How dangerous is soaring?
patrick.seb...@gmail.com
safest aviation sport, almost safer than most 'real' sports. You can't
brake your leg while flying :) Only when you hit the ground :D
Though on a first year 4 pilots that I knew got killed with glider.
Not a good start. And during the years I have counted over 20
fatalities where I can say they either they were my friends or I knew
them well. Plus all the other fatalities. Almost every week on this
group, we get another sad message informing yet another fatality. And
most of the cases, pilots has been extremely experiensed. We know that
they haven't done any stupid moves, they just lost the control of the
plane on wrong situation or the plane has failed on them. I personally
feel that I am on the edge to quit this sport because of that. I don't
want to see not even one more friend passing away. I want to push that
off my mind.
Soaring is the greatest sport I can imagine. No other sport can give
me the feeling, same view, same fellowship etc etc. But is it worth
it???
PS
cherok...@gmail.com
> it???
(resounding) YES
uncl...@ix.netcom.com
YES!
UH
Vorsa...@aol.com
I discovered soaring. That was 20 + years ago. I have been soaring
since, haven't sailed for some 15 years, and also sold all my
(obsolete) ski gear . The answer, then, is an unequivocal " YES " !
Cheers, Charles
Jesper Thomsen
<patrick.seb...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1193738217....@k79g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
Let me put a little perspective on it for you - in Denmark we've not had any
fatalities in the last (off the top of my head) 10 years, and on average we
have about 3-5 incidents/accidents every year. This compared to about
(roughly estimated) 50.000 operations a year so at least here Soaring is the
safest aviation sport you can find.
/J
01-- Zero One
Patrick,
Quitting the sport will not stop further fatalities (Except possibly
your own from flying. I can assure you that life itself is fatal.). We are
going to continue this sport whether you continue in it or not. What will
change is that you no longer have the contact with one of the most diverse and
interesting groups around. We will still be flying, soaring, laughing, lying
about our accomplishments over a beer, having the adventures of a retrieve,
seeing firsthand the grandeur of nature and weather, experiencing the
satisfaction of launching into the skies and returning home, making new friends
... and, yes, possibly losing a few of them along the way.
How dangerous is soaring? My primary instructor would answer the question, “Soaring is bloody dangerous! Anytime you get more than about 3 feet off the ground (whether on a ladder, airplane, rooftop) or travel more than about 15 miles per hour (whether in a car, bicycle, skis, or airplane), you are taking your life in your own hands.”
Let’s be diligent about our safety with procedures, better equipment, etc. But at the end of the day, it is still going to be more dangerous than not flying.
I want to live to see what my great-grandchildren become. But when they ask what I did with my life, I don’t want to say “Well, I worked 40 years and then I retired.” I want to tell them about the time that I thermalled with a bald eagle, or the time I saw a corn stalk flying in the thermal over Uvalde, or the grandeur of the mountains and lakes in the western US, or the magic of seeing my “glory” on a cloud below me.
Is it worth it? Each person has to answer it for themselves.
For me, absolutely.
Larry Goddard
01 “zero one” USA
BB
> group, we get another sad message informing yet another fatality. And
> most of the cases, pilots has been extremely experiensed. We know that
> they haven't done any stupid moves, they just lost the control of the
> plane on wrong situation or the plane has failed on them.
This is unfortunately not a very accurate picture. The newsgroup tends
to hear of the "extremely experienced" category, but the majority of
the 4-6 fatalities per year in the US are fairly simple screwups
around the home airport.
The vast majority of the fatalities among the "extremely experienced"
pilots also come down to fairly simple pilot errors -- trying to ridge
soar some tiny bump in a strong wind, thermal up off the middle of the
canyon, make that last desperate transition, flying over unlandable
terrain because "there is sure to be a thermal there" and so forth.
More experienced pilots take greater risks. Fatalities from "losing
control" or "the plane has failed on them" are essentially unheard
of.
So here's the bottom line. Flying gliders is not inherently risky. We
only fly in good weather, our systems are very simple, and there is no
engine to fail. This rules out 90% of the causes of accidents in light
planes. If our pilot training and rules of engagement were the same as
that of the airlines, our fatality rate would be less then theirs.
That's why numbers are misleading. It's not Russian roulette, with the
question "how many chambers are loaded?'" A danger rate anywhere
between extreme motocross and airline flying is entirely in your own
hands.
The accident-waiting-to-happen takes this fact and says "they were all
pilot errors. A truly skilled pilot like me would never do something
so stupid." This is a good defense mechanism, but a wiser pilot (or
spouse!) will notice that the pilots who crashed felt the same way.
The wiser pilot remembers the temptations to which his much more
skilled and accomplished friends fell, and understands "where they
failed I could fail as well." He studies obsessively, makes
contingency plans and sets personal limits, and runs through his
checklist once more.
Why do we do it? In the end, there is nothing in the world like the
sense of wonder and accomplishment at the end of a long cross-country
soaring day.
John Cochrane
Ian
> Almost every week on this
> group, we get another sad message informing yet another fatality. And
> most of the cases, pilots has been extremely experiensed. We know that
> they haven't done any stupid moves, they just lost the control of the
> plane on wrong situation or the plane has failed on them.
People often ask me "Is gliding safe?" My reply is always the same -
"No, it is not safe, but it's is not hard to make it personally safer
- don't be bloody stupid."
Does S&G still publish accident reports [1]? They used to categorize
the causes: "Instructor failed to take over in time", "Poor field
selection", "Rigging error" and so on. However, almost all - certainly
90+% - of accidents had the same meta-cause lurking behind the report:
bloody stupidity.
Pressing on through an unlandable area on a dying day? Bloody stupid.
Forgetting to connect the elevator before launching, and then not
checking? Bloody stupid.
Flying in dangerously tight gaggles for the sake of a few points?
Bloody stupid.
"Just [losing] the control of the plane on wrong situation"? Bloody
stupid, almost certainly.
All you have to do is not be bloody stupid (and discourage bloody
stupidity amongst those around you) and you can decrease your own risk
enormously.
Ian
Ian
> Almost every week on this
> group, we get another sad message informing yet another fatality. And
> most of the cases, pilots has been extremely experiensed. We know that
> they haven't done any stupid moves, they just lost the control of the
> plane on wrong situation or the plane has failed on them.
People often ask me "Is gliding safe?" My reply is always the same -
"No, it is not safe, but it's is not hard to make it personally safer
- don't be bloody stupid."
Does S&G still publish accident reports [1]? They used to categorize
the causes: "Instructor failed to take over in time", "Poor field
selection", "Rigging error" and so on. However, almost all - certainly
90+% - of accidents had the same meta-cause lurking behind the report:
bloody stupidity.
Pressing on through an unlandable area on a dying day? Bloody stupid.
Forgetting to connect the elevator before launching, and then not
checking? Bloody stupid.
Flying in dangerously tight gaggles for the sake of a few points?
Bloody stupid.
"Just [losing] the control of the plane on wrong situation"? Bloody
stupid, almost certainly.
All you have to do is not be bloody stupid (and discourage bloody
stupidity amongst those around you) and you can decrease your own risk
enormously.
Ian
[1] Don't read it any more. There are only so many time I can be
enthralled by "Derek Piggott takes a fresh look at winch launching",
"Our chairman's son goes solo on his sixteenth birthday" and the task
for Day 3 of the last Eastern Counties Club Class competition.
Ian
> Let's be diligent about our safety with procedures, better equipment,
> etc. But at the end of the day, it is still going to be more dangerous
> than not flying. ...
> Is it worth it? Each person has to answer it for themselves.
>
> For me, absolutely.
Absolutely. We must always beware of people and clubs who claim that
"Safety is the prime concern." If they really meant it, they wouldn't
go gliding at all. It's a hobby - for most of us - so fun is our prime
concern, followed by as much safety as we can reasonably fit in.
Ian
raulb
soaring. I have, of course, known OF pilots who were killed while
flying, and everyone made some mistake which caused their demise
(well, at least one may have had a heart attack).
However, when I was 19, a girl from my high school and church was
killed in a traffic accident. Should I have quit driving?
An acquantance of mine, and fellow glider pilot Jack Lambe was shot
and killed by his brother. I still have my guns (and I won't argue
with you whether you think I should get rid of them or not) and I
still associate with my brother.
Then too, I have fallen off the top of a 6 foot ladder. No, I was not
killed, but I could have been had my head hit the floor before my
shoulder. Yet I worked for another 20 years as an electrician,
climbing ladders.
I have totaled a 1-26 on the side of a mountain. I still fly.
I have also had a serious motorcycle accident (forced off the road by
an inattentive driver) which could easily have resulted in my death.
I still ride.
My point is, as the man said, "you pays your money, you takes your
chances." If you do not think that the benefit is worth the risk,
don't "pays your money." No one can (or should) decide that for you.
In the end, it is all in your perception because some people crash and
some people don't. Some people die soaring, but some people die in
traffic accidents, some people die falling off ladders, and some
people drown in 3 inches of water after slipping in their bath tub.
I don't believe in predestination, but I happen to be one of those
people who believes that when your time is up, it's up. You coud be
soaring or you could be slipping in the tub. I should have died at
least 5 times by now and although I have been seriously ill or injured
in each of these, for who knows what reason, I am still here. I would
have missed a lot if I let my fear of dying rule my life--don't get me
wrong, the chance of dying is always on my mind.
