Sunday Aug 3 : Where To?

[mcelrah]

Woodstock too. Drove down there after High Rockand encountered four Kitty Hawk Kites guys - a senior instructor throwing off three of his "dune goons" for high flights in the mountains on
Falcons. Lazslo, Ellis, and I flew bagwings... Baby-butt smooth - took hands off the controls for photography, answered cell phone calls, adjusted harness. I flew for a couple of hours - Lazslo got 5 1/2. He did a ridge run to Strasburg and back, then Edinburg and back. - Hugh

[Matthew]

Wow!

[DanTuck]

Flew High Rock on Sunday, mountain launch #17, and even though I sledded I had fun. It was good to get another cliff launch under my belt but I think I launched at the tail end of a cycle. It was pretty light at the moment that I launched and Matthew said I dove a little bit. By the time I recovered from the dive and made a right turn, I was too far out from the ridge. Should have turned left and more quickly. Headed out to the LZ and also gained altitude on the way out. I hit some pretty strong sink pockets but did a few circles and still ended up nearly 1,000' over the LZ. Since it was quite thermic, and I'm no Karen Carra, I started my downwind a little bit high and stuffed it to cut through the junk. I ran into quite a few bumps on my downwind and was still a little high when I turned onto base so I kept it stuffed. I should/could have extended my downwind a bit. I ended up overshooting the crest of the field by about 50 feet and landed in the gulley. On final, I saw that I was going to overshoot the crest and go into the gulley so as soon as I got to it, I turned just a little bit left so that I could land straight onto the uphill (far) side of the ditch. Of course, that made me land a little bit crosswind but I still pulled my flare and landed flat on my feet. Thanks a lot Matthew for throwing me off, much appreciated.

One last comment - I really think that upcoming 2's should be very, very strongly encouraged to buy a single surface glider. My Falcon is very forgiving and gives me many correction options when on approach.

[Matthew]

Even though I may be chastised by GaryD for offering practical advice-- here goes.

The cut-out in the tree line at High Rock is for emergencies only. Do not fly through the cut out on base unless you are too low. The prefered approach when it's out of the North or NW is a left hand DBF aircraft approach. Turn on base and come in over the trees to the south of the cut-out and then turn on final. Christy taught this to me. This gives you an additional couple of hundred feet to land on final and gives you pleny of attitude to make the turn onto final. Also, make your turn onto final before reaching the centerline of the field. If it's crossing from the west, you can be pushed into the treeline on the mountain side if you wait too long to turn onto final.

Also, the trees are getting kinda high in the cut-out and need to be chopped down. Glenn almost hit them on his approach. Perhaps as part of the High Rock Fly-in, someone in MHGA could coordinate a work party to cut down those trees. Oh, and the road to the LZ once again needs more work.

It never ends.

Matthew

[deveil]

Even though I may be chastised by GaryD for offering practical advice-- here goes.

hey matthew,
the above? well said. (i hadn't been following that thread and just jumped over.)

if i'd have scrolled up the page from the 'latest post' button. . .
if it wasn't in my head to help 'moderate' that thread? (how arrogant is that?!). . .
if i hadn't had my antennae up. . .

it would have never occurred to me to select out some particular phrasing such as that.

i was relieved that i had time to pop back on and try to cover that.
sincerely
garyD

[XCanytime]

Dan,
I have to respectfully disagree about the single surface glider for the new Hang 2's. I feel that an entry-level double surface glider should be the first glider for the Hang 2. Something along the lines of the Pulse or the WW Eagle. Unfortunately, the Eagle is no longer manufactured by WW, but the used market should be healthy. The entry-level double surface glider has enough of a performance edge over the Falcon that I feel makes it safer. There have been too many Falcons that have drifted downwind of a ridge and unable to make it back out front. The entry-level double surface glider has a wider flying envelope than the Falcon, so you can fly more often and gain more experience, which is the key to safer flying. Experience builds judgement, and judgement is the hardest skill to acquire.

Bacil

[mcelrah]

Pictures from Saturday (dent in barn) and Sunday (Woodstock on PG). Foot is my Marine son's after a long hike. - Hugh

http://mcelrah.smugmug.com/gallery/5631 ... 8089_PxGCc

[brianvh]

I have to respectfully disagree with Bacil and say that the falcon is the best entry into the mountains until you stop making obvious mistakes on approach. Building up airtime is for the second half of H2 into H3. I know of 2 H2s (myself included) who have drifted over the back in a falcon...how many H2s on double surface have crashed on landing? The falcon crash ratio is just so much smaller.

Airtime isn't as important as making it through the first tight field landings. As you build experience landing you have to concentrate on refining the approach until you no longer need the falcon down button to save your skin. Then it's time to transition to a double surface, starting over with big easy fields as you learn the new glide characteristics.

