Pilots who take time to thoroughly pre-flight should be applauded, not made fun of (cough..dd..cough )
This is utterly incomprehensible to me. I'm very mild-mannered, but if someone made fun of me or anyone else for being overly-cautious with a preflight, that person would get a piece of my mind. I have been around aircraft my entire life and have never seen that happen before. Take two hours to preflight if you wish, you're the PIC.
Sorry, anybody who takes two hours to preflight a hang glider is flashing warning signals that he's got no fucking clue what he's doing. You can practically assemble one from parts in that time. And I one hundred percent guarantee you that 747 and F-18 pilots don't spend two hours preflighting their planes.
A factory fresh T2C that has just passed a two hour preflight with flying colors prior to its second flight ever is about thirty times more likely to fuck somebody up than any other glider rapidly set up and moved to launch with NO preflight but has a good pair of wheels on the basetube.
There is nothing more absurd than some Hang Two asshole with Industry Standard aerotow equipment and a Rooney Link checking every nylock and safety ring on his glider before hooking up behind a Dragonfly.
Do you do a sidewire load test or skip that one because your instructor told you might break or damage the wire?
Do you do a lift and tug two seconds prior to commitment on foot launch or do you find that a waste of time because you preflighted the hell out of your suspension and connection and did three hang checks while you were waiting in line?
I one hundred percent guarantee you that if you're spending two hours on a preflight you're NOT doing something else that would be a hundred times more effective in widening your safety margins. Just doubling your fucking Rooney Link knocks your chances of crashing down to one percent of what they were.
Is there any interest in just spending five minutes preflighting your glider and using the balance to look over other people's equipment, help them launch safely, pick up some valuable information that Harold or Trisa might have forgotten to relay?
The Pilot In Command on a hang glider tow flight isn't always the person under the glider wing.
- Even with everything being done right it's frequently the guy at the other end of the string controlling the magnitude and sometimes alignment of the thrust and he can be in a position to save or kill the glider.
- And with things NOT being done right - which describes the vast majority of hang glider towing - the Pilot In Command is often a couple of hundred or thousand feet of two thousands pound Spectra or a few inches of 130 pound Greenspot.
Name some shit that matters that people are catching because of preflights beyond two minutes or missing because of inadequate or omitted preflights and causing them to crash. If we're crashing gliders because of shortcomings on preflight we should put more in the way of emphasis, time, focus, effort on preflight. Otherwise we should look at what's actually crashing gliders and put more in the way of emphasis, time, focus, effort into whatever works to fix those problems.
Lenami, Terry, Zack, Grant, and Kevin were not killed because of preflight inspection issues and deficiencies. They were killed by procedures, training, and equipment issues.
Kevin didn't need two hours of preflight - fifteen seconds worth of briefing would very probably have spelled the difference between a cool flying experience and a fatal contact with powerlines. (If you had been at Columbus that day would you have been talking to him or too busy rechecking all your safety rings just in case you missed one during the first five checks?)
And Lin didn't need to spend fifteen minutes preflighting his three-string connection. He needed to spend five or ten minutes practicing making the connection at home in front of the television. (And he also should've had five minutes of briefing so that he'd understand never to tow with anyone on the other end of the string incapable of dumping tension.)
Whatsamattah Davis? Got your own little cult too intellectually castrated, culled, cowed, inbred, and sealed off to have any hint of a useful discussion?
I've had it once where the pin had bent inside the barrel from excessive tow force. My weaklink was still intact. The tug pilot's weaklink broke so I had the rope. I had to use two hands to get the pin out of the barrel.
I know about this type of accident because it happened to me, breaking four ribs and my larynx... and I was aerotowing using a dolly. The shit happened so fast there was no room for thought much less action. But I wasn't dragged because the weaklink did its job and broke immediately on impact.
Imagine if you will, just coming off the cart and center punching a thermal which takes you instantly straight up while the tug is still on the ground. Know what happens? VERY high towline forces and an over-the-top lockout. You'll have both hands on the basetube pulling it well past your knees but the glider doesn't come down and still the weaklink doesn't break (.8G). So you pull whatever release you have but the one hand still on the basetube isn't enough to hold the nose down and you pop up and over into an unplanned semi-loop. Been there, done that... at maybe 200 feet agl.
- without putting yourself into an unplanned semi-loop if you're much below two hundred feet
- Lin wasn't under any tension to speak of when he was locked out trying to get his parachute out and open - the winch was freewheeling.
