "disabled" as he left the military.

And now he's listed as even more and highly likely permanently "disabled" as he left light sport aviation at the beginning of last fall.

A lot of people with invisible injuries could use a few flying lessons.

Then they could get visible injuries with a flying lesson or two from a top notch u$hPa...

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=27396
Scooter tow faillure... or Never Land On Your Face

Mitch Shipley - 2012/10/22 19:04:16 UTC

We engage in a sport that has risk and that is part of the attraction.

...certified instructor...



...like Mitch. (Right Paul (Edwards)?)

(Same...


http://ozreport.com/pub/images/fingerlakesaccident2.jpg
http://ozreport.com/pub/images/fingerlakesaccident3.jpg


...STUPID unforgivable sorta tow launch crash, Bird of a Feather.)

In September 2019, USHPA secured a $120,000 U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Adaptive Sports grant. ... The current grant covers training through September 2020.

And if you haven't burned through the entire $120 K grant by the end of next month... Hell, just keep the change. We'd really like to properly thank you for the outstanding public service you're so selflessly providing. (And how come we're just hearing about this now with seven weekends to go? (Keep up the great work, Tim. Maybe see if you can get $150 K for the next cycle - what with the outstanding success you've had with this one.))

[Tad Eareckson]

The level of public chatter is probably a fairly good indication of the level of the field activity of the sport and everyone and his dog know that they're both going down the toilet at a fair clip. And I did a little sampling to help quantify what's going on.

I went to Jack Show General and grabbed figures over a period in which Chris McKeon's 2020/08/10 03:03:04 UTC was the most current post in the subforum (still is at the time of this post) and grabbed figures.

I went back to Page 5 which was the most recent which included no rebooted threads from years past. Activity ranged from 2018/12/05 04:43:54 UTC to 2019/12/14 04:25:09 UTC and last posts from 2019/11/02 19:36:19 UTC to that latter figure.

14 of the 25 threads of the page were launched by Chris and 23 of the relevant total of posts are his.

And went back to Page 360. That's one page beyond my sabotaged and locked Aerotow release options? thread which originally racked up 182 posts and now totals 166. Mostly/Entirely 'cause Jack graduated from being just one of the glider guys to Local Coffee Shop Owner and deleted all of his contributions. Went beyond to eliminate that particular blip. Activity range 2008/09/09 22:48:11 UTC to 2009/06/30 23:40:09 UTC and last posts 2009/06/30 23:40:09 UTC to latter figure.

For the 2009 page the range of the current final posts is 2009/06/24 16:29:00 UTC to 2009/06/30 23:40:09 UTC and the time range is:
- 06 days, 07 hours, 11 minutes 09 seconds (06 07:11:09)
For 2019:
- 41 days, 08 hours, 38 minutes 50 seconds (41 08:38:50)

So near the end of last year it was taking nearly seven times as long to generate a Jack Show page and thank gawd for Chris. (And do note how substantially "A basic trainer design for teaching hang gliding" has started pulling the sport out of its death spiral.)

And the totals for the posts of the 2009 and 2019 pages are 315 and 262 respectively - down seventeen percent. (Minus looking at lengths of posts but the long winded stuff has been out of fashion since causes of death in glider crashes all became the suffering of fatal injuries.) Combination of the facts that our local coffee shop owners aren't permitting anyone to discuss anything of actual substance, those with anything to say worth listening to have all been silenced.

[Tad Eareckson]

http://www.hanggliding.org/wiki/HG_ORG_Mission_Statement
HG ORG Mission Statement - Hang Gliding Wiki

2019 HangGliding.Org Simplified Rules and Policies

* This website is a small private business just like your local coffee shop. No different than any other business you visit on a daily basis, big or small.

Then why is it a dot org? Small private businesses just like your local coffee shops are dot coms. And their owners don't really give flying fucks about what their customers talk about while they're sipping. They know it's none of their goddam business and that if they started behaving as if it were their actual goddam business wouldn't be in business very long. And as a matter o' fact yours has been on a steady downslide for years.

Anyone showing a pattern of abuse or harassment that would cause them to be thrown out of their local coffee shop can expect the same treatment here, including personally attacking or harassing the customers, or the business owner.

Why would they attack the business owner? The coffee shop has been around for a bit over fourteen years and it appears that in all that time he's only made two miniscule posts - both within the past month and a half - regarding a "Difficulties logging in" issue.