Having said all of this, I now tell you that you have to ignore what
any one done/said and make up your own mind about flying. If you
can't get past the risk of dying, then by all means, quit flying. If
you decide to go on flying, DO NOT fear it. You have to respect the
dangerous activities (flying, driving, working with electricity,
etc.). You will get in A LOT more trouble flying while being afraid
of flying than you ever will if you fly and respect it.
Whatever you decide, it will be the right decision for you, but not
necessarily for anyone else.
Papa3
Last Sunday was one of the most beautiful soaring days imaginable here
in the Ridge Country of the northeastern US. Trees are turning
colors, there were hawks a-plenty, and I even flew with a bald eagle
for a while. It was good.
On the car ride home, I began counting the number of roadside
memorials to people killed in car accidents along interstate 80 (for
those of you not familiar: a) interstate 80 is a major 6 lane highway
which crosses the US and b) there is a trend in the US for people to
set up impromptu roadside memorials to friends and family killed in
car accidents) . In the 30 or so miles I travelled along this section
of road, I counted no fewer than 6 memorials. Six (or more) lives
snuffed out just going about their daily business or visiting friends
and family or maybe taking that long overdue vacation.
What's my conclusion? Life is filled with risks. We can manage
them to the best of our ability, but beyond a certain point there's
only so much that we control. Would I rather be remembered as
someone who had taken advantage of what life has to offer or someone
who "survived" to waste away slowly in an old age home?
I don't want to be cavalier about it, but I believe people who take up
soaring (or motorcycle racing, or downhill skiing, or horse jumping,
or...) know the risks. They choose to accept those risks. I think
they make the right choice.
Erik Mann
LS8-18 (P3)
user
No.
But we do it anyway. My, we are a selfish bunch...
<patrick.seb...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1193738217....@k79g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
Kloudy via AviationKB.com
>
>But is it worth
>it???
>
>PS
Yep.
You're gonna die sometime. Why not live while you're breathing?
--
Message posted via AviationKB.com
http://www.aviationkb.com/Uwe/Forums.aspx/soaring/200710/1
james.d...@saic.com
> Soaring is the greatest sport I can imagine. No other sport can give
> me the feeling, same view, same fellowship etc etc. But is it worth
> it???
>
it.
I will concentrate on striving to let good judgement, not my ego,
drive my decision process. In other words, I will try not to do
anything "Bloody Stupid", and wreck my glider.
Nyal Williams
>> Soaring is the greatest sport I can imagine. No other
>>sport can give
>> me the feeling, same view, same fellowship etc etc.
>>But is it worth
>> it???
Is anything worth it? You can die from sex, from eating,
from drinking too much water, from too much sleeping.
Hiding under the bed is not living. Stay wary, but
live your life with some risks taken; otherwise you
will never know who you are, or of what you are capable.
Rick Culbertson
> Soaring is the greatest sport I can imagine. No other sport can give
> me the feeling, same view, same fellowship etc etc. But is it worth
> it???
Hi Patrick,
For myself the answer is a firm Yes. This subject is near and dear to
all of us, as has been repeated by the replies here every pilot must
personally address the question. Your question is valid and
appropriate as Soaring is an "all in sport"and not for everyone, if
after serious reflection the answer is other than a true Yes... then it
certainly would be time to hang it up and OK to do so.
Back in 1999 I asked myself that same "is it worth it"question about
flying Hang Gliders, after 23 years of flying HGs I became a bit
complacent so my answer was "No". The main reason and simple answer is
because I wasn't "all in" and that's a recipe for big trouble. So I
shifted to Sailplanes because I still love soaring where the interest
and passion to fly returned 10 fold. I too have lost close friend in
both sports, some very reciently but I've lost many more friends and
family to cancer and traffic accidents. A few years ago my sister fell
off a ladder while hanging a bird feeder in a tree, she is now a
quadrapalegic, what can you say, you never know how long you may have
as the risks in life are many. For all the reasons and more mentioned
in the other replies posted here I say yes because speaking only for
myself it's what makes me tick, helps to keep me firmly engaged in
living a full life with a an grin and a twinkle in the eye. it's one
of the great reasons to be alive.
Rick - 21
Colorado, USA
hret...@aol.com
approach. Their death , and I would bet the vast majority, was due to
their failure. I don't recall reading about a death due to mechanical
failure, going back 30 or so years.
So, throw all the crap about living life in the can and ask yourself
if you are a good airman. If you suck, you'll probably kill yourself
and I would suggest you find a simpler hobbie.
If you're good, prove it to the rest of us by not doing something that
got your friends killed.
Perhaps you're just getting old and are looking for a reason to quit.
"Take up slack"
R
patrick.seb...@gmail.com
going to spend my life on bed :) There are lot of other ways to have
great time too. Though soaring is extremely the best rush I can get. I
like to polish the rock, beat the shit out of the skiers and so on.
Who wouldn't :) Like John said, there is nothing better than have that
100mile final glide back home after 500 miles behind you. But still I
don't know if it is worth it any more. Though one reason can be that I
have experienced it all already. Flown 20 years, about 4000hrs. But my
main consern still is that people dies. Of course you can die
anywhere, doing anything. But none of my tennis friends hasn't died on
tennis court. None of my icehockey friends hasn't died on ice rink.
None of my sailing friends hasn't died while sailing and so on... But
I've lost and wittnessed way too many fatalities. It totally changes
your view when you are first person on an fatal accident site. Done
that 4 times. Sure there has been stupid errors, but still. You can't
rig your tennis racket wrong...
On 31 loka, 00:27, Rick Culbertson <rc5...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > Soaring is the greatest sport I can imagine. No other sport can give
> > me the feeling, same view, same fellowship etc etc. But is it worth
> > it???
>
> Hi Patrick,
>
> For myself the answer is a firm Yes. This subject is near and dear to
> all of us, as has been repeated by the replies here every pilot mus
patrick.seb...@gmail.com
I recall couple of Nimbus 4's failing in flight. And one LS-6
(fluttered)
HL Falbaum
Yes, and a 1-34 or two as well.
We should remember that what we do has some risk. The management of that
risk is what we are about. We can manage more of the risk than, say, a
motorcyclist or a full contact karate participant.
When we get the feeling that what we are about to do is a bit dumb, we
should decide if it is worth it or not. We should know where the traps are,
such as a very marginal final glide in the hope that we will make it
(especially if we have done this before and got away with it)
Of all the forms of "evidence" in Medical and Sociologic research, anecdotal
evidence (I know 3 people who were killed in gliders last year) is the
next-to-last in value.
We all know how to behave---If we just do it we minimize the risk.
I think it is worth it!
--
Hartley Falbaum
DG808C "KF" USA
<patrick.seb...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1193784563....@50g2000hsm.googlegroups.com...
thermalrider
If your not living on the edge...your taking up to much space!
Is it worth it? It is the best thing you can do with your clothes on!
Is it safe? You are in command of that and only you.
If you do not respect the forces you are dealing with eventually you
will pay.
Regards
Jim
LS-1f (1J)
Ramy
mind everytime I hear about another fatality, especially someone I
knew (2 so far this year!). And I think most repliers are correct, for
most of us, it worth it, but probably not for our families and
friends...
I think the most important is to understand the big risk involved, and
not to be in denial like some posters who believe that as long as you
are not doing stupid mistakes you are safe. No matter how safe you
think you are, the risk is still significantly higher than most normal
activities (such as driving). Of course, there are measures we could
take to significantly reduce the risk, such as only fly in stable air,
far from terrain, never get further than 10:1 glide back to the
airport, etc, but than it wouldn't be much fun wouldn't it?
Ramy
On Oct 30, 10:59 am, "Kloudy via AviationKB.com" <u33403@uwe> wrote:
1LK
of 1 in 80. The additional risk I take on when flying is, by
comparison, relatively small. That said, there's little question that
soaring is more risky than generally believed. When the annual number
of deaths relative to the likely number of soaring participants (hours
would be a better denominator, but the data isn't available) is toted
up, soaring appears to rank right up there with motor racing or
serving in Iraq.
As to the fact that many fatalities involve highly experienced pilots,
it's worth considering that we accumulate age while aquiring
experience; one is protective, the other with it's accompanying loss
of neurologic competence is not.
The choice to participate should be made with a clear understanding of
the risks; for me the rewards are sufficient compensation. Your
milage may vary.
Ray Warshaw
1LK
BT
How dangerous is hiking.. experienced people are attacked every year and die
How dangerous is.... white water rafting.. canoeing.. sailing.. swimming..
water skiing.. snow skiing (trees jump in front of skiers)..
How dangerous are motorcycles.. the best instructor in the state just got
killed because a car lost control swerving to miss a ladder on the highway
and jumped the median..
How dangerous is racing, dragstrip, professionals.. get hurt or killed every
year..
How dangerous are quads.. people are maimed every year..
Don't give up your life because you think you might get hurt.. train..
study.. PRACTICE..
The most dangerous pilot is one who thinks he can fly himself out of a
jam... but you only see him at the airport once every 3 months.
BT
<patrick.seb...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1193738217....@k79g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
Bullwinkle
<bNO...@SPAM.cox.net> wrote:
The question is a fair one for someone to ask.
The answers I've seen so far are either not helpful or simply emotional.
Bottom line: here in the US (can't speak to other countries, which may be
better organized) no one can tell you if soaring is more dangerous than any
other activity because we have no rates with which to compare them.
Example, is there one fatality per 100,000 tows, or 100,000 flight hours, or
what? No one knows because there is no denominator (exposure data). We can
tell how many people died, and how many reportable accidents there were
(NTSB database), but absolutely no idea how many tows were made last year,
or how many flying hours were flown in the US last year.
