Safety

I second that!
We have developed a nice (and ambitious) workflow, which we don't seem to follow ourselves. We are already gathering incident/accident data. I can see a few topics reg. safety statistics on this forum, but no working group created, no brainstorming, no drafting etc. I don't even know who created it.

I believe that the incident reporting forms should be better developed. If people are reporting now and then we change the form, then either we have incompatible data or have to ask people to fill in again.

I believe we should step back a bit, create a working group, start with some basics (like the steps outlined by Louis in Building a Just Culture for Free Flight, which I totally agree with). Only then should we be ready to start this process. If we have set ourselves (again, ambitious) target of finishing a task within two weeks, then it's not a long wait. Let's not lose the great momentum that we are having.

I intended to build a gaggle report. I trust no one else but the pilots to say what happen / happened in a gaggle. I'm also willing to follow Just Culture principle but if this project intend to gently wait accident report for organiser I'm out and will propose another solution / working group.

We are a pilot union, there is no comitee per se. At least yet.

Very needed. The sport raised from the outside world but now it's time for institution to catch back and define rulebook,guidelines and procedure. If the formats are left too open nothing of this will ever be possible

From what I know, I believe level homogeineity is indeed a first class safety parametrer. Thank for bringing this up.

I agree that anyone compeeting shuld have done SIV manouvers with an official SIV instructor
But doing an official SIV every time we change the glider is going to be really expensive, expecially for someone that is not already in a CCC.
Not every pilot in FAI1 competitions is using a CCC, so consider that.
I still do collapses, stalls, (SIV manouvers),... with my competition wing, but for actual training, not just for a certificate

I would agree to mandatory SIV - not necessarily on the same model as raced.

I fully agree with comp pilots being able to handle the cases that are being taught in SIV courses but, I do not agree in requiring them to attend one of them and getting the "certification". I have friends that when they buy a new wing they go to Lake Garda and do the whole "sequence" of maneuvers to their satisfaction. The "certification" would cost them + 1000 Euros for something that they can do it already...

Having said that, I fully realize that leaving it to the pilot conscience, is not a 'calibrated' way to deal with the issue....

I think if you can prove you can fly predefined maneuvers without attending an SIV, that should be acceptable as well. If you do not dare to fly those maneuvers in an environment comparable to an SIV (i.e. over water, with an (automatic) life vest, with a rescue boat on the water), then it is probably not a bad idea to attend an SIV.

Of course not everyone has easy access to a suitable place for such training.

Hi Jonas,

I like the idea of looking for ways of better selecting pilots that are really capable of competing XC with tools to sort out unexpected wing behaviour.
I think your proposal lacks some detail
Are you proposing for CAT-1 events ? All Cat1 or just Worlds and perhaps Europeans ?
Are you proposing for a larger array of events ? Which ?

What do you exactly mean by a SIV certification ? Who is able to certify ? Please think worldwide, not only central europe.

Regarding "on the wing used in the competition", you should be more comprehensive, because if a pilot changes from an Enzo to an X-One, would you require a new certification ? Would you require only a certification in the same type of wing ? How many years that certification holds its validity ?

As you see, there are many details to be explored here

Submitting a video showing certain skills (catch & release, stopping rotations, cravat clearing spin etc), on a yearly basis to get you verified for the comp season is a good idea. Standardising where the camera needs to be mounted and what needs to be in the frame could mean that anyone can just go and do a flight and film the required skills and submit it to a website. I’m sure someone could train AI to verify the videos as there are some very obvious movements it could learn from.

Spot on ! I'd like a Meet Director or Safety Director to be able to nominatly call any pilot for an answer. If both are in direct line without terrain interférence the pilot shall be able to reply even just to say : "wait it's sketchy". We curently ask our student more than we do for top comp Pilots.

One ideia is to have the task automatically stopped after a certain percentage of pilots or team leaders call level 3,
independent of the Meet Director or Safety Director.

GPS Trackers are provided & distributed by organizers to pilots. They are great, quite often.
VHF Radio devices are to be bought & brought by pilots. They are shitty, quite often.

In my very first PWC, in Japan, a looong time ago, radio devices combined with a GPS unit inside had been distributed to us. That solved many issues.

