Soaring Safety Foundation

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Reprints of monthly SOARING articles. Did you miss the magazine? Reread the article here!

December 2007 - Last Flight -- by Bernald Smith

Don't have a last flight! Unless it's because you've retired from flying. SSF advocates First Flight! That's our program where we urge everyone to make their First Flight of each year, one with a Glider Flight Instructor. Not a BFR, but just a flight to add to the middle name of SSF: Safety. Your safety. Is it worthwhile? What if you're the most experienced pilot in the world? What if you're much more experienced than any flight instructor you might be able to find? Read the full article

November 2007 - Which Approach -- by Richard Carlson

“Tell me your touchdown point. What is your stopping point?” At some point in your training you probably heard your instructor utter these two phrases. Instructors ask these questions because precision landings are a specific task spelled out in the Practical Test Standards (PTS). While every licensed glider pilot has made precision landings, most of us would agree that not every landing we make would meet the PTS standards. . Read the full article

October 2007 Motorglider Certification and Training -- By Stephen Dee

When I got involved in soaring in 1967, motorgliding was considered such an oddity that it was not mentioned in polite company! The prevailing philosophy back then seemed to be that if you wanted to fly an aircraft with an engine, you were encouraged to go fly an airplane, because sailplanes were reserved for the purest form of flight. Forty years later, the purists still exist, but I’ve heard that nearly 70% of all gliders built today are equipped with some type of engine, whether it be self-launcher or sustainer, so the concept seems to have taken root. The machines have matured with the concept, and we now have a wide variety of motorgliders to choose from, that span the field from trainers to high performance sailplanes. In this article, I will address some of the certification issues, both for motorgliders and pilots, and provide answers to some of the most frequently asked questions I’ve fielded along the way. Read the full article

September 2007 - Ground Non-Flight Damage. Is Your Canopy Insured? -- by Bernald Smith

No, not the one over your back patio, nor the one you use at the beach. I'm talking about the one on your sailplane. Most of us have them insured, as part of our glider hull insurance policy. So, when we have a hull loss claim for a damaged canopy, we have coverage, minus deductible of course, which may be as low as zero if we've had no claims for several years. Read the full article

August 2007 - Risk Management Toosl for Soaring Pilots -- by Mike Bamberg

The general aviation community has had, for several years, tools to help pilots develop personal minimums and for assessing risk for individual flights. We have modified these tools to make them more appropriate for the soaring community. . Read the full article

July 2007 - Avoiding Surprises! Motorglider Safety Tips -- by Stephen Dee

How many times have you heard, “Flying is safer than driving,” or “The most dangerous part about airline travel is the drive to the airport!” While I agree entirely, there is no escaping the fact that the environment we fly in, regardless of the type aircraft, is simply not a forgiving one. Whether mistakes are made in execution or through simple ignorance, both have the same potential for disaster. I am of the opinion that the best safety device in any airplane is a well-trained and prepared pilot. So, I offer these suggestions for preparing both the pilot and his machine for an upcoming season. First, let’s talk about pilot preparation. Read the full article

June 2007 - Three C's Promote Safety -- SSF Safety article reprint

The following is a reprint of an article published in the October, 1987 issue of SAILPLANE SAFETY, the house organ of the Soaring Safety Foundation prior to SSF’s commencing publication of safety articles in SOARING in 1996. Read the full article

May 2007 - Four Simple Steps to Improve your Proficiency -- By Rich Carlson

Most pilots will agree that being proficient is much more desirable than simply being current. The major question these pilots ask is, how can I become proficient? Read the full article

April 2007 - Soaring Accident Rates -- By Rich Carlson

A cursory look at the 2006 soaring accident rates shows both good and bad news. The bad news is that the number of accidents remained constant from the previous year. The good news is that there were 50% fewer fatalities than in 2005. Read the full article

March 2007 - Emergency Response Plan, Suggestions for Soaring Sites -- By Burt Compton

How would you respond to a wingrunner falling and seriously scrapping their hands and knees? A bee sting? A glider that has landed just off the airport and has run through a fence, trapping the pilot and the passenger in the cockpit? A towplane that flips over after a bad landing, and now has fuel dripping onto a hot engine? Read the full article

February 2007- 100 of us will have Accidents in 2007! WHO? -- By Bernald Smith

Please read this next sentence out loud: I may have an accident on this flight. That is my way of getting readers to put themselves into the position of knowing that I’m meaning the sentence to apply not just to me, the author hereof, but to all readers. What in the world am a doing, you rightly may wonder. Read the full article

January 2007 - Starting the Year off Right -- by Gene Hammond

The Soaring Safety Foundation introduced, the “First Flight” program in 2006 and again remind you to take the first flight of 2007 with an instructor.