In my own club, we could count tows, but have no system for totaling flight
hours among the private owners.
All that said, do I intend to continue soaring? Of course. There's simply
nothing like it. But I'm making that decision with my heart, not my head.
Bullwinkle
hret...@aol.com
aircraft failed. You still have a 98.7% chance of killing yourself ,
1.2% someone will slice thru you , and I'll give you .1% your aircraft
will fail at no fault to yourself. All this of course if anything
happens at all.
I think you should quit and collect stamps because your mind is on
death and not the business at hand.You think some kind of roulette
wheel is spinning with everyones name on it and you're next. With that
kind of confidence, you're a magnet for an accident.
Enjoy your snow, but I bet you'll shake this nonsense.
And as old Gus said, the best way to treat death is to ride off from
it.
R
Anybody want to talk about head-on collisions on a two lane highway?
Tony Verhulst
http://home.comcast.net/~verhulst/GBSC/student/faq.htm
"Most soaring accidents are the result of a series of judgment errors so
to a large extent, soaring is as safe as you make it."
Tony V.
Brian
How Dangerous is soaring?
Short answer is no one really knows and even if they did it would be
meaningless number.
No one knows because we really don't know how much soaring is done. As
stated in another post we know how many fatal accidents (127 since
1985) But we have no denominator.
It is a meaningless number because even if we knew it, it wouldn't
apply to you. The real question you want to know is "How dangerous
are you?" Soaring more than just about any other sport puts your
individual safety squarely upon your shoulders.
If you really want to know how dangerous Soaring is to you. Go to the
NTSB Site and review those 127 Accidents. How many of those pilots
were doing something you might be doing when they died?
IF you don't fly in the mountains, remove those accidents.
If you don't do Low passes, Remove those Accidents.
IF you don't fly motorgliders, selectively remove those accidents.
IF you don't thermal Low, remove those accidents.
If you don't put yourself in positions where you can't land at
airports, remove those accidents
If you don't put yourself in postions where you don't have good
landing options, remove those accidents.
After doing this every pilot will have a percentage of these Fatal
accidents that could have been them. Maybe they will alter the way the
fly to improve there numbers. The lower the number the Safer Soaring
is for you. If you don't fly obviously this number will be Zero. But
you will still die doing something.
Another way of saying what I said above. Soaring probably is one of
the safest sports around in that if you are hurt it will probably be
your own fault in all but a very few cases.
Brian
soar2...@yahoo.com
> safest aviation sport, almost safer than most 'real' sports. You can't
> brake your leg while flying :) Only when you hit the ground :D
>
> Though on a first year 4 pilots that I knew got killed with glider.
> Not a good start. And during the years I have counted over 20
> fatalities where I can say they either they were my friends or I knew
> them well. Plus all the other fatalities. Almost every week on this
> group, we get another sad message informing yet another fatality. And
> most of the cases, pilots has been extremely experiensed. We know that
> they haven't done any stupid moves, they just lost the control of the
> plane on wrong situation or the plane has failed on them. I personally
> feel that I am on the edge to quit this sport because of that. I don't
> want to see not even one more friend passing away. I want to push that
> off my mind.
>
> Soaring is the greatest sport I can imagine. No other sport can give
> me the feeling, same view, same fellowship etc etc. But is it worth
> it???
>
> PS
Excuse me here, but what exactly is your f**king point?
If you want to quit, then quit. Nothing that I, or anyone else, can
say is going to change your mind. Really, just post a "For Sale" sign
on your glider and get on with it. BTW, I have permanent knee damage
from playing tenis, but I don't whine about it.
Tom
bumper
wildflowers, the majesty of mountain ranges, fall colors, the first snow,
and of course soaring.
You weigh the risks, you mitigate what you can, you accept those that seem
managable or are worth it.
YES
bumper
mart
gliding is not dangerous, but it can be highly unforgiving.
Every decision should be a consious one.
"Is it safe to fly in that direction?"
"should I fly with a audio vario or flarm?"
"did I do a good preflight check?"
Sometimes when I am confrontated with a difficult decision , I pretend
that I ask my girlfriend ( flies too) would do. That it itself is
already a reason to look for other options.
I also found that it is often not the super pilot that takes the most
chances , but more the sub-top "wanna-be's ".
--
mart
asw22...@gmail.com
> I couldn't imagine life without the smile of a pretty girl, a field of
> wildflowers, the majesty of mountain ranges, fall colors, the first snow,
> and of course soaring.
You left out gadgets Bumper....
patrick.seb...@gmail.com
same situaiton than I am. I have flown almost everywhere and I have
flown numerous competitions plus I have been instructing since 1992.
So I believe I am qualified to fly glider just fine and write about
it.
I am not sure if you guys understood my consern.What happened to those
extremely skillfull pilots ie Geoff Loyns? can the same thing happen
to my other friends or myself. Is it worth trying the thin ice
anymore?
That who said that soaring is not dangerous is wrong. You can get
killed without your own reason. You can just thermal on a 10 footer
and some one who is joining the lift, hits you from behind. Maybe he
didn't see you at all. That has happened numerous times. Luckily most
of them has survived, few didn't.
PS
Robert van de Sandt
I just suggest to read the following
http://www.ls-flugzeugbau.de/safety-comes-first-e.html
and make your own opinion.
Robert
Ian
> I think the most important is to understand the big risk involved, and
> not to be in denial like some posters who believe that as long as you
> are not doing stupid mistakes you are safe.
If that's a reference to me then you have missed my point. Which is
that by no being stupid the risk can be enormously reduced, not that
soaring can be safe. Nothing is safe.
If it's not a reference to me just ignore this!
Ian
Ian
> At my present age, my risk of dying on any given day is in the range
> of 1 in 80.
How old are you? A 1 in 80 chance of dying today means that you have a
79 in 80 chance of making it to tomorrow, which is a (79/80)^365 = 1%
chance of making it through a year. I'll bet even 100 year olds have a
better survival rate than that ...
Ian
1LK
> How old are you? A 1 in 80 chance of dying today means that you
have a
> 79 in 80 chance of making it to tomorrow, which is a (79/80)^365 = 1%
> chance of making it through a year. I'll bet even 100 year olds have a
> better survival rate than that ...
>
> Ian
Well under 100. Ian (although not as far under as I'd like). It's a
multifactorial analysis and some of the factors that go into it are
personal, but, given the assumptions, it's probably a decent
characterization. The risk isn't additive, BTW; it remains about the
same day to day as long as the factors used to calculate it are
stable.
Ray Warshaw
1LK
Ian
So you really do only have a 1% chance of being here next year? What
are you doing posting to Usenet - go flying. It's probably not worth
buying a flarm, by the way. Or a parachute.
Ian
Mike Schumann
this by installing a Ballistic Recovery Chut in your glider?
Mike Schumann
<patrick.seb...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1193824682.1...@o38g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com
hret...@aol.com
have no business in an aircraft if you equate it to skating on thin
ice. I figured you scared the crap out of yourself after doing
something stupid. That or you're stringing us along. Maybe you're
looking for attention. God knows.
Go buy a chainsaw and cut down a tree. When you're done , you'll know
what to do.
R
Kloudy via AviationKB.com
> But my
>main consern still is that people dies. Of course you can die
>anywhere, doing anything. But none of my tennis friends hasn't died on
>tennis court. None of my icehockey friends hasn't died on ice rink.
>None of my sailing friends hasn't died while sailing and so on... But
>I've lost and wittnessed way too many fatalities. It totally changes
>your view when you are first person on an fatal accident site. Done
>that 4 times. Sure there has been stupid errors, but still. You can't
>rig your tennis racket wrong...
>
OK..you're thinking too much.
That's the first sign.
Time to quit.
--
Message posted via AviationKB.com
http://www.aviationkb.com/Uwe/Forums.aspx/soaring/200710/1
Bob Kuykendall
> How dangerous is rock climbing.. trained people fall every year and die..
Woot! Stand by for a "wear ur helmet" post from Majid... ;)
Bert Willing
I have come to the same point as Patrick a couple of years ago (although
with just about half the experience) when in my region a had a total of 18
fatalities in one year. Southeastern France is probably the most crowded
gliding aerea you could imagine, but 18 is a lot, and 3 of them were members
of my club.
I was asking myself the question when I would be the next, and I stepped
back from gliding for almost a year to have a thourough thought at it (and
to discuss alot with gliding buddies).
I came to the conclusion that attitude towards the risk of flying is the
most important point, and that the key point for maximum safety is to be
*always* aware of the situation and of one's actual personal abilities and
limits - *always* and in *every* situation. One glitch can be the fatal one.
If others don't follow that rule and have a hard encounter with the planet,
I won't be able to change that.
So I decided to live as best as possible up to that rule, and not to be
negatively influenced by the fate of the 5-10 fellow pilots who die every
year here in Europe.
After that decision, I went and bough my first glider (after 17 years of
club operation).
And I enjoyed every single minute I spent flying it (and the upgrade gliders
which came up eventually). The only question I put myself since was - how to
get more flight time....
Bert
"Kloudy via AviationKB.com" <u33403@uwe> wrote in message
news:7a84aae7eb4e9@uwe...
Bob Kuykendall
> Excuse me here, but what exactly is your f**king point?...
>
> ...Nothing that I, or anyone else, can say is going to change
> your mind...