- We have weak links. And anybody who isn't an off the scale stupid pin bending shit like Bobby or Davis is easily capable of designing a conventional release that can handle any hang glider weak link you wanna name.
- It's A LOT easier to put Peter's Linknife out of action than it is a three-string - or any other release that wasn't slapped together by a total moron. If the lanyard flops over the cylinder or a few wheat stubble stalks find their way into the slot you're right back into moronic discussions about radios, parachutes, and hook knives.
It would not need to be the primary release, but definitely as a last-resort back-up release, short of using a hook-knife.
Get fucked. When the shit hits the fan the primary release IS the last resort.
...without a weak link. Focal point of a safe towing system.
P.S. Ever wonder:
- why Peter always stays walled up in his little cult forum that nobody can join, read, or comment on without his permission?
- what Peter's doing while everybody who gives a flying fuck is talking about the latest towing disaster?
Dennis Wood - 2013/06/30 15:31:29 UTC
Suffolk, Virginia
there is a "nut and bolt" company named FASTENAL that also sells some trade tools, including hook knives. they have different qualities, and sell in quantities also. prices are cheaper than some other places of purchase.
Why would you need a hook knife when you've got a Rooney Link? Zack Marzec didn't have any trouble getting off tow when his glider started getting into a dangerous attitude?
Sorry, I don't see the logic in trying to save a couple bucks on equipment that I am litterally entrusting my life to. "Pacifier"? may be... but there's an old saying out there... "You never need the backup, until you need the backup".
I know of at least one pilot out there that flies with two caribiners. His logic makes more sense to me... you can't have too many backups.
You can't have too many backups.
Glenn Zapien - 2013/06/30 20:56:17 UTC
They do run a turn around pulley.
I should've realized that.
You do launch next to the operator.
Who, even though he's right there and knows that they've got a ten percent malfunction rate on student hookups, can't be bothered to check that the three-string's properly connected.
Casey Cox - 2013/07/01 02:06:06 UTC
I could hardly watch that.
Really? I can never seem to get tired of watching it. This thing's an absolute classic. Hope it goes viral enough so everybody with so much as a passing interest in hang gliding can see what a great job Mission does.
Someone with that little experience...
How do you know how much experience he did or didn't have?
...(pio...
Sorry, I missed the PIOs.
...no hook knife...
How do you know he didn't have some useless piece of shit hook knife?
Either way, I don't like the plastic safety hook knifes.
Yeah, there's nothing that pisses me off more in hang glider towing than seeing people with cheap plastic hook knifes - with the exception, it goes without saying, of homemade funky shit.
There has to be a better tool.
A Koch two stage release? Just kidding.
I had a dive knife which had a plastic sheath. One day the plastic broke and sent the knife plummeting into the weeds. The next one I reinforced the joint on the back of the plastic using a soldering iron.
Better knives for a better hang gliding future. Enough of this Bronze Age crap.
However, having attached a lanyard to the next knife, I was worried about it flipping around and cutting me if I would have to deploy. This is a good knife for a water landing to cut through the sail, but it seems like there could be a more effective tool that is sturdy enough for both operations.
Sounds like you've got some pretty good ideas about hang glider towing knives. Any chance you could be persuaded to do a seminar at Ridgely sometime?
Hey Mike... How many more posts about hook knives are you gonna listen to before you can't take it anymore and explode?
Mike Lake - 2013/07/01 11:27:08 UTC
Gawd. It's about fuckin' time.
Tim Dyer - 2013/06/29 17:03:26 UTC
Las Vegas
Weak links are not for lockouts. They prevent the glider from overstressing. You can lock out all the way to the ground and still have an intact weak link.
Well said Tim. Amazingly after 30+ years this myth persists.
With a little help from USHGA, Tim Herr, Bill Moyes, Bobby Fucking-Genius Bailey, Dr. Trisa Tilletti, the excellent book, Towing Aloft, by Dennis Pagen and Bill Bryden, Davis, Malcolm, Russell, Plaurel Tjaden, Matt, Ryan, Jim Keen-Intellect Rooney, BHPA, HPAC, HGFA...
I can never understand why some of you guys persist with such crappy and contrived releases.
Get back where you came from and take up checkers, faggot.
Just use one with about the same failure rate as your side-wires and something only a mindless dunce can rig incorrectly and you'll be fine.