* When posting, think about non-HG pilots who come to visit the site every day. Please put your best foot forward and showcase the fun adventurous atmosphere we experience every day in the landing zone after a great flight.

And if an eleven year old kid gets splattered as a consequence of a massively botched tandem thrill ride don't think about him, his family, his Mesa Verde Elementary School classmates, the implications for the sport... Just launch another fifteen page thread on how to perfect flare timing and let Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department and u$hPa tell us everything we need to know about what happened and why.

The majority of website traffic is NEW traffic, and very likely non-pilots.

Another way of saying that people who might have an interest in hang gliding take one look at what's going in in the local coffee shop and then go back to watching cat videos.

This website has very broad world wide reach. Over 3 MILLION people have visited this website.

And a number of current participants you can count on the fingers of one hand - three of whom are Chris McKeon.

* No PORN or adult material. It is against my server companies policies and there are plenty of other websites for that stuff.

Good thing you included that in your site rules. Glider forums in which such rules are not clearly specified are totally overwhelmed by PORN or adult material. Ditto for the personal blogs of glider people.

If you couldn't show it on TV during a childrens program, don't post it here.

It's OK to take a child up on a totally shitrigged tandem platform operation and splatter him - along with yourself - in front of his family. But don't even think about posting anything about it here - since this isn't the sorta thing you'd expect to see in Saturday morning cartoons. (With the possible exception of the Roadrunner/Coyote stuff.)

Please use the REPORT feature in the forum to notify me.

Since there's such a tremendous volume of material posted at your local coffee shop that you'd need a staff of at least thirty monitors to properly screen activity. And if you even attempted to give things a weekly skim the quality of the coffee would go straight to hell.

* This site is reasonably moderated.

36 posts to date for the month of August. Three posts per day for the worlds largest hang gliding community. Keep up the reasonably great work.

Unfortunately, the sport of hang gliding contains a very small but extremely vocal group of extremists who escalate and harass people at every turn. People like this have "run off" the reasonable pilots from community web sites in the past.

The REASONABLE pilots. The Standard Aerotow Weak Link crowd.

This will no longer be tolerated here.

Too late. If you read Davis's rules for the Big Spring comps you'll find that AT weak links that safe are no longer tolerated.

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=24846
Is this a joke ?

Marc Fink - 2011/08/31 08:11:05 UTC

I was actually in the process of reaching for the release and just about to pull it when the weaklink blew. If procedures were amended to "insist" on stronger weaklinks I would simply stop towing.

Last sign of a pulse:

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=39719
Building hang gliding back up
2014/10/28 22:48:45 UTC

See what happened?

This site will be a run as a professional business moving forward.

Keep up the great work. If it keeps moving forward at it's current rate it should be extinct within a year and a half or so.

If you are looking for a wild west, anything goes forum, where people are free to scream at one another like rabid children, there are plenty of sites out there like that for you...

Yeah motherfucker? Name one. Reminds me of all the lives Jim Keen-Intellect Rooney saved by giving people the rope and all the Tad-O-Linkers he visited in the hospital.

08-19
http://c2.staticflickr.com/6/5277/30076449505_1f6ed2f804_o.png

...but not here. We are here to promote the sport of hang gliding.

Without actually participating in it ourselves. And in our local coffee shop owner's case - without ever having actually posted anything about it that he didn't subsequently see fit to delete.

Literally millions of people have visited this website from all over the world.

Literally 10.228 quarter million people from all over the world have visited:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLBJA8SlH2w

094-22322
http://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4856/32213440768_8a214a5136_o.png


to date. And I'll bet at least 10.227 million of them watched that and rushed to get in line for lessons.

Fuck you and your millions of people who've visited your piece o' shit local coffee shop from all over the world. If I were you I wouldn't be touting bullshit like this as evidence of what a quality coffee shop you're running. All it shows is that 99.999 of your hits are people who take one look and never come back - all quantity, no quality.

Keep that in mind and put your best foot forward when posting.

Where can we go to see one of your posts...

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=12682
Landing on your feet (for AEROTOW)- So Dangerous

Jack Axaopoulos - 2009/06/29 14:26:26 UTC

OMG!!! You dont even have wheels!!?!?!?!?
YOURE GONNA DIE FOR SUUUUREE!!!!

I have a brilliant idea. People who cant land for sh*t.... LEARN TO LAND That way when a weak link breaks on you, ITS A NON-ISSUE. Genius huh???

...to get a really good idea of how we should be communicating with each other?