>
That seems a bit contradictory to me. If nothing said will change his
mind, that kind of takes the point out of saying it. It certainly adds
a bit of a question mark to the f-bomb. Tragedies like the one at hand
often shake people along fault lines they didn't even know existed.
Wandering off-topic, I have to see this most recent accident from the
parental perspective. I've flown with Emil Kissel, and I know that he
has been passionately devoted to soaring, and devoted to promoting and
furthering it. My heart goes out to him. As a parent, I have to look
at soaring through the perspective of, is this something I'd sign the
consent form for? That might sound like an element of triviata, but it
is not. It is, in fact, crucial to the development of soaring as a
sport and crucial to the maintenace of the critical mass that keeps it
viable. We totally need to keep drawing in the kidlings, keep forging
them into safe, conscientious pilots who temper their caution with a
touch of boldness. And we can talk ourselves blue in the face about
how safe soaring can be, how safe the training regime is, how safe
training makes for safe pilots. But that's maybe a tough sell when you
see a lot of what's behind the gelcoat.
Bob K.
Chip Bearden
aggressive cross-country soaring are riskier, still, although they are
typically practiced by more experienced pilots who should (key word)
know how to manage those risks. There's a good article about safety
and risk by former World Champion Bruno Gantenbrink on DG's Web site:
http://www.dg-flugzeugbau.de/index-e.html. If you fly cross-country or
competitively and haven't read it, please do.
I grew up mouthing the cliche (an international one, apparently, based
on Bruno's article) that the most dangerous part of soaring was the
drive to the airport. In fact, flying is the most dangerous part. In
40+ years of soaring, I've lost quite a few friends and acquaintances
to glider crashes, including my father and my best friend, both highly
experienced pilots. I've been first on the scene at fatal crashes. I
think about the potential downside consequences of soaring before
every contest and often when driving to the gliderport (although,
oddly, seldom when I'm flying). I've got two 13-year-old daughters who
would be devasted if something happened to me while flying.
Yet I continue to fly. Soaring is the most fulfilling, exciting,
rewarding activity I participate in, and I feel more alive for it.
Nothing matches the exhilaration of completing a task or an ambitious
flight knowing I've flown well. And I'm honest enough to admit that if
soaring were completely risk free, it wouldn't have the same appeal. I
suspect more than a few of my fellow pilots share this "condition"
although I would describe none of them as thrill seekers or dare
devils.
Yet I do everything I can to minimize the risks balanced against my
desire to compete and fly cross country. I bought my current glider
because it had a safety cockpit and impact-absorbing landing gear. I
equipped it with a canopy wire deflector bar, an ELT, a 6-point safety
harness, a rear-view mirror, and more than a gallon of easily
accessible drinking water. All this was to keep me out of trouble and
to help me survive trouble if it occurs. I'm considering installing a
transponder or a portable collision avoidance device to reduce what I
think is my biggest risk currently--being hit by a power plane in the
busy airspace where I fly west of New York City. I'm probably more
cautious than some. I know my limits and don't knowingly exceed them.
Soaring isn't for everyone. One pilot I know, a good one, dropped out
of soaring after his wife got sick and died. As much as he loved
soaring, his children were young and he didn't feel it was fair to
them to continue something that increased the risk they might end up
losing both parents. He intends to get back in the game when they're
older. I think he made the right call for him.
I confess that when I was in my 20s, I not only mouthed the cliche
about driving being more dangerous than flying, but I glorified the
risks that even then I acknowledged existed in order to enhance the
sense that I was doing something special, something extreme, something
most people would never experience. Now in my 50s, I see that part of
the appeal of soaring is the ability to push myself up against the
edge of the cliff, look over it, and then back away. I don't need or
want the risk that a power pilot flying head down and locked will plow
into me from behind (as nearly happened a few months ago) or the risk
that someone above me in the gaggle will make a mistake and spin down
through my altitude (as happened a few years ago). The challenge is to
work with the risks I can control. It's the ones I can't control--and
I'd be in denial if I said they didn't exist--that trouble me. There
are enough of those, plus the risk that I will make a bad mistake
someday (I'm not in denial about that, either), to remind me that
soaring is inherently risky compared with most of the other things I
do. To date, those risks are not sufficient to cause me to quit
soaring. But we're all different and what works for me may not apply
to anyone else.
Chip Bearden
ASW 24 "JB"
USA
Kloudy via AviationKB.com
>Fairly stupid comment.
>
uh, not really.
But despite your poor manner I will elucidate for our thread host.
One year several friends and acquaintances died around me in soaring
accidents.
The year my daughter was born.
Everytime I climbed into the plane I began thinking about how the small
increase in risk to my safety became more acute to those counting on me. The
results of those risks were suddenly clearer, close and personal.
I thought about my friends.
I thought about my family.
Being too careful was starting to interfere with fluid responses to my
piloting.
I was thinking too much. Risk increased.
I Quit for 15 years to reduce the probability of injury in the interest of
those relying on my health.
Returned to soaring as our social/family/financial situation matured.
My mind is not occupied outside the task of piloting anymore.
Too much analysis can be a hazard.
Bill Daniels
My glider is safe. It's tucked away in my garage going nowhere. It's not
going to crash - at least until I fly it. Gliders don't crash, they require
a pilot to crash them. Long ago in the early days of flying it was said
that the weakest link in aviation safety is the "loose nut on the control
stick" meaning the pilot. Pogo said, "We have met the enemy and he is us".
The above is not to denigrate anyone alive or dead. In fact, it's a cut and
paste from an e-mail exchange with Stu Kissel. He thought it was a good
observation.
Pilots can sometimes be described as safe or unsafe. Mostly, there're
somewhere in between. Being human, pilots have good days and bad days. For
a pilot, a bad day can be really bad.
Soaring is neither safe nor unsafe - it's just very unforgiving. If you
aren't rock solid sure of your skills, get a second opinion - fly with an
instructor. In fact, even if you are sure, fly with one anyway. Check
rides fall in the category of "cheap insurance." If you are like nost of us
and fly only 20 or so times a year, your skills will fade so schedule
checkrides twice a year. Your insturctor will appreciate the business - and
applaud your good judgement.
Soaring is mostly done solo. We expect a pilot, alone n the sky, under
significant stress, to function at a very high level with no backup of any
kind. Recently, a very unsettling medical news item said that 50% of the
people in the general population over age 50 had experienced at least one
episode of unexplained loss of consiousness. That makes one think about
2-seaters and a second pilot. It makes me think of Stu.
My condolences to everyone - we're all family.
Bill Daniels
1LK
> On 31 Oct, 11:32, 1LK <rwars...@mannkindcorp.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Oct 31, 5:36 am, Ian <ian.gro...@btinternet.com> wrote:
> > > How old are you? A 1 in 80 chance of dying today means that you
> > have a
>
> > > 79 in 80 chance of making it to tomorrow, which is a (79/80)^365 = 1%
> > > chance of making it through a year. I'll bet even 100 year olds have a
> > > better survival rate than that ...
>
> > > Ian
>
> > Well under 100. Ian (although not as far under as I'd like). It's a
neither cumulative or additive. I have a 98.75% chance of being here
tomorrow; on a day a year from now I'll have roughly the same odds of
being here a day after that.
I do wear a parachute, BTW, but again, given my age and condition,
it's not certain that I could extract myself successfully from a lawn
dart. I wear it because I'd rather be busy trying to use it, than
sitting on my hands waiting to hit the ground.
As you know, FLARM isn't usable here (US), but I'm planning to add a
transponder and an ELT this year. I take aspirin as well. Not sure
why I post to Usinet, perhaps the riskiest activity of all.
I control what I can and accept the rest and, yes, I think I'll go
flying.
Ray Warshaw
1LK
> > multifactorial analysis and some of the factors that go into it are
> > personal, but, given the assumptions, it's probably a decent
> > characterization. The risk isn't additive, BTW; it remains about the
> > same day to day as long as the factors used to calculate it are
> > stable.
>
> So you really do only have a 1% chance of being here next year? What
> are you doing posting to Usenet - go flying. It's probably not worth
> buying a flarm, by the way. Or a parachute.
>
> Ian- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
jeplane
How many traffic accidents have you seen through the years while
driving to the gliderport?
In that same time frame, how many gliders acidents have you seen at
that gliderport?
Richard
Phoenix, AZ
On Oct 30, 5:50 pm, Ramy <ryan...@yahoo.com> wrote:
" No matter how safe you think you are, the risk is still
significantly higher than most normal activities (such as driving). "
Marc Ramsey
How many gliders fly at at the gliderport?
jeplane
" No matter how safe you think you are, the risk is still
significantly higher than most normal activities (such as driving)"
You sure?
How many times have you seen a traffic accident on your way to the
gliderport?
In the same time frame, how many glider accidents have you seen in
that same airport?
Although I can appreciate what Patrick is going through, stopping from
flying ARE NOT going to stop accidents from happening. And I doubt the
deads would have want us to stop anyway...
jeplane
> How many cars are on the roads you use to get to the gliderport?
> How many gliders fly at at the gliderport?
So you are telling me driving is safer than flying? Not sure if I
would drive or fly with you!...:-)
Don Johnstone
UK ras. Normally it's a reporter looking for a story
to sensationalise. We mostly ignore it and don't give
them any ammo
J a c k
> I can't understand your rudeness 'R'. I believe you haven't been on a
> same situaiton than I am. I have flown almost everywhere and I have
> flown numerous competitions plus I have been instructing since 1992.
> So I believe I am qualified to fly glider just fine and write about
> it.
