[Rick Masters]

January 25, 2015

Personal choice or the endangerment of a little life?

[Rick Masters]

February 2, 2016

Some of the best parts of scooter towing is that it is any size training hill that the instructor needs for their student and as a student you don't need to go back up the training hill with your 45-50 pound solo hang glider.
-- U.S. Hang Gliding, Inc.

Although towing introduces added levels of risk, today commercial teaching is often done by towing even when a training hill is nearby.
A training company can make a lot more money using a towing systems instead of teaching at a training hill.
This is different than the hang gliding world I came from.
In the 1970s, everyone I knew learned by foot-launching hang gliders from slopes.
Towing was for daredevils on water skis.

Extra Altitude is available at a rate of $35 per 500 feet additional.
-- U.S. Hang Gliding, Inc.

The other side of the issue is: Should the sport be put at risk by commercial towing operations?
When I suggest that hang gliding needs to return to foot-launch teaching and abandon towing, I get a lot of backlash from folks who live in areas where there are no hills nearby.
But the approval of towing seems to be a resounding "Yes" from the USHPA and the commercial pilots involved in it.
Has the promise of big money changed the USHPA from an association to a corporation?

Prices start at $170 usd for the 1500 ft Discovery Flight Tandem.
-- U.S. Hang Gliding, Inc.

Looks that way to me.
But pilots are willing to accept the risk so who am I to suggest otherwise?
All I'm saying is we could lose the sport.
Commercialism is changing the sport from the art of hang gliding to the cash cow of hang gliding.
I can only point to a man who traveled the entire length of a mountain range, the Appalachians, to tow and die from a flat field in Florida.
http://www.gainesville.com/article/20160202/articles/160209928
I find this incomprehensible.

So each person’s flight to 1500 ft would be $151.50 each or if anyone wanted more altitude say to 3000 ft the extra altitude would still be $60 for the extra 1500ft and the price would be $218.50 with early booking discount ($20 per 500ft).
-- U.S. Hang Gliding, Inc.

I was taught by other hang glider pilots.
I was rated by Observers and Special Observers.
I learned to fly hang gliders for a percentage of the gas money split between two or three guys in the car.
It cost me almost nothing. The freedom from expense was part of the joy of hang gliding.

In-Fight Pictures/Videos are also available for purchase at $45 for one or get both for only $80.
Guests friends and or family my take pictures or videos of the flight from the ground but, we cannot allow any other forms of in-flight videoing operated by the guest, either on their body or on our/ their equipment or self. This includes but is not limited to cell phones, goggle cams, Go Pros, Drifts, Verb, or any other kind of action cam or recording device currently known or unknown.
-- U.S. Hang Gliding, Inc.

The sport of hang gliding has lost its way.

- Form a national hang gliding association -

[Bob Kuczewski]

I was taught by other hang glider pilots.
I was rated by Observers and Special Observers.
I learned to fly hang gliders for a percentage of the gas money split between two or three guys in the car.
It cost me almost nothing. The freedom from expense was part of the joy of hang gliding.
 :
The sport of hang gliding has lost its way.

[JoeF]

First experiences (like ducklings) imprint directions. Start with what feeds well one's end. If one wants to start by neglecting self-responsibility, neglecting physical fitness for hang gliding, neglecting respect for depth of understanding, then plop oneself for a tandem towing or a pulled-by-scooter experience to shunt the depth flows. The virgin experience of self-launching can be lost by tandem launching. The wrong-timing for launching by self may be set by first-experience being pulled by scooter towing and the like. Shunting mastery of angle-of-attack and gaining apparent wind for gliding could be sticky on the nerve learning; such shunting may occur with having first experience by passengering. Avoid passenger mills that rob so many people of self-soaring.

Or consider feeding self-soar hang gliding:
Run with a wing that one sets up. Get the joy of mastering the device's structure; one will be depending on the integrity of a wing and the fullness of trained self.
Hop with a wing in the wing-running mode. Mini hang glide on flats; progress to bumps on flats. Where is one looking when running with the wing; master that target looking? Have experiences in calm first. Then in mild wind. Learn to orient the wing. Learn to tie down the wing. Etc. Study some daily as one builds physical and mental skills. Test oneself about parts. Notice and avoid peer pressure (that wells up inside oneself; take responsibility for the pressure). Prove your own knowledge and skills. Ask questions and get answers. Prove the matters in your experience, as you are the one that will be launching, flying, and landing. It takes time to respect wind and apparent wind. It takes time to respect invisible turbulence; it takes time to grow wind eyes.