Mindless dunces constitute about 99.7 percent of the people who fly hang gliders. We're still talking major bloodbath.
By all means have a hook knife the colour and material of your choice if this makes you feel better, it might be useful for opening a pack of biscuits.
Is there a color that works reasonably well for both functions?
There's no sense in coming up with more and more contrived ways to improve your crashes if the most important thing at the very start of the chain is a bit of shit.
Have you even begun to consider the recall costs? Do you want the US to become the next Greece?
You don't see many sailplane pilots crawling out of their cockpits hacking away at the line with a hook-knife!
Well, you actually DO - but they're almost always mistaken as skydivers.
This was a near fatality because his release failed.
Beats the hell out of an actual fatality of someone crushing his chest with one of those Kotch jobs.
Let's not all get drawn into issues that only serve to dilute the main problem.
Is the 130 pound Magibraid as good a lockout protector as the Greenspot?
No matter how you get in the air, you should have enough speed (AOA), to abort.
You SHOULD - but air is funny stuff sometimes so sometimes you DON'T.
The release used has to be one hundred percent failsafe...
Not if you have an Infallible Weak Link. If you have Infallible Weak Link you can use whatever Industry Standard crap you want for a release because the Infallible Weak Link will infallibly and automatically release the glider from tow whenever the tow line tension exceeds the limit for safe operation.
...all the time...
Bullshit. You can't make a release that's one hundred percent failsafe ALL THE TIME. Whenever I hear somebody talking about his release that's one hundred percent failsafe ALL THE TIME I just start walking away. What we're shooting for is a release that's one hundred percent failsafe THREE QUARTERS of the time in regular use and a little under half the time in lockout situations.
...and mentally you should be prepared to use it any time.
And, of course, when you're holding a lot of bar pressure you should also be mentally prepared to do an unplanned semi-loop...
...when you take your hand off to get to the actuator.
As soon as the s*** hits the fan, or just before that.
Good freakin'...
Bill Bryden - 2000/02
Dennis Pagen informed me several years ago about an aerotow lockout that he experienced. One moment he was correcting a bit of alignment with the tug and the next moment he was nearly upside down. He was stunned at the rapidity. I have heard similar stories from two other aerotow pilots.
...luck.
Why leave safety to an external factor...
Because we have highly experienced, skilled, qualified, professional tug pilots constantly poised to...
Jim Rooney - 2007/08/01 13:47:23 UTC
Whatever's going on back there, I can fix it by giving you the rope.
...fix whatever's going in back there by giving us the rope - in the very unlikely event that a weak link on one end of the line or the other allows us to get too far out of whack.
...it's your ass...
Which is why I always want a highly qualified, experienced, skilled, professional tug pilot acting as Pilot In Command of my glider choosing all of my equipment and making all of my decisions for me.
Regards,
Bob
Hey I like this feature, when I type poop I get s***, fun.
And when I try to write something about the Dick Stark fatality, I get d*** Stark. Even more fun.
Is this the US government interfering snooping on us?
No, these are scumbags like Jack Axaopoulos and his soul mate Bob Kuczewski feigning decency while they're busy f***ing everybody over.
Again, why not a simple barrel release? I've used the type of three ring circus shown in the video, but really only when I wanted to do an over under type release.
Keep in Simple.
Shove in Up Your Ass, Davis.
Brian Horgan - 2013/07/01 15:48:22 UTC
could you just over fly the tow rig in this situation?
Could you just use a release that works and check it before you launch so you never get in that situation? Just kidding.
Scott Corl - 2013/07/01 19:35:10 UTC
Fairborn, Ohio
I think he did overfly the tow rig. Even if the winch is letting the drum free spin, there can be lots of friction creating enough tension to cause a dive like this.
We just need enough tension to overpower our control authority - which often sucks at the best of times anyway.
It really is essential to disconnect from the line.
Any thoughts on the best color hook knife to accomplish that job?
I would note that I've tried cutting old pieces of tow line with the hook knife that came with my parachute and it's not very easy to do.
In my mind my plan has always been to try to cut the week link and not the tow line its self. The week link is made of a much smaller gauge that is significantly easier to slice through.
In my mind I plan to use equipment that doesn't suck and configure and preflight so there's less chance of me ever getting into that situation than there is of me landing on the DC Beltway during rush hour (which is pretty much any hour). But, hell, I tend not to spell "weak" with two "e"s twice in a row and make two words out of "itself". So you may be better off with your own approach.