>
> I am not sure if you guys understood my consern.What happened to those
> extremely skillfull pilots ie Geoff Loyns? can the same thing happen
> to my other friends or myself. Is it worth trying the thin ice
> anymore?
>
> That who said that soaring is not dangerous is wrong. You can get
> killed without your own reason. You can just thermal on a 10 footer
> and some one who is joining the lift, hits you from behind. Maybe he
> didn't see you at all. That has happened numerous times. Luckily most
> of them has survived, few didn't.
The only reliable way we have to determine how dangerous is soaring is
to look at the statistics, and at the qualifications required of and
supplied by the people whose flights make up those statistics.
We know something about many of the rare failures to have a safe flight,
and little or nothing about the thousands of safely executed flights,
and one could be expected to have understood that quite well before the
question was asked. Therefor we can only conclude that the questioner
does not really expect to get a solid answer.
Does he want reassurance? He has it from those who have said in effect,
"Go out and fly as safely as you know how, and you will be very safe."
Does he want a reason to seek a more mundane pastime? He has it from
those who have listed the many threats, expounded upon the uncertainty
of life in general, and wondered at the occasional loss of a highly
experienced and proficient pilot.
The greater curiosity is why those brave and hard-working tow pilots do
what they do. The dangers are at least as great, and the satisfactions
far less obvious.
Jack
Bob Kuykendall
through]
On Oct 31, 4:04 pm, jeplane <jepl...@excite.com> wrote:
> On Oct 30, 6:50 pm, Ramy <ryan...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> " No matter how safe you think you are, the risk is still
> significantly higher than most normal activities (such as driving)"
>
> You sure?
>
> How many times have you seen a traffic accident on your way to the
> gliderport?...
That question reflects a very typical, but not very productive
approach to the issue at hand. The plural of "anecdote" is not "data."
Data such as that in this PDF is why I personally feel fairly certain
when I say that flying gliders is considerably riskier than most of
what you'd call "normal activities":
http://www.ntsb.gov/publictn/2007/ARG0701.pdf
See page 15, which shows (for year 2003) bar graphs for both the raw
total and fatal accident numbers per general aviation sector, and the
total and fatal accidents per hours flown for each sector.
Observe that the numbers for gliders are 19.45 accidents per 100,000
hours flown, with 5.07 fatal accidents per 100,000 hours. That's
second only to amateur-built aircraft, with 21.6 and 5.5 respectively.
Contrast that with the numbers for single-engine piston-powered
airplanes with 7.91 accidents and 1.41 fatal accidents per 100,000
hours. In 2003 at least, gliders had 245% more accidents and 360% more
fatal accidents per hour than the puddle-jumpers that comprise the
majority of the US general aviation fleet.
There's no breakdown for poor saps like me who combine the two worst
categories by dabbling in amateur-built gliders, but my bet is that
the numbers would be somewhere between the two.
As concerns comparisons between the accident rates of flying and
driving, I defer to this analysis by Harry Mantakos:
http://www.meretrix.com/~harry/flying/notes/safetyvsdriving.html
Given those numbers, I normally feel fairly confident when I say that
soaring is much more dangerous than driving, and is perhaps comparable
to riding a motorcycle. But I do tend to get odd looks when I go on to
say that I gave up riding on the street and took up Formula IV
roadracing (125cc anything-goes full-fairing 2-stroke bikes with top
speed of about 100 mph) because I thought it was safer as well as more
fun.
Bottom line: I don't recommend flying or soaring to just everybody.
Based on what I know about their methods, means, and risk aversion,
for some folks I recommend knitting or photography.
Thanks, Bob K.
Ramy
Yes, I am sure and I think Marc explained it very well. No need to be
a rocket scientist to do the math. Couple of posters on this thread
clearly don't understand basic statistics. And yes, stopping from
flying WILL stop flying accident to happen to those who stops flying.
But I agree with you with one thing, the deads would not want us to
stop flying. But I am also sympathise with those who got traumatized
witnessing accidents and losing friends.
And don't get me wrong, I am not advocating stopping flying, in the
contrary, I will be the last one to stop, but at least I do not live
in denial as some others, am very well aware that there is a big risk
and I have only partial control of the risk as I am human and all
human are prone to mistakes, and I am willing to take the risk since
it worth it for me. As my new bumper sticker says "I live to fly and I
fly to live" and hopefully I'll be able to do it for years to come.
Ramy
Mike Schumann
safety upgrades.
Mike Schumann
"Chip Bearden" <jnbe...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1193847527.6...@o3g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...
--
Eric Greenwell
I think most of us that have been in the sport for 20 or 30 years have
known more people that were killed in glider accidents than car
accidents. If you limit it to glider pilots killed in cars versus in
gliders, it makes glider flying look even more dangerous.
As a group, we manage to drive cars much more safely than we fly our
gliders, in good part because (as already mentioned elsewhere) glider
flying is much less forgiving.
--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA
* Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly
* "Transponders in Sailplanes" http://tinyurl.com/y739x4
* "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation" at www.motorglider.org
asw22...@gmail.com
Not as many road accidents as I have seen at the gliderport!!
Lets face it guys Gliding is Dangerous.
Very Dangerous if you start to push the envelope of your experience
and comfort level.
I have lost over the years more than 10 friends or acquaintances.
When I raced sailboats or windsurfed I never lost any!
This summer was a real bad one for me loosing a very close flying
buddy Geoff Loyns, then Steve Fossett goes missing and now Stew.
All I knew through soaring, hanging at the airport or conversing on
here and emails.
I love soaring and think it has given me some of the best memories of
my life.
But as I look at my young son I am drawn between the selfish urge to
mental floss with soaring and the reality of life.
Running a Start up company with employees that rely on my breathing
and working is another factor.
I will probably keep flying but in a different way than I used to.
My flying will be less risky and not as aggressive as previous years.
I want to also explore other sides of soaring that I have not
experienced as much, such as enjoying the moment more than chasing
after distance/speed.
Don't get me wrong Soaring is an amazing sport but you have to realize
it is dangerous.
It is the only sport I know where if you screw up you will probably
die!!
That is a sobering thought for sure.
Any one who tells you otherwise either is on crack or has not been
around the sport for a long time.
Just hang around the glider port long enough and you WILL loose flying
friends.
It is a fact most people die in bed smelling of urine and lysol,
So the trade off here is gliding or pressing the button above your bed
screaming for the nurse to change your bed pan!!
On that note I will stop waffling..
Regards
Al
ryszard.k...@gmail.com
lets ask ourselves , what we did to improve our luck factor recently ?
-We constantly change the rules (in US) for safety
-Europans developed Flarm
But nothing was changed with the plane.
Everybody seems to be happy with disillusioned idea of safety cockpit.
We don't have airbags, balllistic chutes, tail mounted bungee
arresting harpoons,
second chance ex katiusha miniature rocket engines to get us out of
trouble,
power traffic avoidance low energy systems ,etc.
.Ryszard Krolikowski (RW)
Bert Willing
Once you stop thinking about the risk, you become one.
However, if the thinking about the risk starts to intimidate you, you are in
the wrong place.
Bert
"Kloudy via AviationKB.com" <u33403@uwe> wrote in message
news:7a860aefd44d3@uwe...
SoaringXCellence
Chip,
Thanks for your comments, all well put.
I also lost my father in a soaring accident, in the 1979 US
nationals. He was an experience pilot and instructor and we just
don't know what happened.
I stepped into soaring 25 years later as my family matured and I
couldn't resist the enticement any longer. My family is aware of the
risks, as am I. We accept that something may happen to any of us on
any given day, most likely not even related to soaring.
I agree with most of the comments relating to managing risk. I try to
do all I can to understand the sources of risk. Read accident reports,
analysis the actions of other pilots around me, and introspectively
evaluate my own errors and limitations. As an instructor I am
constantly exposed to "common" errors and thought processes that lead
to increased risk. Whenever I'm aware of a potential for increased
risk, I narrow my tolerances and refrain from approaching the edges of
my skills. The point here is to maintain the self-awareness to
recognize the change in risk.
Not only in soaring but in just about every life activity there is a
need for situational awareness. We see it everyday on the highway
with the the casual driver that makes an inappropriate lane change,
for example. In aviation we are particularly sensitive to the need
for situational awareness as the inherent risks are indeed greater. I
feel that one of my greatest challenges, as an instructor, is to
develop in my students the abilitiy to evaluate their situation and be
aware of the currently available options for action. In my experience
it is much more difficult than teaching someone to control the
aircraft, navigate, communicate, or any of the other tasks that are
evaulated in a pilot test or flight review.
I've probably nattered too long.
Mike
Ian
There are about 30,000,000 licensed drivers in the UK. About 3,000
people get killed on the roads every year. That's 1 fatality per
10,000 drivers.
>From memory, there are about 5,000 members of UK gliding clubs. About
2 - 3 people get killed gliding per year, on average. That's 1
fatality per 2,500 pilots.
The everage driver does 10,000 miles per annum, which is 200 hours at
50mph. The average gliding club member does something like 10 hours
per annum.
So that's 1 fatality per 2,000,000 driver-hours against 1 fatality per
25,000 pilot-hours.
I'd welcome correction on the figures - I'm doing this from memory of
stuff I looked up ~10 years ago, but I'd be very surprised if driving
risk came within an order of magnitude of soaring risk.
Ian
Ian
> Observe that the numbers for gliders are 19.45 accidents per 100,000
> hours flown, with 5.07 fatal accidents per 100,000 hours.