* No posts or links about Bob Kuczewski, Scott C Wise, Tad Eareckson and related people, or their material or organizations. ALL SUCH POSTS WILL BE IMMEDIATELY DELETED.

Like you did with all your own posts. Wattsamattah? Didn't have a best foot to put forward?

[Tad Eareckson]

Hey Bob...

http://shga.com/forum/phpBB3/download/file.php?avatar=541.jpg


Think ya got enough clearance at this point to safely transition to the control bar? Or are you still concerned about getting hit by a column of killer sink for which your survival will be entirely dependent upon a perfectly timed and executed landing flare on the slope with your hands at shoulder or ear height on the downtubes where you can't control the glider?

Or hell... Kagel, morning sled... Probably much safer to stay on the downtubes...

16-031309
http://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4348/37169463766_6f13e0b9fe_o.png

21-062521
http://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4374/37169461966_72147182e8_o.png


...until you're safely stopped in the LZ after a perfectly timed and executed landing flare.

43-100301
http://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4435/36962233760_e1e244c5f3_o.png


In pre 2011/08/11-2013/02/02 Flight Park Mafia aerotowing one FREQUENTLY needed to make emergency landings immediately after launch - often in sled...

17-1821
http://c1.staticflickr.com/1/962/40373978690_9aef9ff7ca_o.png


...air...

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=24846
Is this a joke ?

Davis Straub - 2011/08/26 14:04:52 UTC

We had six weaklink breaks in a row at Zapata this year. Russell Brown (tug pilot, tug owner, Quest Air owner) said go ahead and double up (four strands of Cortland Greenspot). He knows I used his Zapata weaklink in Big Spring (pilots were asked to tell the tug pilot if they were doing that).

...but most likely...

http://ozreport.com/13.238
Adam Parer on his tuck and tumble

Adam Parer - 2009/11/25

Due to the rough conditions weak links were breaking just about every other tow and the two tugs worked hard to eventually get everyone off the ground successfully.

...in unstable soaring conditions. So somebody show me a single frame from a single dolly launched AT in which a flyer still on tow doesn't have both hands in optimal flying positions on the control bar, but rather one or two hands on the downtubes at shoulder or ear height for better roll control and landing flare authority.

Ditto for platform:

013-04212
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7249/14019440682_034c3fafd0_o.png


http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2809/13746340634_a74b33d285_o.png
022-04610

This:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aerotowrelease/8318603266/


http://www.flickr.com/photos/aerotowrelease/8306300488/

is a u$hPa illegal AT release configuration. u$hPa AT SOPs mandate that the release actuator be mounted "within easy reach". This doesn't qualify because there's no reach of any kind involved in actuation.

For a two point release the obvious location is low on a downtube - preferably...


http://ozreport.com/pub/images/fingerlakesaccident2.jpg
http://ozreport.com/pub/images/fingerlakesaccident3.jpg


...low on the dominant hand side downtube. You blow the release and at least one of your hands is automatically in much better position to get the glider safely stopped with you on your feet. (Really gotta admire the chess master level thinking of the few people who are actually working on things - despite being masked by the fanatic fringe. (And just think where we'd be today without the efforts of the few people who are actually working on things. Quite possibly exactly where we were nearly seven and a half years ago - 2013/03/03 19:37:19 UTC - when Jim Keen-Intellect Rooney posted that sentiment on The Davis Show. Maybe even worse off. One shudders to think.))

And the SOPs have never said anything about SECURE mounting so...

http://www.chgpa.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3107
I have a tandem rating!!!

Lauren Tjaden - 2008/03/23 22:20:15 UTC

When Jim got me locked out to the right, I couldn't keep the pitch of the glider with one hand for more than a second (the pressure was a zillion pounds, more or less), but the F'ing release slid around when I tried to hit it.

...just firmly strap it to onto a downtube with velcro.

06-02914
http://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1582/25806739256_8b0dc95171_o.png

07-03201
http://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1513/25737698641_fdbd9f2aa3_o.png

08-03206
http://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1707/25806738026_c5b53178e3_o.png

09-03212
http://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1630/25806737416_581e6ff03b_o.png

10-03225
http://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1504/25711850432_5d577ba88c_o.png


What's the worst that could possibly happen?

http://www.wallaby.com/aerotow_primer.php
Aerotow Primer for Experienced Pilots

The Wallaby Ranch Aerotowing Primer for Experienced Pilots - 2020/08/18

Welcome to Wallaby Ranch, the first and largest Aerotow Hang Gliding Flight Park in the World! We're the aerotowing (or "AT") professionals; no-one knows AT like we do; it's all we do, and we do it everyday, year-round.

http://www.ushawks.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=625
Little Hawk at Wallaby Ranch

Bob Kuczewski - 2020/08/10 00:35:22 UTC

Fun day at Wallaby!!