Also: I appreciate my barrel releases even more now.
It usually doesn't take too much time and effort to get to them and pry them open if the glider's high and level and you're not dealing with a whole lot of tension.
I feel like this wouldn't be possible with barrel releases.
There's lotsa shit that isn't possible with your bent pin engineering miracles. Just read the fatality reports.
Lin Lyons - 2013/07/02 01:39:55 UTC
Moraga, Califoria
Some comments:
Erik Boehm - 2013/06/29 14:21:54 UTC
Also, I think he needs to practice deployment... that took a second or two longer than it should have
I don't think I have to practice. I've got it pretty well down now. I'm not likely to forget. The real problem is to understand that it's time to use the 'chute.
The real problem is to understand that you're very unlikely to survive a second incident which finds you grabbing for your deployment bag handle.
However, I'd just taken a parachute clinic. Had I not just taken the clinic, it's unlikely that the video would have been posted. Now, I'm a parachute clinic desciple. If you haven't done it, do it. If it's been a long time do it.
What if...
- instead of having taken a parachute clinic, you'd have taken a how-to-connect-a-three-string-to-a-tow-ring clinic?
- instead of a Ryan Voight how-to-land-in-a-narrow-dry-riverbed-with-large-rocks-strewn-all-over-the-place clinic, Kevin O'Brien had taken a how-not-to-drift-downwind-of-the-airport clinic?
Christopher Albers - 2013/06/29 20:59:30 UTC
Why no hook knife?
This always comes up.
No shit.
I honestly don't think I had time. I probably had less than two seconds of dive time to spare. Any distraction would likely have meant that I wouldn't have posted the video.
Well, I'm sure that, given their dedication to safety, Mission Soaring Center would've posted it - along with your tracklog - as a service to the world hang gliding community to help prevent a similar tragedy.
There's always the problem that you have three to four strings to cut, both sides of the bridle and the release line, and the autorelease, if you haven't already released it.
- Or it hasn't already released itself and dumped you into a whipstall.
to eliminate that problem, solve a bunch of other issues, and allow you to blow tow - easier - with either hand?
Oh, right...
The Mission Soaring Hang Gliding school provides professional training on state-of-the-art equipment at our dedicated training site at Tres Pinos just south of the San Jose / San Francisco Bay Area.
The Mission Soaring Hang Gliding school provides professional training on state-of-the-art equipment so, obviously, that's not state-of-the-art equipment.
If the auto-release had been attached, it would have to break because I wouldn't have been able to reach it.
If the autorelease had been attached and the bridle hadn't the shock wave resulting from your impact would've shattered most of the windows within a three mile radius.
On top of that, I hadn't attached a line to my hook knife, so if it slipped...
So how come Mission sold you the hook knife without a safety lanyard?
You can bet I'll fix that post haste.
Fuck the hook knife. Spend the time practicing hooking up the three string - while you're waiting for delivery of your Koch two stage.
Brad Barkley - 2013/06/29 14:47:52 UTC
I'm confused as to why, if they knew he had a problem, the winch operator kept up the tow pressure...
It was the mile plus of line that I was dragging that probably produced most of the pressure.
How many pounds per square inch?
Clearly, pulling the line off the winch drum had some effect, but I've been told that the drum had never spun that fast. In addition, typically a winch operator doesn't have a knife handy.
No shit. And Mike Robertson's winch doesn't have a radio handy either because it isn't secured and has vibrated onto the ground. That's not a big fucking deal unless you've arranged with the student to give instructions.
By the time he'd found one, I'd have been on the ground.
Fuck him. What a douchebag operation.
NMERider - 2013/06/29 14:41:03 UTC
If anyone wants the facts then contact Mission Soaring Center and ask to speak with Harold Johnson...
That's probably not the best idea in the world.
I could tell that just by watching the video and listening to all the silence coming out of Mission.
I could be wrong, but he's probably still somewhat upset.
Good. For the purpose of the exercise he killed you. He should be upset for the rest of his useless fucking life - or at least until he does something honest and decent to balance things out.
He is speaking to me again...
I wouldn't be speaking to HIM.
...but is even more demanding of safety than I remember.
WHOA!!! Let's not go NUTS here!
He's very good...
Bullshit.
...and when I tow again, he's the operator I'd like to have.