Coo. And I just estimated (in another post before seeing this) a
fatality every 25,000 pilot hours in the UK.
Ian
Ian
wrote:
> I absolutely disagree, and I stand my point (and manner).
>
> Once you stop thinking about the risk, you become one.
>
> However, if the thinking about the risk starts to intimidate you, you are in
> the wrong place.
I stopped flying for a while because I could only fly midweek and
there were just too many near-misses with military aircraft at my
(then) club. Personal best: a Tornado around two wingspans away, at
the same height. Intimidated? You bet I was.
Ian
Ian
> Not exactly. The odds ratio applies to any point in time; it's
> neither cumulative or additive. I have a 98.75% chance of being here
> tomorrow; on a day a year from now I'll have roughly the same odds of
> being here a day after that.
If you have a 98.75% chance of being here tomorrow, then you have a
98.75% x 98.75% chance of being here a day after that, a 98.75% x
98.75% x 98.75% chance of seeing Sunday and so on.
Sure, /if/ you make it to 1st November 2008 you have a 98.75% chance
of making it to 2nd ... but there's only a 1% chance, on these
figures, that you'll put it to the test.
Ian
Tom Gardner
> I stopped flying for a while because I could only fly midweek and
> there were just too many near-misses with military aircraft at my
> (then) club. Personal best: a Tornado around two wingspans away, at
> the same height. Intimidated? You bet I was.
EEK! Which (ex) club, if you don't mind me asking.
And I thought I was quite close enough to B1s maybe 5 miles away,
or C130s at my altitude and where I could count the individual
cockpit window panes.
I've also heard a story of a B52 lining up on the club's runway
(wheels down, wing root lights) before realising its mistake
and peeling off.
And I did witness some "interesting" commercial airliner and glider
movements at Lasham, back in the 70s.
Is there room in a B1/B52/C130/Tornado for a FLARM? :}
Tom Gardner
> Not exactly. The odds ratio applies to any point in time; it's
> neither cumulative or additive. I have a 98.75% chance of being here
> tomorrow; on a day a year from now I'll have roughly the same odds of
> being here a day after that.
Think of it like tossing a coin to see whether you live. The
probability
of each toss being "heads" is 0.5, and is independent of the previous
results.
To stay alive for a week, you have to toss "heads" 7 times in a row,
and the probability of that is 0.5 ^ 7 = 0.078125 = 1 in 128
Personally, I hope you have more than a 0.9875 ^ 365 chance of
being alive in a year. (i.e. 0.01014 or 1 in 98).
Of course, if you are still alive in a year, there would be the same
chance (0.9875) that you would be alive in a year and a day.
Bert Willing
Berlin Wall. My personal best was an F4 diving to avoid me and passing
something like 20m below me.
There has been more than one occasion that I was intimidated in-flight (as
well as on the road), but it didn't scare me off, because the general risk
at that time to be run over by a fighter aircraft at that time was something
I accepted.
"Ian" <ian.g...@btinternet.com> wrote in message
news:1193909198.7...@y42g2000hsy.googlegroups.com...
Ian
> EEK! Which (ex) club, if you don't mind me asking.
> And I thought I was quite close enough to B1s maybe 5 miles away,
> or C130s at my altitude and where I could count the individual
> cockpit window panes.
Borders GC. Lovely club, excellent site beside the Cheviot Hills - and
that was the problem. Normally the fast military stuff stays at 500'
or less, so it isn't a problem for gliders. However both they and we
could be at 500' AGL in the hills, and there were too many close calls
for me to be happy.
It wasn't the military pilots' fault: I am quite sure they don't want
half a ton of fibreglass in their cockpits. However there did seem to
be some serious deficiencies in the Civil Air Notification Procedure,
with information about midweek gliding (hint to Mr Putin: invade over
the weekend) simply not getting through to the pilots.
> Is there room in a B1/B52/C130/Tornado for a FLARM? :}
We did have a visit from a military ATC chap, and he said that a Good
Big Radar Reflector would help enormously. I was thinking about
installing an 18" aluminium cube reflector, made for yachts, in the
fuselage above the wheel.
Incidentally, this is probably ten years ago, and I think it very
likely that with the growth of BGC and increase in midweek flying
things should be much smoother and more effective now. Please, folks,
don't let this put you off flying there!
Ian
Tom Gardner
> We did have a visit from a military ATC chap, and he said that a Good
> Big Radar Reflector would help enormously. I was thinking about
> installing an 18" aluminium cube reflector, made for yachts, in the
> fuselage above the wheel.
I've idly wondered about that, but I'd want to know that slow targets
aren't simply removed from the screen before the radar operator even
sees them. Even several decades ago "ground clutter" was routinely
removed by simply ignoring any reflection with a doppler shift of
less than 70mph.
Clearly it has to be more sophisticated than that for airborne
radars,
but I'm sure it is possible.
jeplane
How many times have you seen a traffic accident on your way to the
gliderport?
How mnay times have you seen a glider accident at that airport in the
same time frame?
Martin Gregorie
In support of that figure I did what seemed like very little flying this
year, but found to my surprise that I'd managed 35 hours. I'd guess that
I'd do 50-70 hours in a year with more normal weather.
I thought I'd read that the UK had around 8000 active glider pilots but
I won't argue with you over a change that has relatively little impact
on your argument.
--
martin@ | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org |
1LK
instance; my odds of being here next year are another thing entirely.
For that you need to do mortality computations.
Ray
1LK
>
> To stay alive for a week, you have to toss "heads" 7 times in a row,
> and the probability of that is 0.5 ^ 7 = 0.078125 = 1 in 128
It's not binary, it's multifactorial.
Ray
Tom Gardner
>The calculation which yields the 80/1 is only true for the single
>instance;
Single instance of what? If it is the "single instance of a day",
then the calculations are correct.
> my odds of being here next year are another thing entirely.
>For that you need to do mortality computations.
>
> > To stay alive for a week, you have to toss "heads" 7 times in a row,
> > and the probability of that is 0.5 ^ 7 = 0.078125 = 1 in 128
>
> It's not binary, it's multifactorial.
I don't understand: what do you mean by "it" and "multifactorial"?
Binary? Well yes, flipping a coin is binary; that's why I
subsequently
used your figures (that you didn't bother to include).
It might help if you could explain the reasons (based on an
equivalent
example, if you prefer) why you believe that the calculations are
wrong.
Examples I can think of are
- it is not a 1.25% chance of dying on every day, only on some days
- each day shouldn't be treated as independent from the preceding
days (but that doesn't fit with your original statement)
Anyway, I am glad that your mortality isn't as imminent as it
at first appeared.
Ian
I'm having real difficulty understanding this. Are you saying that ...
1) There is a 1/80 chance you'll be dead by this time tomorrow and
that
2) There is a 1/80 chance you'll be dead by this time the day after?
Ian
Dan G
Ian is basically on the money. The BGA has just under 8,000 members
but that's not the same as active pilots - 5,000 is probably as good a
number as any other. The number of vehicle occupants killed annually
is about 1,700 (another 1,500 die by being hit *by* vehicles). I have
no idea what the average hours-of-flight-per-year is - must vary
enormously.
Of course, in the UK, to get *killed* in a glider is pretty rare -
going back through the AAIB reports for the last ten years or so
there's certainly no pattern in cause, experience, site etc.
Off the top of my head:
Two lost wings (structural failure and at high loads, probably outside
placard, though the wings were understrength)
Two collided with other gliders (three if you count a tug pilot who
hit a Cirrus)
One flew into a parachute DZ and was hit by a skydiver (who also died)
Two? had heart failure (a tug pilot died this way too)
Two died in winch launches, one however was inexplicable (maybe
medical, see above)
A couple of those were in two-seaters where both occupants died.
Two more people were on the ground and were struck and killed by
gliders. One of those gliders was later destroyed in a seperate crash,
though the occupants survived with serious injuries.
Injury accidents are probably frequent enough that statiscally valid
conclusions can be drawn. Early this year the BGA published an
excellent supplement looking at this data, I can't find my copy but
iirc, winch launching (up until the very successful Safe Winch
Launching campaign), low-level stall/spin (though some winch accidents
are really stall/spin, so this probably should be higher), and bad
field landings (selection too late/badly executed) were top of the
list.
Dan
Dan G
> Off the top of my head:
> Two lost wings (structural failure and at high loads, probably outside
> placard, though the wings were understrength)
> Two collided with other gliders (three if you count a tug pilot who
> hit a Cirrus)
> One flew into a parachute DZ and was hit by a skydiver (who also died)
> Two? had heart failure (a tug pilot died this way too)
> Two died in winch launches, one however was inexplicable (maybe
> medical, see above)
Should add that the guy who flew into the DZ didn't have a parachute
(he didn't get one when using the glider after someone too big to fit
with a chute) and might have had a chance of using it (collision was
at 2,500'), and one of the pilots killed in a mid-air possibly
couldn't jettison his canopy as he'd zip-tied his PDA cables to it -
the other pilot bailed out successfully.
Dan
Chris Reed
probability, and thus why we cannot calculate risk properly.
Tom's coin analogy fails because he is looking for an unbroken sequence
of survival, which therefore takes into account the past in predicting
the future. His calculations are cumulative. Even with coin tosses, we
can see that once we ignore the past and stop cumulating results, the
calculation changes.