Equipment provided by organizers is tested, working, and mandatory to be used by the pilots.

Why not imagining a proper communication system provided & distributed by organizers to pilots?
Why not explore communication means other than VHF, such as Zello or mesh-radio systems?

Hi Jonas,

You seem to have a bad concept of what you call "hidden reports".
But you must know, this system was born out of a problem of lack of reporting levels, or lack of accurate reporting.
Pilots are many times reluctant to report for different resons, sometimes there is a kind of "herd behaviour" in which pilots report a level heavily influenced, one way or another, by the report of a "well known" pilot (or avoid reporting in the same situation), radio VHF reports are sometimes lacking information such as who is reporting, his position, his height, and even if clarifications are requested, sometimes they do not come easily.

So this system of easy reporting levels without the problems cited above, is a big step forward to the eyes of many experienced organizers and pilots.
The only problem with this system is when there is lack of cell coverage (loss of signal). That is why VHF radios cannot be discarded.
A good MD could, on a day where there are some concerns about levels (wind, T-Storms, etc,) , and live tracking is failing in some areas, communicate on VHF radios the situation of signal loss, and ask for radio level announcement in those stages.

There is also a problem with reporting level 3 when the conditions are really sketchy; using the radio while trying to fly a wing out of shitty situation can often be dangerous! Mandating the pilot to let go of the controls (brakes) in order to communicate the level will decrease the overall safety. In this way the trackers are better suited since they require less pilot input.

Safety briefing should encourage pilots to report level 2 and 3 to give info to organization.
It doesn't means task is gonna be stopped.
Just giving live info. about an area.

In FAI 2 comps, i often hear that "if you push level 3 you go land"
I think this sentence should be avoided because people thus never call level 3 and report nothing.
A set of guidelines should be written to explain why it's good to report level 2 or 3, and what you can do in that case.

Regarding the new flymaster devices with reporting level 2 or 3: it's a great improvement!
I wish people would use it more. It does not reveal anything on radio, you can push it several times during the task, ... and it gives valuable info to organization.
They also allow safety director to send messages to pilots (ex: task stopped, helicopter incoming, ...), with a better guarantee of communication than radio as the device will ring until acknowledgement.
Presentation of the device during comp. briefing is sometimes lacking yes. But you'll get used to it, just ask around.
Some meet directors now have some video demoing the behaviors and buttons.

This one seems obvious. Fabien mentioned using more restricted sportive airspace on too large unlandable places.

My Suggestion: just Mark landable areas and have waypoints only for windsocks (really in place).

Why:
1) A landable place ist not always and ever landable. WHO guarantees, that a landable, ist safe?
2) I am not sure if a landable waypoint File is really a contribution to safety. In my experience it is safer to assess landing Options visually than to calculate reachable outlanding options from waypoint files. The latter allows the Pilot to Push the Limit more effecively, which does nit result in a safety gain.

Hello Robert

Good point!!

I suggest also, that the tasksetter published standard tasks in different weather situations where bomb-out fields are marked but also other potential dangers like powerlines, turbulent zones, etc.

Hey,
And this is what is already happening. MD usually talks about the available landings, difficult parts along the race, etc, etc...
When you are flying for the 1st time in a place, it is almost impossible to remember all the suitable landing fileds, no landing zones, power lines...
And during a briefing, most of the pilots are on their instruments, not paying much attention. After the briefing, never enough time to study properly the map if you have to take off in the 1st ones...

I think all landing fields, dangerous areas, etc... should be in the instruments (airpace, waypoints).

- NO LANDING zones definition : a zone not providing any suitable landing fields and not allowing a safe crossing (forest, valley, urban areas, airports, etc…) Every area should be treated case by case.
- Suitable landing definition : a flat field with no obstacles in entry that can allow a safe landing without wind (based on high performance gliders) Sailplane database ?
- Recommended landing fields : Suitable fields providing an easy access for retrieve, authorization from the farmer, windsocks, etc…

I totally support it. I was there on Ikarus, it was a great decision on the last day!

But I really believe it should be as simple as SSS crossing penalty. It doesn't matter what pilots do before, obviously they should try not to get in the cloud, but at least they'd know that they cannot cross SSS like that.

And SSS crossing should be like an airspace penalty, or similar.