Bob_and_Malcolm_Wallaby_800

(But keep making sure those Torrey paragliding instructors are wearing helmets while demonstrating kiting to students. Ya sure don't want them setting poor examples with respect to critical safety issues. (The nice streamlined one Bob Grant's wearing is pretty good quality.)

I started my active participation in this sport 1980/04/02 and am still waiting to hear a fatality report that concludes with, "If only he'd gotten himself fully upright with both hands on the control tubes at shoulder or ear height..."

What's your rationale for pulling that nauseating Grebloville bullshit, Bob? What's the scenario in which you're gonna have an advantage with your hands in zilch control / arm break configuration. I'm guessing you're doing this for the same reason you DO FEEL that the BIG DEAL I make about the differences between bent and straight pin barrel releases is somewhat overblown. You want to keep appealing to the lowest common denominators of the sport 'cause you know that they're your best bet for maintaining your perpetual total control over the fake hang gliding association you've established. You don't want any issues with the reasonably competent crowd challenging your authority. Same deal as the Jack and Davis Shows, u$hPa, Flight Park Mafia, clubs, pretty much anything else ya wanna name in the sport.

Here's Ryan:

03-01512
http://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1582/25333465453_16fbd6f9d9_o.png

06-01609
http://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1540/25661605520_1464382edf_o.png

09-02003
http://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1627/25962178605_f8d10d1405_o.png

11-02020
http://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1469/25936290466_f86aea73b6_o.png


Also a total douchebag BUT he IS a pretty accomplished flyer - as long as the air is glassy smooth and the LZ is a mile wide Happy Acres putting green anyway. He goes from getting airborne to fully proned out, kicked into his harness boot, both hands on the control bar in proper flying position in about six seconds. Breaks the Christopher LeFay Five Second Rule at about one second. Tell me what you're doing that's more effective, efficient, safe, conservative, advantageous in any way. He's gonna have more airspeed, control authority, response speed, altitude than you are at any given moment.

And I think I just figured out another dynamic of what's going on in Grebloville. Joe's the one who permits you douchebags to fly Dockweiler on the two days a week he's sure he won't be using it to generate revenue for his commercial interests. He has a lot of influence, political control over flying in the LA region. Retards his students' progress to be able to keep milking them for instruction income. And Grebloville victims are gonna keep kissing his ass, singing the praises of his Four or Five Cs, pissing all over hook-in checks, staying upright for five minutes after launching at Kagel and going upright ten minutes prior to landing, keeping their hands ten inches clear of the control bar at all times in order to be able to maintain the best possible relationships.

http://www.ushawks.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=811
FTHI

Bob Kuczewski - 2011/11/14 05:28:43 UTC

Tad, Joe Greblo is a very conservative instructor, and he teaches a physical hook-in check just prior to launch. He does not mandate a lift and tug. If you go to Joe's web site (http://windsports.com) you can find contact information for him. Joe knows far more about hang gliding than I probably ever will. If you can convince him that he should be teaching "lift and tug" instead of "turn and check", then you'll get my vote of support.

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7671
Gallery Of Pain

Christian Williams - 2012/01/18 19:58:00 UTC

Here's the way Greblo looks at it (or how I remember his lectures):

We take off and land upright. Therefore, all the bad stuff happens when we are upright. And close to the ground.

Therefore, learn to fly upright in the worst conceivable (and sudden hairy) conditions. (One up/ one down is "upright").

The alternative, if "more secure prone", is to go prone instantly upon take-off, and stay prone until the last possible landing moment.

In both cases, this requires a change of hand and body position in the worst conceivable conditions near the ground.

Therefore, in order never to change hand position near the ground, it is necessary to learn to face all the worst moments (thermals, gusts, sinkholes, midairs, gear failure, downwind landings and takeoffs, a lifted wing into boulders and an entire wire ground crew snagged on your jock strap) upright.

A little reflection suggests that taking off upright and flying upright until well away from the danger zone is not very different from ground handling, where you are flying standing on dirt. A good test of upright flying skills is whether you can ground handle a glider in 25 mph of laminar flow. Do you require a wire crew? Hmmm.