Thus, at the start of the week, the chance of survival for a week at
coin toss levels is 1 in 128. The chance of surviving for 8 days is
worse, at 1 in 256. However, if our subject survives day 1, his chance
of making day 8 increases to 1 in 128, and by the end of day 7 it has
risen to 50:50. The older he gets, the longer his chances of living
forever! I think (but as a European writing after what UK
government-sponsored has recently described as a "hazardous" level of
wine consumption I cannot be sure) this may be related to Zeno's paradox
(in Tom Stoppard's words, "... thus proving that the arrow never reaches
it's target and Saint Sebastian died of fright").
If we ignore the past, however, each day's chance is the same at 0.5.
Thus Ray (may he live forever) is able to state that next year his
chances will be pretty much the same, if he makes it that far.
Cumulation of probabilities is what the human brain does automatically.
Suppose the chance of being killed on a glider flight is 1 in 1,000. The
mind (without extensive training) deals with this in a number of ways:
1. I can fly safely 999 times, then have to give up or I will certainly
die on the 1,000th. If I'm already dead, I was "statistically" unlucky.
2. I've had 500 flights, so my risk level has risen to 50:50.
3. At my club we fly 1,000 flights a year between us, so one of us is
sure to die flying.
Unless I'm badly mistaken, none of these are true statements.
I try to think as follows:
a. In the UK where I fly, gliding fatalities are on average around 2.5
per annum out of 5,000 pilots, so my "statistical" risk is around 1 in
2,000 of dying through gliding each year.
b. I can do a number of things to reduce my personal risk to less than 1
in 2,000, so I'll try to do those things.
c. This is, to me, an acceptable level of risk for the pleasure I get
from gliding.
The good thing is that these probabilities are not cumulative. I've been
flying for 11 years, so if they were cumulative my "statistical" risk
might be down to under 1 in 20. It ain't.
What can be cumulative are personal mistakes - careless rigging, no
positive check, lack of sleep, etc. etc. These are the things I worry about.
Tom Gardner
> Tom's calculations indicate how hard it is for the human mind to grasp
> probability, and thus why we cannot calculate risk properly.
>
> Tom's coin analogy fails because he is looking for an unbroken sequence
> of survival,
Well, yes. If I die on Tuesday, it would seem somewhat
optimistic to assume that I'll be alive on Wednesday!
Am I missing something?
> which therefore takes into account the past in predicting
> the future.
Er, no. Conditional probability and all that!
> His calculations are cumulative. Even with coin tosses, we
> can see that once we ignore the past and stop cumulating results, the
> calculation changes.
Er, for the conditions I stated, no.
> Thus, at the start of the week, the chance of survival for a week at
> coin toss levels is 1 in 128. The chance of surviving for 8 days is
> worse, at 1 in 256. However, if our subject survives day 1, his chance
> of making day 8 increases to 1 in 128, and by the end of day 7 it has
> risen to 50:50.
True, but missing the point.
The chance of getting to day 7 from day 1 is 1 in 128, so
the chance of getting to day 8 from day 1 is still 1 in 256.
No change.
No one is disputing if you've reached day 7 then the
chance of getting to day 8 is 1 in 2. Conditional probability, etc.
But on day N the chance of getting to day N+356 is
vanishingly small.
> The older he gets, the longer his chances of living
> forever! I think (but as a European writing after what UK
> government-sponsored has recently described as a "hazardous" level of
> wine consumption I cannot be sure) this may be related to Zeno's paradox
> (in Tom Stoppard's words, "... thus proving that the arrow never reaches
> it's target and Saint Sebastian died of fright").
Rats. You took the words right out my mouth! Leibnitz
and Newton also had a few things to say in this area :)
> If we ignore the past, however, each day's chance is the same at 0.5.
> Thus Ray (may he live forever) is able to state that next year his
> chances will be pretty much the same, if he makes it that far.
Quite correct. But of course we are actually talking about the
chance of him getting there (which would seem to be unfortunately
small based on his statements).
> Cumulation of probabilities is what the human brain does automatically.
> Suppose the chance of being killed on a glider flight is 1 in 1,000. The
> mind (without extensive training) deals with this in a number of ways:
>
> 1. I can fly safely 999 times, then have to give up or I will certainly
> die on the 1,000th. If I'm already dead, I was "statistically" unlucky.
>
> 2. I've had 500 flights, so my risk level has risen to 50:50.
>
> 3. At my club we fly 1,000 flights a year between us, so one of us is
> sure to die flying.
>
> Unless I'm badly mistaken, none of these are true statements.
Correct (except under pathologically perverse circumstances :)
> I try to think as follows:
>
> a. In the UK where I fly, gliding fatalities are on average around 2.5
> per annum out of 5,000 pilots, so my "statistical" risk is around 1 in
> 2,000 of dying through gliding each year.
>
> b. I can do a number of things to reduce my personal risk to less than 1
> in 2,000, so I'll try to do those things.
>
> c. This is, to me, an acceptable level of risk for the pleasure I get
> from gliding.
>
> The good thing is that these probabilities are not cumulative. I've been
> flying for 11 years, so if they were cumulative my "statistical" risk
> might be down to under 1 in 20. It ain't.
I think the concept of "cumulative" is seriously misleading
in this context.
I think what you're really trying to say is that the probability
of dying on day X from cause Y is *not independent* of the
probability of dying on day X+1 from cause Y.
Under such conditions the "1 in P^N" calculation is clearly
and simply invalid.
In the absence of other information, I chose to presume
"independent" and you have chosen "not independent".
Ian
> If we ignore the past, however, each day's chance is the same at 0.5.
> Thus Ray (may he live forever) is able to state that next year his
> chances will be pretty much the same, if he makes it that far.
That's not his claim, though. He seems to be saying that his chance of
dying tomorrow is 1 in 80, his chance of dying the day after that is 1
in 80 and so on to 1st November 2008, but that his chance of dying at
all during that year is still only 1 in 80. I do hope he'll explain,
in case I'm missing something obvious ...
> Cumulation of probabilities is what the human brain does automatically.
> Suppose the chance of being killed on a glider flight is 1 in 1,000. The
> mind (without extensive training) deals with this in a number of ways:
The prblem, of course, is that one cannot be killed twice, so it does
not make sense to combine (simply) the probabilities of dying on
different days. Multiple survival is the aim, and survival
probabilities can be combined quite easily. Just recast our statement
as "The chance of surviving a glider flight is 999 in 1,000"...
> 3. At my club we fly 1,000 flights a year between us, so one of us is
> sure to die flying.
There's actually a 63% chance that one of you will have bought the
farm by the end of the year. Get a new safety officer!
> a. In the UK where I fly, gliding fatalities are on average around 2.5
> per annum out of 5,000 pilots, so my "statistical" risk is around 1 in
> 2,000 of dying through gliding each year.
Agreed.
> b. I can do a number of things to reduce my personal risk to less than 1
> in 2,000, so I'll try to do those things.
Agreed.
> c. This is, to me, an acceptable level of risk for the pleasure I get
> from gliding.
Agreed.
> The good thing is that these probabilities are not cumulative. I've been
> flying for 11 years, so if they were cumulative my "statistical" risk
> might be down to under 1 in 20. It ain't.
Your chance of making it through the next 11 years is still 99.5% I
reckon you can improve that to 99.95% by application of non-stupidity!
Ian
1LK
that at work. The important point is the one made in Chris's post
that gliding carries a risk in the range of one to between two and
three thousand depending on what denominator is used. Serving in Iraq
carries a similar risk, but the population isn't uniform; there's
clearly a difference in being in being part of the rear echelon vs
patrolling the streets. Our population is similarly stratified in
terms of risk.
There are also, unfortunately, factors beyond personal control in
play. As I've aged, I've noted that I need a bit more distance
between myself and the car in front of me. My head needs to swivel to
a greater degree to see things in the periphery. These effects can be
measured/quantified. Medical events such as stroke or MI have been
suggested as the cause of a number of accidents; the ones that killed
the student who soloed ahead of me where I learned to fly in SoCal and
that of a friend who crashed during the return to Kitty Hawk were
likely caused by medical incapacitation. As I age, my risk of such
events increases.
The important thing, IMHO, is to recognize the risk, decide what
you're willing to accept, and, if you choose to go forward, control
what you can and hope that what you can't won't kill you.
Ray Warshaw
1LK
Tom Gardner
> Serving in Iraq
> carries a similar risk, but the population isn't uniform; there's
> clearly a difference in being in being part of the rear echelon vs
> patrolling the streets.
It is always worth comparing one risk with another, as
a sanity check.
During the first Gulf War in 1991, it was safer to be a black GI
on active service in the Gulf than it was to be a black civilian
in Washington DC.
In this case "safer" means probability of non-accidental death
per 100,000 people.
When I first heard that I was sufficiently suspicious that I went
down the library (it was just as the web was arriving) and checked
the sources myself.
The other surprising statistic is the age at which you are
most likely to be a homicide victim in the UK. Most people
presume 16-24, but actually it is three times more
likely to be deliberately killed when you are under 1 year
old. And 55% of those homicides are committed by females.
(N.B. I used "homicide" very deliberately, not murder)
danlj
> ...clip...
>
> Observe that the numbers for gliders are 19.45 accidents per 100,000
> second only to amateur-built aircraft, with 21.6 and 5.5 respectively.
>
> Contrast that with the numbers for single-engine piston-powered
> airplanes with 7.91 accidents and 1.41 fatal accidents per 100,000
> hours. In 2003 at least, gliders had 245% more accidents and 360% more
> fatal accidents per hour than the puddle-jumpers that comprise the
> majority of the US general aviation fleet
...clip...
