jl@unc.UUCP (01/21/86)
Another biography:
ASEL, IA, 360 hours;
Glider, 65 hours;
but who cares? We want flying stories, right? Hours of boredom, moments
of terror! Near misses!
July 1966:
Having soloed less than two weeks before, I soar silently over Lasham,
England in a single-seat Swallow glider. Airplanes are few, an occasional
aerotow, and once a week or so a big plane comes in for a major overhaul
at the Dan Air depot.
My scan becomes urgent as I hear a quiet airplane rumble that rapidly
grows loud. It must be big and coming fast. This is one advantage gliders
have, like a short-range radar. Now the roar is tremendous.
Frantically, I turn to check my six o'clock. Maybe I'll get a brief glimpse
before.... Hey, the roar is still just as tremendous. Hmm....
I see a big four-engine prop plane running up its engines by the hangar
800 feet below.
-- James Lipscomb (jl@unc)
"It's better to go like this, than in some senseless tragedy."
"I'd rather have a near Miss, than a near miss."singh@glacier.ARPA (Harinder Singh) (01/23/86)
.......... Mr. Lipscomb's experience with the sound of a large airplane running up on the ground while he was flying above in a glider reminds me of a similar experience: I was giving a friend a ride in my favorite glider to-date (no, make that a sailplane), a Grob Acro, out of Sky Sailing Airport in Fremont, CA. We had a high aero-tow to five or six thousand feet just outside the TCA and just sort of lazed around to get a long ride. As we came down to about 2000 feet and I started positioning myself for imminent pattern entry, we heard a scary thud or buffet coming from the tail-section. Like nothing I had ever experienced before. I looked back, around, and everywhere but could see nothing. Meanwhile, the dull thuds occurred again, somewhat irregularly. I could have sworn from the feel of it that they were coming from the tail section. The glider was handling just fine, but I feared imminent structural failure. Especially since the aircraft IS an aerobatic sailplane that is flown by many different people, some of whom may push it's limits. You may think it difficult that someone would take it beyond +6G, but I had had a definite admission from someone of something close ( highly illegal in the SF Bay Area airspace). As you can gather from the context of this posting, the "problem" was on the ground. On the 45 to the pattern entry we saw plumes of smoke rising from the upwind side of the runway. Been a tow-plane accident, I thought. But the runway was clear so our cautious landing was un-eventful - not that a glider pilot has many choices once he has lost altitude. Turned out that everything was OK! No accident or anything - the airport is RIGHT NEXT TO a drag-strip where some jet-cars (?) were starting up. That is where the booms and the smoke had been coming from.... And now for a question: what can one do during a pre-flight of an aerobatic rental aircraft to ensure that it has NOT recently been over- stressed by someone?? Anything other than the usual precautions (which may NOT reveal latent problems)?