DO NOT BLAME YOURSELF and DO NOT ALLOW YOUR NATURAL HUMAN FEELINGS to blind you to the fact that this asshole fucked you over and is continuing to fuck you over. Be EXTREMELY careful about trusting people and making friends in this sport.
Brad Barkley - 2013/06/29 14:47:52 UTC
...if they knew he had a problem...
The critical issue here is time.
Often a synonym for altitude.
I was on the ground in less than thirty seconds. With eleven or so of that being parachute time.
Seventeen when it was doing anything.
There really wasn't anything anyone on the ground could do in the time available.
could've. But they're not using state of the art equipment so that's out.
All they got to do was have heart attacks watching my suicide dive. I'll be the first to admit that I was very lucky this time. (Do I really want to do this again? Really?)
Then stop hanging out at chute clinics and start looking at Koch two stages.
Mike Bomstad - 2013/06/29 16:20:39 UTC
A radio could have been very useful in this situation.
Probably not. In fact, it probably would have been a problem. I honestly don't think I had time to analyze any communication other than, "THROW YOUR PARACHUTE". And, frequently, that's not the first thing that's advised.
They make towing MORE - not LESS - dangerous.
Erik Boehm - 2013/06/29 16:28:10 UTC
I don't understand why the pilot allowed the line to get behind him...
I was pretty nearly at the top of the tow when I tried to release.
Which is the whole idea.
After a few tries, I could see that the pin had released, and I was in trouble. At that point, the tow line was pretty nearly straight down, over the base tube...
...pulling me down. And I was moving at a pretty good clip. Had the line released, it would have been a good flight.
And if Jon Orders had been in the habit of doing hook-in checks Lenami and her boyfriend would've had a great afternoon and Jon would still be doing tandem rides instead of dealing with obstruction of justice and negligent homicide charges.
I was doing everything right.
Sorry, missed the hook-in check.
(Except for that one minor detail, of course.)
Did you:
- make sure the asshole on the winch had a means of cutting you loose?
- look into how they've been doing this in Europe and some of the less stupid regions of North America since the mid Eighties?
Once the fit hits the shan, then one sees how good one's decision making really is.
Hopefully a lot better than what one was using to get himself into the shit in the first place.
The hang gliding community has been left in shock at the death of an experienced pilot in an accident in York yesterday.
It is understood the Perth man had launched off Mount Bakewell, a well known flying site on the outskirts of the York township, and collided at high speed with rocks near the top of the hill.
"Attachment" and "Second release". - Keep in mind, this is the first time they've seen anyone make this stupid mistake.
And they've never HEARD of anyone ANYWHERE making that stupid mistake. And the concept of release failure is totally foreign to them.
While on the other hand, Jim Keen-Intellect Rooney...
I'm also sure it has it's problems just like any other system. The minute someone starts telling me about their "perfect"system, I start walking away.
...can't conceive of a release that DOESN'T fail one out of five times. 'Cept maybe for homemade funky shit which can't be towed at all because it doesn't have the requisite huge track record.
They are redesigning the link...
It's a RELEASE.
...so that it won't/shouldn't happen again.
So they were using state of the art equipment until 2013/06/15 but right after you locked it up they all the sudden know just how to make it more state of the art.
I have had online conversations...
With WHOM? You don't google "aerotow release" without my name turning up real high in the results. So which idiot pin bender are you talking to?
...about the barrel link...
Somebody who doesn't know the difference between a release and a weak link. Yeah, that really helps narrow things down.
...and it does look good.
Beautiful curve, isn't it? So how much pull does it require under four hundred pounds towline - or did the conversations never get quite that technical?
In truth, after eighty tows...
Not really...
Casey Cox - 2013/07/01 02:06:06 UTC
Someone with that little experience...
...all that inexperienced, is he Casey?
...and this mistake, I'm not going to do it again.
I can list a whole bunch of stupid mistakes you ARE gonna do again. But don't worry, everybody you're associating with will be doing them too so if you get bit it'll just be a freak accident.
The school supplies the links.
And the school refers to them as links, right? And these Jack Show assholes are allowing you to get away with calling them links 'cause they're incapable of seeing any differences either.
I suspect, but don't know if, that's generally true. Honestly, a 2nd release would have helped.
No, it wouldn't. It would've taught you that a primary release failure is no big fucking deal 'cause you've got a backup.
Me being more careful would have helped just as much.
Astronomically more.
A second release would add some confusion to every flight.
How confused do you find two point aerotow pilots who fly with twin barrel secondaries?