>
> As concerns comparisons between the accident rates of flying and
> driving, I defer to this analysis by Harry Mantakos:
> http://www.meretrix.com/~harry/flying/notes/safetyvsdriving.html
>
> Given those numbers, I normally feel fairly confident when I say that
> soaring is much more dangerous than driving, and is perhaps comparable
> to riding a motorcycle. ...clip...
The fatalities-per-hoiur statistics in soaring were presented at SSA a
couple of years ago, and Judge McWhorter, sitting next to me, compared
it to the fatality rate in coal mining, a famously risky occupation.
Judge quickly calculated in his head that soaring has about a five-
fold greater fatality rate per hour than coal miners.
But he's a mining-safety expert; his next point was not that coal
mining is too dangerous, or that soaring is too dangerous, but that
formal safety practices, taught and followed with discipline, reduce
the fatality experience rate tremendously in coal mining, and would in
soaring also.
The key to devising safety practices is understanding the behavior and
circumstances that increase the incidence of deadly accidents (we call
them 'accidents' because the participants had no intention of having
them).
The key to making safety practices effective is to follow them with
discipline and understanding.
Now, the caveat is that we can ultimately control only our own
behavior; we merely influence others, which is not the same thing. So
we then need to understand also to what extent we are at risk from
others' foolishness or ignorance, or from uncontrollable factors.
In this regard, a colleague stopped riding motorcycle completely,
during college, when he discovered a statistic that said that 2/3 of
motorcycle accidents are due to autos turning left in front of the
motorcycle. Most of the risk was beyond his control, and he wanted to
matriculate through medical school with intact brain and spinal cord.
Another factor is tolerable risk. Several posters have alluded to
this: a single parent with small children will have little tolerance
for personal risk, for the sake of the children. Others have more
room. I'm not here to deride either.
And fear itself is an very aversive emotion. Whether or not the fear
is rational, it's real, and it's distracting. One sensible response
to fear is withdrawal from the situation. If this means to stop
soaring, so be it, for that person. For others, it stimulates
additional study or training, or a change in location or practices.
So be it.
Thanks for listening.
DJ
Del C
Downhill Skiing, Motor Cycling and Mountaineering (all
of which I have tried at some point in my life). The
point is how you manage the risk and how rewarding
you find the activity! Gliding can be as safe or as
dangerous as you want to make it, with low level cross-countries
and mountain flying being riskier than high level local
soaring.
If you fly as your instructor taught you, don't fly
into impossible situations, and above all keep a good
look out for other aircraft, your risks of sudden death
are greatly reduced.
All human activities, driving, crossing the road, etc.,
carry some small degree of risk. Gliding is actually
statistically considerably safer than Horse Riding,
which does not generally seem to be regarded as risky.
Del C
At 01:06 03 November 2007, Danlj wrote:
>On Oct 31, 7:41 pm, Bob Kuykendall wrote:
>> ...clip...
>>
>> Observe that the numbers for gliders are 19.45 accidents
>>per 100,000
>> hours flown, with 5.07 fatal accidents per 100,000
>>hours. That's
>> second only to amateur-built aircraft, with 21.6 and
>>5.5 respectively.
>>
>> Contrast that with the numbers for single-engine piston-powered
>> airplanes with 7.91 accidents and 1.41 fatal accidents
>>per 100,000
>> hours. In 2003 at least, gliders had 245% more accidents
>>and 360% more
>> fatal accidents per hour than the puddle-jumpers that
>>comprise the
>> majority of the US general aviation fleet
>....clip...
Andy
>Gliding is actually statistically considerably safer than Horse Riding,
>which does not generally seem to be regarded as risky.
What are the horse riding statistics and what are they based on based
on? Hours in the saddle or something else? Do horse riders log and
report the hours they ride to some controlling authority that compiles
the statistics? Are the statistics broken down into the many types of
horse riding?
I suspect there is very poor data on the time exposure to most of the
risks that kill people, except of course total hours lived prior to
the fatal event.
Andy
Nyal Williams
and then there's liars.
Your chances of having an accident are 1 in 2; either
you will or you won't. Same is true of rope breaks,
of mid-airs, smothering in your sleep, or whatever.
It is up to you each and every time to prevent it.
Be wary!
Eric Greenwell
> There's statistics, then there's damned statistics,
> and then there's liars.
>
> Your chances of having an accident are 1 in 2; either
> you will or you won't.
You are confusing "probability" with "possibility". The chances are 3 in
4 of it attracting posts like this one, that discuss probability instead
of safety. I think even Tom Knauff stopped saying that.
> Same is true of rope breaks,
> of mid-airs, smothering in your sleep, or whatever.
> It is up to you each and every time to prevent it.
> Be wary!
But your advice is good.
--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA
* Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly
* "Transponders in Sailplanes" http://tinyurl.com/y739x4
* "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation" at www.motorglider.org
Del C
by the number of participants. I don't think horse
riders are required to log their time in the saddle!
Incidentally, actor Christopher Reeves (aka Superman)
was an active glider pilot, but was paralysed from
the neck down and ultimately died at an early age as
the direct result of a horse riding accident. I guess
that sort of proves my point on a non statistically
significant sample of 1.
Del C
Mike the Strike
occupational hazards in Great Britain. At the time, professional jump
jockeys were top of the list, with flat race jockeys not far behind.
Both were ahead of deep-sea fishermen. The advent of North Sea oil
rigs put some of their workers at the top (divers, as I recall).
I don't recall any piloting professions anywhere near the top of the
list.
My conclusion - horses are dangerous and aircraft much less so.
Mike
Nyal Williams
addictive properties.
I've never tried cocaine or crack or any sort of drugs,
but I know it is more addictive than tobacco, caffeine,
colas, or sugaars (all of which I have abandoned and
am free from), and that it is disruptive to work, careers,
families, and every sort of productive endeavor. Who
cares?! Can't and won't quit.
Bruce
Entirely agree on the addictions side.
On the other hand I must take issue with the theory that soaring is disruptive
of family life. Apparently , since I took up soaring seriously, as opposed to
the occasional flight, I am a much better person to be around. My general mood
is better, and family life is smoother. Should I neglect to go flying on more
than one weekend in a row, I am reminded pointedly that my soaring is suffering
neglect...
My 13 year old daughter is an air scout, and loves to be involved occasionally
as does my son. Can't do it too often at present, because they can get bored
easily, and there was a lack of nice two seaters to fly them in. I want to fly
XC, the club crates are , well CRATES. So I was forced to order a two seater.
According to my insurance company, soaring is less dangerous than being a hobby
handyman. They load your premium if you use power tools in your garage, but not
if you admit to flying gliders. Maybe I got lucky, but one assumes the quants
have checked the risks. My guess is that - while active soaring is a higher
risk,than being sedentary, the skills of observation and situational awareness,
and self assessment learned all lower risk in other activities. Overall the
insurers see no material change in risk for an active glider pilot. It would be
fascinating to discover why a hand drill is more likely to cause an insurance
loss. Anyone involved in the actuarial side?
Bruce
Nyal Williams
Yep, I've been told to go to the airport on more than
one occasion!
Are you speaking of life insurance or medical insurance?
I've not bought insurance since 1970 and I don't know
the 'drill.' I did run a drill into my thumbnail building
a set of flaps for a Capella about six or seven years
ago.
bumper
"Bruce" <bg...@wesgray.co.za> wrote in message
news:fgl4fq$2qhc$1...@newsreader02.ops.uunet.co.za...
> Hi Nyal
>
> According to my insurance company, soaring is less dangerous than being a
> hobby handyman. They load your premium if you use power tools in your
> garage, but not if you admit to flying gliders. > Bruce
Unfortunately, it may be that they just include a disclaimer in your
insurance policy (assuming it's life insurance), stating that you are not
covered while acting as air crew or while piloting or passenger in GA
aircraft. This is common in the US and would likely be the case unless you
have policy that specifically covers you while partaking in flying
activities.
I understand there is no such exclusion of coverage for home handymen (g).
bumper
Bullwinkle
cSxXi.52730$kj1....@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net, "bumper"
<bum...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
For what it's worth:
The last time I applied for a life insurance policy, the company did not
include a war exclusion (I was in the military at the time, and subject to
deployment), but balked at covering me when flying gliders. It required a
significant amount of discussion and negotiation to get them to cover me
(they finally did).
Admittedly this company caters to the military, and they wouldn't sell many
policies if war were excluded from coverage, but their perception of the
relative risks of soaring versus war surprised me.
Bullwinkle
Martin Gregorie
>
> Unfortunately, it may be that they just include a disclaimer in your
> insurance policy (assuming it's life insurance), stating that you are not
> covered while acting as air crew or while piloting or passenger in GA
> aircraft. This is common in the US and would likely be the case unless you
> have policy that specifically covers you while partaking in flying
> activities.
>
lumped gliding in with rock climbing and skiing.
Tony Verhulst
> Admittedly this company caters to the military, and they wouldn't sell many
> policies if war were excluded from coverage, but their perception of the
> relative risks of soaring versus war surprised me.
Just a guess but maybe it was not the "perception of the relative
risks", but rather the unknown risk of soaring. I suspect that their
actuaries can tell you to the nth decimal place their risk of a claim
due to war. Probably not so when it comes to soaring.
Tony V.
John Smith
> The only policy I've seen that excludes gliding is travel insurance. It
> lumped gliding in with rock climbing and skiing.
To me, it seems perfectly reasonable to lump gliding in with rock
climbing and skiing.