Add potential energy to self and wing by wing running and hill walking-toting-wing action.
Honor gravity. Honor physical fitness. Honor installation of potential energy by pilot action. It can be a real joy knowing that you participated directly in adding the potential energy to the system; then convert that potential energy into kinetic energy for the gliding.

Have safe-splat configuration for the stumbles; avoid all whacking. Examine one's response to these things. Rest on it. Give some training cycles. Avoid stuffing too much into one commercial day by simply mapping out a longer training program that eventually becomes comprehensive. Avoid badges, ratings, instruction fees, unneeded travel expenses; passengering; put all such synergy into a spread-out program locally that respects that it takes time to train legs, arms, mind focus, eye positioning, equipment handling; physics of launching, physics of flying, physics of landing. No rush. Master one's body, mind, understanding, clothes, wind awareness, gear, aerodynamics, coordination, judgment, ... What is bar pressure? Trim? PIO? DIO? Rotor? Lee? Laminar? Gradient? Twist? Enjoy growing yourself into a self-soar hang glider pilot who is confident about what is going on ... Be around others who practice good judgment about hang gliding. Watch, listen, think, ask questions, journal your progress, study, practice this and that. Bring it all together with increasing embedded ability. Advance skills slowly; skip no training. Gradually study all the incidents that are recorded openly; find out what went wrong; avoid all those processes that would bring injury or death or damage.

Take days and weeks of training locally on flats and bumps. Don't rush things. One's body, nerves, habits of horizon looking, gaining confidence in handling wing moments, and much more may take place during many weeks of local training and learning.

Make models during this training-growing time; get to know reflex, yaw, roll, pitch ... in models. Explore gusts with models and kites.

Passenger towing mills may be robbing one of the duckling opportunity for self-soaring by replacing the initial phases of experience with passengering instead of self-soar hang gliding. Judgment is to be trained way before flying. Any passenger who avoids knowing well what to avoid may well repeat unfortunate history. Be a hang glider pilot from moment one: have extensive ground learning; master mini hang gliding; assure systems are "go" for safe progression; enter next steps with just one new thing at a time; avoid shot-gun loading of new things.

Does one want to be a passenger
or be a self-soaring hang glider pilot?

[Rick Masters]

Does one want to be a passenger
or be a self-soaring hang glider pilot?

Joe,
Interesting. Other pilots have brought this up to me recently, as well.
The rationalizations presented for tandem instruction by certified instructors are by and large cash cow hang gliding practices.
The entire concept of hang gliding involves becoming one with your wing. Tandem instruction is the antithesis of this.
And I am talking about real tandem instruction, here, not the rampant misuse of the tandem exemption that threatens our sport.
Both of us come from learning backgrounds that did not involve tandem, so we speak from a foundation of knowledge.
Hang gliding has been led astray by the cash cow hang gliding sideshow.
Pilots need to step back and rethink everything that has been accepted.
The foremost misconception is that hang gliding is an industry.
It's not.
Hang gliding is a recreational art.

- Form a national hang gliding association that recognizes hang gliding as a recreational art, not an industry -

[Frank Colver]

I and others, in the early days, didn't even have the opportunity to learn from others direct teaching. We started on the small hills and taught ourselves. But those of us lucky enough to live in an area with growing hang glider activity did get to watch our fellow flight learners fly, and if observant, we also learned from their successes and mistakes.

Frank C.

[Rick Masters]

Commercialism is changing the sport from the art of hang gliding to the cash cow of hang gliding.
I can only point to a man who traveled the entire length of a mountain range, the Appalachians, to tow and die from a flat field in Florida.
I find this incomprehensible.

To pound another nail in this, look at the Feb 19 headline for the story from the Ocala StarBanner:


Hang glider had dreamed of flying solo from a mountain
http://www.ocala.com/article/20160219/ARTICLES/160219707

To me, this is so incredibly sad.
Flying solo from a mountain was once my dream, as well.
But because of my belief that the proper progression of learning hang gliding went from running off sand dunes - to intermediate hills - to mountain sides, it was impossible for me to be killed on tow. I had no interest in it.

I was obsessed, rather, with micrometeorology.
I would sometimes spend days on launch, studying the thermal cycles, wind patterns, bird flights, other pilots launching, the sounds of thermals rising up through the canyons...
How could a novice learning through tow ever experience any of this?
Today novices are nothing but raw meat for tow in$tructors and the U$hPA.
It's no wonder to me that the sport of hang gliding is deteriorating and the accident rate is going up.