As we frequently see during a sports event, the coach appears and stresses the need to return to fundamentals rather than “looking pretty.” Since many pilots do not have a “coach” (unless you consider the grouchy instructor at your site as a coach), the Soaring Safety Foundation wants to reinforce the need to review the fundamentals learned in the past and use that knowledge to build an even more solid base for flying safely. Read the full article

December 2006 - Potential Hazard Training -- By Bernald Smith

So, compared to aerotow, winches can be dangerous, as shown by statistics last month. Does that mean winch launching is too hazardous? Is that the only risky thing about soaring? What about stalls? They shouldn’t be risky, except of course, close to the ground. Ditto for what comes after a stall in many aircraft, the spin. Aerobatics risky? Even up high? For all flying, didn’t our mothers tell us don’t fly too fast; don’t get too far above the ground? What does that old saw tell us? Maybe that the ground is what folks are used to, where you probably wont get hurt if you don’t move, (unless the move is to jump out of the way of a falling object).Read the full article

November 2006 - Winch Launching -- By Bernald Smith

There’s been some recent discussion among some folks within SSA about the cost advantages of winch launching vs aerotow, spurred no doubt by the perceived rising prices of aviation fuel. (I note that at $3/gal, auto fuel is relatively cheaper than when I first started to drive in the early 1940s.) It should be recognized that along with advantages, there may be disadvantages to winch launching, compared to aerotow. At least one important one is that of their relative safety, as reported by countries with extensive winch launch experience. Read the full article

October 2006 - What happened to my 50:1 Glider? -- By Eric Greenwell

It’s not a surprise to a self-launching sailplane pilot that his sailplane doesn’t sail nearly as well when the propeller (and engine on a lot of them) is extended. What is a surprise to many is how much performance they lose, because they’ve never tried it, or it’s been so long since they tried it, they forgot what it was like. Read the full article

September 2006 - Current or Proficient -- By Rich Carlson

FAR Part 61 clearly states that pilots must be both current and proficient if they are to safely operate a glider. Currency requirements like, 61.56 Flight Review, 61.57 Recent flight experience: Pilot in command, and 61.69 Glider towing: Experience and training requirements typically spell out the minimum amount of flight experience that a pilot needs to exercise the privileges of their pilot certificate. Other regulations like, 61.31(j)(1) Type rating requirements, additional training, and authorization requirements, and 61.107 Flight proficiency state that the pilot must be proficient in various flight maneuvers. While most pilots are familiar with the currency regulations, they tend to gloss over the proficiency ones. Do you? Read the full article

August 2006 - Spins -- By Bob Wander

Over decades of instruction I have discovered that very few pilots can answer all three questions that follow. Please write down your plain-English answer to each of the three questions below. Limit yourself to 50 words or less for each answer, please! Question # 1: When the spin begins, why does the glider nose pitch down? Question # 2: When the spin begins, why does the glider bank to the left or to the right? Question # 3: When the spin begins, why does the glider yaw develop into continuing rotation? Read the full article

July 2006 - Nothing published

June 2006 - Nothing published

May 2006 - Stalls -- By Bob Wander

The Soaring Safety Foundation is concerned with the number of stall and stall-spin accidents that occur. These accidents feature high energy at impact. High impact energy translates into significant risk of personal injury or death. The 'G' forces that your body must endure, in a sudden stop, vary with the square of airspeed. Impact at 50 knots features four times the G-force than does an impact at 25 knots. Read the full article

April 2006 - Slips -- By Gene Hammond

During discussions with pilot examiners across the United States, the Soaring Safety ` Foundation (SSF) has learned that one of the weak areas noted during practical tests for all glider ratings is slips to landing. Read the full artilce

March 2006 - Keep your eyes on the Goal -- By Rich Carlson

“My that experienced pilot looks low! What’s he doing now? Why is he heading in that direction? He should know better than that!” How often have you heard these questions at your gliderport? How many times have you been the pilot? Did you ever think that some pilots may have been inadvertently trained to do this? Read the full article

February 2006- Bad News -- By Bernald Smith and Gene Hammond

Folks, lets get serious about our flying. According to the data listed below from the NTSB and other sources, for the years 1999-2004 inclusive, there were 48 glider/towplane fatalities. We have to go on faith with the government data, but if it’s even close to being correct, that’s pretty bad for what’s going on. Read the full article

January 2006 - Time to Stop Flying? -- By Bernald Smith

Its a great time to be growing older - people are staying active and living longer, which means there are more senior pilots in the air. Are they more likely to be accident-prone? If you look at age-rated highway accident/fatality rates compiled by AMA and NCIPC, the per-mile accident/death rates do go up with age. But, a study by BGA shows age-rated glider accidents lower for older pilots. Statistics from the SSA Glider Insurance program also support that, in that there are far fewer accidents with older pilots, but of course the population of older pilots is unknown within SSA as we don’t have those kinds of statistics like BGA has. Are old pilots superior to the spectrum of old car drivers? Read the full article

Last updated 3/5/06