The market for used falcons is pretty active. Sure, you may end up spending an extra $1000 for the year you own then sell the falcon, but I think it makes the mountains much less intimidating, assuming you don't fly in the same building conditions Bacil prefers.

[brianvh]

I should add that drifting over the back is so rare it raises a lot of hoopla, but in both those instances the pilot landed in small fields a DS may not have made it into, with no injury and only one bent batten for damage. There may be other instances I don't recall.

Crashes on landing on so common that even though the consequences are more serious they tend to get brushed off. I ask you again to look at H2 crashes in falcon versus double surface. Falcon wins hands down. Off hand I remember two H2 treelandings, one in a falcon, one in a pulse, both caused by errors in glide angle judgement, not conditions.

For my own H3 tree landing, I've been told if I just stuck with my original attempt to make the field, the gradient would have kicked in and I likely would have made it. Conditions where the falcon penetration becomes a problem are not conditions most H2s should fly in regardless of the glider, though they should do a few such flights shortly before becoming H3.

[RedBaron]

The vast majority of H2's crash and burn on DS gliders. That's a fact. But, they're all flying gliders they've got the rating for. The only thing they don't have is proper training and assistance for their first approaches. The training hill is absolutely inadequate to teach you how to fly approaches. And a bunch of tandems at the tow park don't really teach you how to land your Eagle at the Pulpit secondary.

[mcelrah]

I am finding problems with the link for photos I posted, so suggest you just go to "mcelrah.smugmug.com" and scroll down to the gallery called "paragliding Woodstock 5 Aug 08" (yeah, I know it was really 3 August but I was tired last night). - Hugh

P.S. When I started flying paragliders, I got a whole new appreciation for the problem of going backwards if the wind picks up while flying a wing that actually has inferior performance to a Falcon. There are techniques for diving with some speed increase and for just descending to take advantage of the gradient...

[brianvh]

I think setting up markers in a large safe field so that you have to do base along a tree line then land before you reach the marker would be good training. Trying to land short at high rock every time would do this. Coming in over the trees to the east of the LZ at Ridgely and landing before you pass the windsock would qualify, and Manquin has even more treeline to work with.

I consider Bill's to be a technical field, too many ways to end up downhill.

[Matthew]

I strongly disagree that learning to land a DS glider at a tow park doesn't translate to landing at the Pulpit Seconday. Learning at a tow park still teaches you about angles for coming in on approach. Sticking it in that little field with the windsock at Highland when you have to worry about the taxiway, planes coming into land and taking off, the swamp and the treeline allows only for a very short final. And landing on the spot on a South approach at Manquin, coming in over trees and buildings also allows only a very short final. You need to have a short final at the Pulpit Secondary. The only thing diferent is that there is usualy a large wind gradient at the mountain sites. Thus ground speed will increase on final. And again, if you overshoot at the Pulpit Seconday, you have the option of turning 45 degrees towards the mountain and landing uphill with a crosswind.

Matthew

[deveil]

hey matthew . . .

!! ya know, i've frickin Got to quite posting private messages to the general forums.
signed,
somebody who didn't intend to be here and don't intend to be here.
where the F am i anyhow?
don't answer that

[XCanytime]

Brian,
It might be the fact that the number of H2 Falcon crashes are lower than H2 DS crashes by the mere fact that there are fewer H2 Falcon pilots versus H2 DS pilots. I'd like to see the real statistics, the percentages versus absolute numbers, not some blanket statement. The percentage is the real determinant. I would bet there is not a huge difference in the percentages. Janni hit the nail on the head, it's not the glider, but the pilot's training in using ANGLES for approaches, and their situational awareness. ANGLES work anywhere; they are not LZ specific. And this stuff is in the Pagen books. I agree with Matthew about the Pulpit secondary. I've been landing there since 1994. Of course, I've had only entry-level DS gliders strapped to my back, but if you have your angles and approaches down, and your situational awareness is finely tuned, it should not be a big problem to land there. If there's any advice I can give H2s, it's fly often, fly many different sites, and went you can't fly, read the Pagen books over and over again until you have them literally memorized.

Bacil

[hepcat1989]

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[hepcat1989]

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[brianvh]

Bacil - by rough estimation I'd say that H2 on falcon is roughly half the total. I'd say the accident on landing count is 3/4 DS to 1/4 SS. The number of bad approaches are about equal, but the SS gives you an escape if you're too high, and doesn't PIO if going too fast. Yes, entry level DS can PIO, we just watched it happen at Hyner.

No, I didn't actually count, I'm just referring to impressions from memory. If anything I'd say those numbers are too low, and the DS would come out worse if you did actual numbers. I'm trying to recall a falcon landing accident and can only remember Janet Gregor landing in the cut-out of high rock (was that a falcon?), Joe Gregor at Woodstock, and I'm having a mind blank on the guy who broke an arm at the Pulpit, but I seem to remember a hole being involved so it wasn't glider related. I can remember scads of bad approaches. If anything a falcon is dangerous because it's too easy to do an approach so you eventually stop thinking about it.