[JoeF]

Guard one's hang gliding:
== Refuse to give away the virgin spirits of wholly responsible pilot-carriable independent foot-launched gliding flight.
== Refuse tandem riding introduction flights; these give away your virgin flight spirits relative to independent foot-launch hang gliding.
== Refuse hang gliding schools that get you gliding by towing, pushing, hanging near, lateral tethers, frontal tethers, radio-controlling you, speaking while you are operating, scooter towing, aero towing, etc.
== Refuse hang gliding schools that get you flying before you have a minimum of six weeks of robust focused ground school and training and study.
== Refuse hang gliding "instruction" that collects money from you.
== Refuse to glide until you have practiced very many things and reached a familiarity with wings that has gliding as the natural next thing to do.
== Refuse to rent equipment. Have your own knee guards, helmet, pilot goggles (gnats, dust, insects, part flakes, spiders, .. can ruin days, even lives). Have built your own practice TCF with small wings and safe-splat.
== Refuse to give away your first impressions to entities or to processes that have entered your view because someone was promoting something.
== Refuse to take this list of recommendations until you own them from your own true self. Add or modify them until you best support yourself in your adventure of personal recreational hang gliding.


RATHER, BLESS YOURSELF:
Explore weather, air, wind. See Rick's focus on micrometeorology.
Know the wing well. Model. Make models that glide well. Know and experience model gliders that fail and succeed. Shine with some model hang gliders for dive recovery and control; let such prepare you for inhabited gliding.
Assemble hang gliders. Pack hang gliders. Assist seasoned hang glider pilots with their permission. Get answers to many questions.
Get into physical shape. Run with eyes looking at targets and horizon. Pick up feet. Get consistent at lean, walk, stride, run ... with minor wings and then major wings ... all before gliding.
Train your judgment, risk management. Observe others over weeks and months.
Master the owner's manual of three hang gliders. This study can be done during the weeks in which you are training in the field.
Getting into the air is too easy. Landing safely from being in the air is paramount. Avoiding injury to others and other aircraft is important.
Approach major gliding by a strong period of micro hang gliding.
While preparing the field, site, weather awareness: Study hang gliding, videos, incidents, failure modes. Test yourself. Ask seasoned pilots to ask you some questions; any hesitancy can be treated as a positive treasure... : go study the matter and learn more.
Become so prepared that you KNOW what wing to make or buy for your first major gliding session.
Know winds and slopes and self so well that your first major glide on your own wing will be fully independent, safe, successful, and joyful.
Study they why of 100 HG incidents. Write description in our own words with our own pen or keyboard of why each incident happened.
Take some free online tests. Get perfect scores. Study more for anything missed. Study more over questions where you hesitated. If the tests do not adequately exist, begin to compose test questions and answers; be part of the community by building this aspect of ground schooling for recreational hang gliding.
Study hang gliding history. Grow motivations.
Study niche activity options.
Know yourself well.

THEN, select a site, a time, a weather condition, a wing and self-launch to a sled glide; you have earned the opportunity to fly yourself via self-soar self-launch foot-launch recreational hang gliding. Keep up the habit of study, observing, sharpening judgment, honing risk management, , respecting yourself, respecting others' safety. Avoidance peer pressure as root of action.

[Bob Kuczewski]

I think most pilots who tow up would love to be able to drive to a nice slope and just launch themselves into the air without needing tow ropes and drivers and observers and winches and emergency signals and weak links and releases and carts and so on.

Towing does add some risks, but it also eliminates others. Whether we launch from tow or cliff, we must do so as carefully and thoughtfully as possible to make it safely through the vulnerabilities of either launch method.

If the entire planet were as flat as Kansas, I think we'd all be tow pilots.

[Rick Masters]

Whether we launch from tow or cliff, we must do so as carefully and thoughtfully as possible to make it safely through the vulnerabilities of either launch method.

There is no "we" when I foot-launch a hang glider.
My risk is multiplied by 1. It's all me.

Risk on tow is a factorial: you, the driver, the tow equipment and the spotter.
If anyone or anything in that chain screws up, the pilot gets hurt.
Each added element increases the risk disproportionately.
That is n! = 1 x 2 x 3 x 4.
So when I quantify tow risk compared to footlaunch risk, it is 24 times more dangerous.
However, my accident data suggests this is a severe underestimate.
Perhaps the tow equipment should be separated into unique whole values for both the pay-out winch, the pilot's release and weak link release.
This results in n! = 1 x 2 x 3 x 4 x 5 x 6.
That puts towing at 720 times more dangerous than foot-launch, which I think is closer to reality.