Greblo will not sign off a Hang 3 (US intermediate rating) who cannot ground handle with confidence at the limit of his takeoff judgment.

He's not dogmatic about this for veteran fliers, recognizing that gliders and skills and terrain are different. He just provides his analysis. You often see him flying around in violent thermals upright, just (I think) as a kind of advertisement and thought-provoker.

Also as a kind of threat and thought-provoker. Yeah, I think I finally have this one fairly thoroughly thought out. Fit's right in with all the other u$hPa / commercial interest machinery geared towards disempowering the recreational pilot.

http://www.chgpa.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2467
weak links

Jim Rooney - 2007/07/22 22:30:28 UTC

I've heard it a million times before from comp pilots insisting on towing with even doubled up weaklinks (some want no weaklink). I tell them the same thing I'm telling you... suck it up. You're not the only one on the line. I didn't ask to be a test pilot. I can live with your inconvenience.

But they all remained dead silent through the war I spearheaded and after the total extinction from the public record of the 130 pound Greenspot Standard Aerotow Weak Link.

[Tad Eareckson]

Flying sites in Wisco, Iowa, Montana, S. Dakota, Wyoming....???
http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=36831

Ian Riedel - 2020/08/25 13:58:52 UTC
---
H3. Not a noob, always a student.

If we're all always students then who the hell are our instructors supposed to be? Aren't we paying them for instruction and ratings that qualify us to competently, safely operate in all environments reasonably appropriate for our wings and experience levels?

Somebody cite something he learned from Mike in the setup area that wasn't supposed to have been covered in class and appeared as a question on the written. That the force transmitted by a towline is pressure and the purpose of the weak link is to increase the safety of the towing operation? To never hard turn a glider below two hundred feet? To always thank the tug pilot for intentionally releasing us, even if we feel we could have ridden it out - he should be given a vote of confidence that he made a good decision in the interest of our safety?

Has there ever been a nasty incident that occurred because someone wasn't properly tuned in by some Mike in the setup area or one safely avoided because he was?

If we're all always students then we're all too fuckin' stupid to be doing anything more challenging than light air evening sleds at Dockweiler.

I know that I don't have my head totally wrapped around the physics of the aerodynamics and control responses of hang gliders but I also know that this limitation has ZERO implications with respect to pre- and in-flight decisions, actions, responses. Or would someone like to suggest otherwise and cite a scenario? When a passenger jet goes down the reason is NEVER because a qualified individual didn't understand something.

I've never done a loop (or rolled beyond about 90) but I don't have to have in order to watch a blown one and tell you what was done wrong.

This "always a student" crap is an Industry product...

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=27736
Increase in our USHpA dues

Mark G. Forbes - 2012/12/20 06:21:33 UTC

There are also numerous legal issues associated with accident reports, which we're still wrestling with. It's a trade-off between informing our members so they can avoid those kinds of accidents in the future, and exposing ourselves to even more lawsuits by giving plaintiff's attorneys more ammunition to shoot at us.

Imagine a report that concludes, "If we'd had a procedure "x" in place, then it would have probably prevented this accident. And we're going to put that procedure in place at the next BOD meeting." Good info, and what we want to be able to convey. But what comes out at trial is, "Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury, my client suffered injury because USHPA knew or should have known that a safety procedure was not in place, and was therefore negligent and at fault." We're constantly walking this line between full disclosure and handing out nooses at the hangmen's convention.

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=32681
Tandem crash in LV (speculation thread)

Mark G. Forbes - 2015/04/01 03:46:29 UTC

Among ourselves, we agree (via the waiver) that we understand we're engaged in a risky sport that can cause serious injury or death. We each agree that we are personally and individually responsible for our own safety. If we have an accident and get hurt, we agree in advance that it is solely our own fault, no matter what the circumstances might be. We sign at the bottom saying that we fully understand these things, that we accept them, and that we know we are giving up the right to sue anybody if an accident happens.

Those are fundamental tenets of our sport. We are all individually responsible for ourselves and our safety. We need to see and avoid all other pilots, avoid crashing into people or property and use good judgment when flying. If someone doesn't agree with those principles, then they don't need to be involved in our sport.

Our SOPs, instructor certification, incident reports are all total crap; a weak link's strength and purposes are whatever your flight park operators tell you they are, make sure to have good risk mitigation strategies in place, make sure you're always a focused pilot.

And a focused pilot would be the polar opposite of someone who's always a student - despite the fact that they're both deep into the total crap zone.