I think I heard somewhere that it was tested, or they were discussing the possible scenarios.

During Ikarus, the results looked good, but someone pointed out a scenario involving strong lift before an SSS: when pilots start getting sucked up, they may spiral or otherwise lose altitude. If this happens to several dozen pilots at once, it could easily turn into a serious mess.

A similar situation occurred on a more spread-out task in Roldanillo about two years ago. A cloud started pulling very aggressively, and pilots were on the edge of entering restricted airspace. Things got tense with around 20–30 pilots involved. Some entered spirals, while others began stalling. At the finish, tensions ran high - those flying slightly lower behind were frustrated with pilots in front who were dropping unexpectedly on them, especially the ones stalling pilots.

In my view, sooner or later a scenario like this is bound to happen again, and the risk of collisions will increase. But, of course, I could be wrong.

I agree with Robert.
I'm not certain that it would be a positive change for safety for PG competition.
I have not seen a case of collision because of low visibility close to cloud ( I'm not saying that it will never happen) but I've seen and lived quite a few collisions in the huge start gaggle. We should not forget that the bigger the lift area, the less dense the gaggle is, and the safer.
To me, It often seems that the lift area is larger higher in altitude close and around to the cloud. If you cut off this space, we stuck everyone in a smaller space.
Also, I've lived few starts close to airspace ceiling. It was very stressfull in term of safety. Each pilot had a different behavior, different way of escaping or spiraling. It made a lot of unpredictable trajectories inside the dense gaggle which created collisions.
Sorry for not providing data here, as my memory is mixing events and task, but I'm sure a lot of us see what I mean.

Hi i was on that task on Icarus and it was not a strong day, only +3m with the big startcilinder over 3/4 termals and some pilots are spiraling down in the group just to get under the max. level. It was a competition with 150 pilots and it was quite dangerous and not easy to handle.
Immagine a day where you have stronger termals, the situation will be much more complex!
On all these topics where we discuss about SS or ESS the right and good tasksetting it comes more and more important to me.

Tested, refined and validated during German Open 2022 in Ager.

It is an interesting idea, placing a number (which will apply to everybody) in the place of a "guess"

People are trying to top it, they get "slightly in" "slightly over but on the side", "fully in", whatever.

The Meet director screams "no cloud flying" and at that point you do not know if this is helping or not - my guess is that some of the guys that have been in the "white room" are freaking out and want out of it, they did not do it in purpose, they just miscalculated.

With the help of "flying marshals", or trustworthy pilots, it is an idea that the meet director can radio up a "limit" which is definitely below the cloud-base and avoid all the ugliness and the perceived "un-sportsmanship"

Is an idea worthy of discussion. We may find out that is not practical, but discussing it, for sure!

I think the pilot community will always be divided on clouds. Some of the best pilots can consistently climb the side of a cloud and start hundreds of meters above the rest.
We've all done it, and many of us decided it's not worth the risk being on the cloud's side. Any random moment a pilot could appear from the cloud exactly where you are climbing.
I think it's risky, not safe and definitely not sportive.

A clear rule about SSS crossing altitude would be much safer I believe. Ikarus was a trial, that's why people didn't know when should they spiral, etc., but if this becomes regular it'd be much safer. For example it's definitely not like an airspace, nothing happens if you go above this before SSS.

It's interesting. I never thought it could go this far. CIVL appointed a safety Officier recently.

There is a project a reviewing CIVL Internal regulations, maybe it will be the correct opportunity to discuss this topic more.

Wont we need CIVL to approve such a proposal? Are we asking for an independent body because there is a lack of confidence in CIVL? Can we not imbed the function you seek within a body (CIVL) that meets our needs?

Perhaps the creation of a Independent Pilots Union Safety Committee should not just be limited to CIVL, but to all Comps.

This ties in as a possible solution for the What Went Wrong Topic: Communication of safety incidents.
https://gagglereport.org/node/27

An Independent Pilots Union Safety Committee could provide most if not all the solutions proposed: the independent Investigation, Public disclosure/ transparency, Monitoring of Pilots condition if applicable etc.. and possibly at some time in the future even be the independent and impartial safety director that could end the task or race due to safety concerns.

Interesting