I also have a hard time coming up with falcon launch incidents. i remember plenty of bad technique and scary launches, but was always flown out of. Then again, H2's are always better at launching then the rest of us, and they are predominantly on falcons.

Hmm, a H4 blew a tandem launch at Hyner. have you ever wondered why tandem gliders are usually Single Surface? Easier to fix when there's a problem.

[hepcat1989]

.

[davidtheamazing1]

Back to Janni's point, I don't see what would be so hard about having an additional observer with a radio in the LZ for the first couple of mountain flights.

Even after 293 training hill flights, and several tandem lessons, I wasn't prepared. Theres nothing that prepares you for it at the training hill. My first high flight had a very close encounter with a tree. While doing my first pattern, I had the perception that my approach was too high, as I had never turned into final when higher than the trees. I had a radio but while in flight, but felt that the radio feedback from launch was not taking into account my actual position after I flew over the river.

It's true that the angles thing would have been a great skill to have mastered at that point but tandem approaches at the airpark are sufficiently different since there is a wide open landing area and few trees to account for around the field. Also any practice with a tandem instructor makes the judgment alot easier, as a tandem instructor gives immediate confirmation regarding a just-right, too-low, or too-high pattern approach.

For my second high flight under training, (the 1st was not passable) the radio battery wasn't charged up and although it worked for the radio check, died after a minute. That time, I had (obviously) put alot of additional energy into working on my approach with more tandems and watching other pilots in their patterns.

[Danny Brotto]

If we review the official duties outlined for an “Observer” we’ll find no reference to instruction. An Observer does not (and likely may not be qualified to) provide instruction. The role of the Observer is to witness tasks to sign off competencies for ratings (Hang & Special Skills) not provide secondary instruction.

I won’t disagree that many Observers are qualified to provide sage advice but when they do, they are not acting in the capacity of an Observer but rather a mentor (whatever the officially definition of that may be.)

So at sites such as High Rock with it’s H2 w/ Observer status, H2 flight there is for the sake of the Observer witnessing flying skills/tasks geared towards signing off ratings. This implies a competency is the skill set being witnessed.

Danny Brotto

[deveil]

i, myself had made comments that pretty thoroughly combined the roles of Observers and mentors and therefore need to offer a significant apology. to the degree that anyone was influenced by those comments they could have been a significant contributer to misunderstandings between people.
it's not necessarily an uncommon mistake but a significant one, as Observers could be conducting themselves appropriately and at the same time have uncommunicated expectations from those with whom they are dealing.

gary devan

it appears that i'll be a long time getting the all of my foot out of my mouth due to a previous all too casual and careless comment.

[deveil]

as i was the one who hung it out there (ass that is) i figured i should at least take the first bite. hmmmm, not quite fine dining. tastes a little like chicken though, or maybe crow. maybe if i mix in(up) a few more metaphors it'll taste more like foot again. oh wait, it appears there may be a head up there.
garyD

[KirkLewis]

As a new pilot, I'm not sure I understand the differences that would prevent practice at a flight park (both tandem and solo) from greatly improving your safety at mountain sites. A big reason I chose the tandem route over just hill training is I wasn't very comfortable with the idea of just doing a bunch of short hill flights and then throwing myself off a mountain solo. The main thing I've been working on in my tandem flights is landing patterns, since about flight 9 we've been doing nothing but pattern tows. By now I've landed (or attempted to land) in just about every part of the airport. I've also had a chance to see how very different it is to land with windy aloft conditions (In the staging area we didn't even need to circle, just point into the wind). I didn't get that right the first try and I was very thankful Sunny was there to do a quick S turn and land in another part of the field. That's one great thing about having an instructor there, you can make mistakes that they can get you out of

I've found landing (and everything leading up to it) to be the most challenging part of learning to hang glide. At highland I have quite a few options for where to land, and I have room to overshoot/undershoot. I can always try to be more accurate than the field requires, and try different landing approaches. I can also get lots of practice landings in a short period, which isn't possible in the mountains.

[RedBaron]

Even after 293 training hill flights, and several tandem lessons, I wasn't prepared.

Neither was I. And I had as many plus a dozen tandems at Ridgely. My first approach at WS on a Falcon almost ended in the trees.

ANGLES work anywhere; they are not LZ specific.

I would like to add that the whole point of flying a DBF is the ability to adjust your glide angle by extending either downwind or base leg or throwing a few 180's in. Works great at the tow parks, results in disasters at our fields because tree lines don't allow you to extend until your angle is right. And doing all kinds of maneuvers inside tree lines demands a great deal of glider control and condition judgment. Not a novice skill in my book.