I'm quite confident that anything of any practical value in our flavor of aviation has been addressed at least several hundred times over on Kite Strings and that we could produce a pretty comprehensive flight manual in less than a hundred pages.

The V-2 was first launched at Britain in 1944. 1969/07/24 Apollo 11 splashes down after a pretty much flawless moon landing. A quarter century. Hang gliding... Twice that and we're all still highly focused students.

[Tad Eareckson]

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=63595
Sequatchie Valley Hurricane

Davis Straub - 2020/09/25 16:34:36 UTC

A writer in distress

Jessie Dittman - 2020/09/25 16:34:36 UTC

Hello TTT Members/Community,

I'm writing to let our TTT community know what's going on with our family and our community. We have been very stressed and upset by the lies and manipulations caused by David Hanning and Fly Camp...

Yep... Now where have we seen that kinda crap perpetrated by commercial interest types who've gained footholds in flying resources before?

And somebody explain to me how this dynamic isn't pretty much an inevitability. (Fuck you, Highland Aerosports - and the horses you rode in on.)

[Tad Eareckson]

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=36848
Dream 220 aerotow?

crambo117 - 2020/09/22 10:45:32 UTC
Montrose, Pennsylvania

Hey all, i have the opportunity to get a dream 220, brand new sail & 7075 battens. Its a heavier stich sail to be used on my trike, but i was wondering if anyone has ever aerotowed one? I hear some tall Keel pocket wings oscillate under tow. Just curious! Thanks!

Dev C

And after four days of hovering around in the worlds largest, friendliest, most welcoming local coffee shop not one hint of a response. SCREAMS volumes about the extent of the malignancy that's rapidly finishing the sport off.

Well, from the worlds smallest, unfriendliest, most toxic hang gliding community T** at K*** S****** can give you this much...

The extended keel pocket is a remnant of the fundamental major incompetence of this flavor of aviation. In function all it does is replace hang strap length to transmit your body's load to the centerline of the sail. (My first and longtime glider was a Comet 165 with its idiot extended keel pocket, floating "crossbar" (keel), slack sidewires..).

This "design" necessitates either having the keel angled down and back from the nose below the plane established by the leading edges (assholes of the day would refer to the outboard sections of the leading edges as the "trailing edges") or allowing the sail to float way up above the plane established by the three spars. And it's the latter 'cause otherwise you wouldn't be able to break your glider down, fold and bag it with the keel in line with the leading edges.

Furthermore... EVERYBODY bought into this snake oil for YEARS - including Wills Wing - until Wills Wing figured it out, published somewhere, redesigned all their successive gliders accordingly. But there are manufacturers TO THIS DAY...

http://northwing.com/northwing-hang-gliders.htm
North Wing Design · North Wing Range of quality Hang Gliders

2020/09/26

...who are STILL buying into / perpetrating this snake oil.

Zack C - 2010/12/13 04:58:15 UTC

I had a very different mindset too back then and trusted the people that made my equipment. Since then I've realized (largely due to this discussion) that while I can certainly consider the advice of others, I can't trust anyone in this sport but myself (and maybe the people at Wills Wing).

No Zack, you...

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=63574
VG Undone

Steve Pearson - 2020/09/24 22:19:57 UTC

1/2 VG is recommended for aerotowing all Wills Wing gliders configured with VG systems. Towing at less that 50% VG is more difficult because the pitch pressure can be excessively high and that in turn contributes to PIO.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2lk6hbjuJ-c/Ujh-ENPLQrI/AAAAAAAA3IQ/vh46chqQX4M/s1600/JRS_0542.JPG


...can't even trust the people at Wills Wing. You ESPECIALLY can't trust the people at Wills Wing 'cause you know they know better and have sold their souls to popular opinion.

[Tad Eareckson]

Reconsideration...

That may not be a fair shot at North Wing. Doesn't appear to be any significant difference with respect to the keel pocket between the Freedom and the Wills Wing Falcon 4. And even in that shot of Pearson demonstrating proper pro toad AT launch technique on his T2C comp glider we can see a pocket allowing separation between the aft area of the sail and the keel. So there's probably a design issue around which I'm not yet able to get my head wrapped which necessitates a separation.

The separation WAS however absent in my 1989 vintage Wills Wing HPAT:

1-002
http://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7493/28811055926_007c091c28_o.png


(as is the connection to the "pilot"...

2-112
http://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7600/28811055456_925c8abb66_o.png


...in this video.)

I wonder what's going on. (I do, however, know what's NOT going on.) Any ideas?