"How much is a life worth?" OH, it's mine.
Glenn Zapien - 2013/06/29 19:07:28 UTC
He is wayy out there! Like by the highway out there. Truly scary.
Oh yeah. There's a highway (main road) a bit over from the tow field. And another road past that, which is where I landed. 0.9 miles from the field. I asked if this counted as a cross country flight for my next level, but...
I've seen much worse jobs of it.
Tormod Helgesen - 2013/06/29 19:46:19 UTC
Note to self: Buy hook-knife before next tow!
AND tie a string on it, to your harness, so if you drop it, you...
...or, more likely, your next of kin...
...can get it back again.
I think that it would be possible to fly down with the line attatched, but that would require the pilot to descend in a spiral or figure eight, keeping the line slack and hoping that it didn't snag at the last minute.
In fact, very early in towing, I had a knot/kink in the link and did fly it down. After which I was really careful to insure that there were no kinks in the release loops. This time, there was just too much drag, simply because of the resistance of the mile of line in the air for me to get any slack and allow me to "fly the glider".
Felix Cantesanu - 2013/06/30 03:39:07 UTC
This kind of towing doesn't use a weak link or two releases??
I had a weak-link.
Everybody's got a weak link. Something will break - eventually.
Didn't break.
And neither did the glider - so we know it wasn't a problem for you.
New ones are stronger than older ones.
How much stronger and how strong are the older ones?
I did not have two releases. I expect that they're more careful about preflight these days.
How many basetubes do you have, how careful do you need to be that one of them won't separate in flight, and how much more difficult is it for you to ensure that your release will do what it will probably need to in the course of the tow?
Weak links break fairly often, but not because of a problem.
No, weak link breaks are NEVER a problem - a good thing most of the time and merely an inconvenience at worst.
Rather, it's just age and deterioration.
That's a problem. I don't know how much you've been following things lately but that problem can kill you just as dead as a locked up three-string. And thanks for giving us even more confirmation about the shoddiness and incompetence of the operation.
Tom Low - 2013/06/30 04:13:47 UTC
If you can. better if you can throw the chute behind the control bar rather than in front.
At the time, I was simply looking for clear sky.
The glider was intact, level, stable. You should've done that one right.
itttem - 2013/06/30 06:42:30 UTC
Also, note that the pilot release(d) the quick release which in this case would have (saved) the whole thing.
What I released, about a minute into the flight, was the auto-release. The auto-release uses the loop release pin that the normal release uses, so it wouldn't have helped. If I'd used my hook knife, it would have reduced the number of lines to cut from four to three, which would have been good, because the hook knife can't reach the auto-release line.
Mike Lake - 2013/07/01 11:27:08 UTC
You don't see many sailplane pilots crawling out of their cockpit hacking away at the line with a hook-knife!
Thanks. A bit of reality/levity is always good.
I don't think he was in a funny mood. I know I wasn't after the first couple hundred posts about hook knives.
Among new pilots, there is some confusion of weak-links and auto-release.
Not that big a deal - both have killed people when functioning as they're geared or configured to.
I've got 'em straight...
Bullshit.
...but that wasn't always the case.
You've referred to a release as a "link" four times in this post.
There's also the problem of understanding the function...
No shit.
...but getting the names confused.
No shit.
The weak-link line breaks if there's too much tension on the tow line.
Too much tension for WHAT? Safe operation? Your convenience? You had too much tension on the towline. You had so much tension that your ass woulda been toast in a matter of seconds if you hadn't gotten your parachute out and open. Give me a fuckin' definition of too much tension in terms of pounds or Gs and a reason for the number.
These assholes are total quacks.
The auto-release releases the tow if the angle between the tow line, and the glider's direction of flight is too great.
How much they charge for one of those? Could I get a discount if I ordered a couple dozen? I've got a few friends I'd feel a lot better about if I knew they were flying with this kind of protection. Cragin Shelton, Dan Tomlinson, Hugh McElrath, Matthew Graham, Marc Fink, Peter Birren are coming to mind.
No. Wait. Peter's already got a Linknife version of this that works BETTER under real high tension.
(The auto-release uses the normal manual release mechanism. It wouldn't have helped me at all.)
If it ever does help you do you think there'll be time enough for your entire life to flash before your eyes prior to impact?
Yes, I realize we all know this, but just in case there's someone new...
