The Soaring Safety Foundation (SSF) is the Training and Safety arm of the Soaring Society of America (SSA). Our mission is to provide instructors and pilots with the tools needed to teach/learn both the stick & rudder skills and the Aeronautical Decision Making skills needed to safely fly a glider. We also provide information and analysis of incident and accident trends in order to develop better training tools.

 

Data collected from Open Glider Network (OGN) as of Monday February 17, 2025

DurationGlidersFlightsHours
Year to Date  84435873019.32
Last 7 Days  172433436.97

This table shows the number of individual gliders that recorded a flight in the OGN tracking system ant the number of flights/hours those gliders flew.

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The Soaring Incident Database is now available to help pilots, safety officers, clubs, and commercial operators develop new programs that can help prevent incidents from becoming major accidents. See more incidents by searching the database or register a new incident.

Region Pilot Certificate Pilot Injuries Passenger Injuries Type of Flight Launch Method Type of Aircraft
East CFI None None Instructional Aero Tow ASK 21
Incident Activity Damage to Aircraft Damage to Canopy Incident Date Incident Time Weather SSA Member
Flight None 2020-06-06 1600-1800 Not a Factor Yes
Incident Description The student pilot, returning after a multi-month layoff, made a radio call announcing that we were entering a left downwind for a landing on the left grass runway. A few seconds later another pilot radioed that his single place glider was on a right downwind for the right grass runway. I was distracted in monitoring the student flight and did not visually spot the other glider until it appeared off to the right and 75 ft lower when we were both on short final for our respective runways.
Other Comments I should have taught, and used, my CRM skills to have the student find and verify the position of the other glider while I flew the pattern. CRM skills, use all available resources, would have let both the student and myself focus on different tasks instead of me trying to teach both under these conditions.


Find out more about the Soaring Safety Foundation: (trustees, mission, By-Laws, or Contact us by email).