Steve Morris - 2013/07/02 01:52:47 UTC
Sunnyvale, California
Lin,
I agree that everything you did in the air was the best you could do under the extreme circumstances and even if it wasn't "perfect" it was certainly good enough!
The 'chute toss needs work.
I'm sure there are many who would not have fared so well in the same situation.
There are many who HAVEN'T. Read the fatality reports.
The solution to preventing this adventure in the future lies in what was done on the ground.
Have you checked out Mission's website? I'm really not seeing any room for improvement?
I'm glad to hear that changes are being made all around.
Not anywhere near enough.
Dawson - 2013/07/02 03:05:37 UTC
Lake Macquarie
Hi Lin,
Thanks for responding here, and also for posting the video so that others can learn from the mistakes made.
Like Mission hasn't.
I've never seen, and would not tow behind a winch which didn't have a knife or guillotine at the ready.
But you haven't seen an operation which provides such professional training on such state-of-the-art equipment. Mission's training is so professional and their equipment is so state-of-the-art that they don't really need state-of-the-art equipment.
You gave up on pulling the release seven seconds prior to the beginning of the lockout.
What lockout? He's got a weak link line which breaks if there's too much tension on the towline.
The tow operator should ALWAYS have a knife ready to cut the line.
At MISSION? Get real.
He should not have to search for it, it should be right there. Better still, I've seen winch tow rigs which have a guillotine built into them so the operator just has to push a lever to cut the line.
Not much sport in that. Might as well stay home and play checkers.
Lin Lyons - 2013/07/02 01:39:55 UTC
Keep in mind, this is the first time they've seen anyone make this stupid mistake.
But it's not the first time that ANYONE has made this stupid mistake. We do not fly HG in isolation.
Define "WE".
We are a worldwide community, and as such need to be learning from the mistakes that have been made by others, not waiting to re-learn them ourselves.
Flying in isolation is EXACTLY what a lot of these inbred commercial operations like Pat's and inbred cults like Peter's do. If nobody's been killed at Ridgely/CHGA, Inc. by a pro toad bridle with a Rooney Link on one end they're using a proven system that's never failed.
Rick Maddy - 2013/07/02 04:05:59 UTC
Denver
First off, I'm thrilled you are unscathed from such an event. Thank you for sharing this experience so everyone can learn from it.
Anybody who can learn anything from this is a total moron.
I'll second your comment about a parachute clinic.
Parachute clinics are a waste of time.
Our club does repacks every year...
Just carefully open and expose things so you can replace rubber bands as needed.
...and part of it hanging in a control frame, getting tossed around, and practicing pulling out and throwing out chute. It's amazing how difficult the velcro can be to release after a year of being worked together.
I would REALLY doubt that that's an issue.
People that haven't opened their chute pouch in a long time may be amazed at how hard it will be to remove the chute while wearing their harness and hooked into a glider.
I've never had a problem blowing and tossing mine with one hand.
Again, I'm glad you are OK. I believe safety will be improved in places as a result of this.
And I believe I just saw the Independence Day Bunny hiding cherry bombs under the azaleas for the children to find and use to celebrate the birth of this great nation of ours - the day when we cut our ties with those smug limey bastards with their chest crusher releases that are supposed to "work" when you want them to.
Mike Lake - 2013/07/02 10:56:21 UTC
I was going to make a longish post about UK systems but it sounded too much like bragging. Fortunately this guy Macdux has got much of it summed up pretty well.
Crap pre-flight, no launch marshal, crap release system, crap winch operator, crap air to ground emergency procedures, crap winch if it didn't have a guillotine, crap pilot attitude if he takes all the blame for this TEAM EVENT F***UP.
Please pilot, don't knock yourself out and don't worry too much about giving a nasty scare (oh dear, it must have been terrible) to anyone who has taken a big part in nearly getting you killed. A hook-knife (even if you had one) and a parachute are both lousy as a first and second line of defence.
THERE ARE BETTER WAYS OF DOING THIS STUFF without having to worry too much about what to do AFTER the event. Prevention better than cure and all that!
Until the next time then...
Suck my very very reliable bent pin release you freedom hating smug limey bastard with your chest crusher release that's supposed to "work" when you want it to. If your chest crusher releases and winch guillotines are so fucking superior then how come an operation like Mission with a forty year track record that uses only state-of-the-art equipment isn't using them?
Pilots who take time to thoroughly pre-flight should be applauded, not made fun of (cough..dd..cough
)
