You must have the airspeed thing down pat to be doing this kind of flying because there is very little room for error. Even this gentle stall of the left wing did some real damage and had it been blowing like it does at the Cape, you could easily have been blown over after you crashed doing even more damage to your glider. It's great you posted this, I hope others can learn from the excellent footage you got of a classic mistake.
Very brave posting this. Your situation was a classic, textbook stall. I can almost guarantee that you were stalled at the moment your left wheel touched the dune. This probably happened as you were trying to avoid all out contact and not realizing you were pushing out enough to forced that left wing to stall and as it did, your glider did what it will do when a wing stalls.....turn toward that stalled wing (your right wing basically flies right on by it) and you crashed headed downwind.
That was a nice flight! but the landing was tough....Very dramatic....
My name is Yuri. I'm recently graduated H2, looking for some practice. I want to go to cape Kiwanda for it and I have couple of questions - 1) Do I need to formally have a mentor to fly there or H2 rating would be sufficient ? 2) How do I get in touch with local HG guys? I would love to have some company. Thanks in advance for your answer! Yuri
one thing that would maybe have helped, when you shifted your weight to the right to also pull the bar out to stall the glider and maybe land on your feet instead of the leading edge.
Thanks for your video. My glider has been in the garage for too long and I sure would like to drive out to Cape Kiwanda's training hill and spend a couple of weekends to brush up on my landing and launching skill.
I'm no expert and to me your flights were very good up until the last little bit. Really good take off run and your landings are good. My observations of Dune Gooners are that they only try it in quite strong conditions. Any low level flying on low ridges need a significant breeze and high skill levels with technique that needs to be adapted to site conditions. I recommend flying in easier (stronger) conditions and take on the lighter conditions later.
better not still be flying the cape when i come down there to teach a bunch of guys soon will be dragging you north if you are.
my daughter was the one who was hiking all around the cape when they had the bike ride last month. long blond hair, very fit!(into vertical pole work and yoga) we used to spend weeks camping on the coast in fall and early spring , Florence beach, right on the beach!! w/ camper and odysseys and 3 wheelers. Cant do that now. part of their Home schooling. gota love sand
was more than decent. ive been watching you here for months now. even my daughter asked me why you wee still here. Now i gota ask..why are you not getting some real air time with some real air space between the ground and you, where you can practice, with out chance of contact with the ground.
you got it down, turns control, take off and landings!
come on go for it!
you were here! flying close to the ground is chancy, gota be on top of it, leaving options open.
@acrazedmaniac Thanks for the vote of confidence. To tell you the truth, I was feeling just about ready for a mountain flight. I've been trying to gain confidence at lower altitudes over softer terrain. You're probably right; altitude would be helpful for practicing.
Nice training video. Sometimes our best lessons come from our mistakes. What did you learn from the experience? Just before your left wing dug in, did you see (on the video) a chance to avoid the crash? Close proximity flying requires advanced techniques done by experienced pilots - even then there is little room for error.
@penrynbigbird Here's what I learned: 1) Wind and lift are unpredictable; they can't be trusted. 2) I'm not very good yet. 3) I'm glad I was flying over sand and not trees or rocks. I'm not sure about the possible solution that you're referring to. I have thought that perhaps if I would have quickly gotten my feet out of the harness when I got low, that maybe I could have landed on my feet, or even just taken a few running steps before getting in the air again. I don't know. What did you see?
Right after your left wheel touched; that was the time to shift your weight "strongly to the right", IMHO. The one essential you didn't have was ground clearance. Flying straight away from the dune instead of across it would have given you the clearance you needed. Of course it's easy to second guess your situation from the comfort of a chair, but that's what it looked like to me.
@penrynbigbird Excellent point. Looking at it now, I think to myself, "what was I thinking." In the heat of the moment, it's hard to think rationally. Hopefully, more experience will give me the ability to think clearly when the unexpected happens. Thanks for your input.
You must have the airspeed thing down pat to be doing this kind of flying because there is very little room for error. Even this gentle stall of the left wing did some real damage and had it been blowing like it does at the Cape, you could easily have been blown over after you crashed doing even more damage to your glider. It's great you posted this, I hope others can learn from the excellent footage you got of a classic mistake.
jcoyier 2 months ago
Very brave posting this. Your situation was a classic, textbook stall. I can almost guarantee that you were stalled at the moment your left wheel touched the dune. This probably happened as you were trying to avoid all out contact and not realizing you were pushing out enough to forced that left wing to stall and as it did, your glider did what it will do when a wing stalls.....turn toward that stalled wing (your right wing basically flies right on by it) and you crashed headed downwind.
jcoyier 2 months ago
Hi :-)
That was a nice flight! but the landing was tough....Very dramatic....
My name is Yuri. I'm recently graduated H2, looking for some practice. I want to go to cape Kiwanda for it and I have couple of questions - 1) Do I need to formally have a mentor to fly there or H2 rating would be sufficient ? 2) How do I get in touch with local HG guys? I would love to have some company. Thanks in advance for your answer! Yuri
PartsOfMyDream 7 months ago
one thing that would maybe have helped, when you shifted your weight to the right to also pull the bar out to stall the glider and maybe land on your feet instead of the leading edge.
kokalti 10 months ago
Thanks for your video. My glider has been in the garage for too long and I sure would like to drive out to Cape Kiwanda's training hill and spend a couple of weekends to brush up on my landing and launching skill.
rickskater 1 year ago
Very nice video and your comments made me laugh at the end
"No problem...Nothing to see here...Move on!"
6:48 You can actually see that paraglider pilot laughing at you. lol
jacoherbst 1 year ago
I'm no expert and to me your flights were very good up until the last little bit. Really good take off run and your landings are good. My observations of Dune Gooners are that they only try it in quite strong conditions. Any low level flying on low ridges need a significant breeze and high skill levels with technique that needs to be adapted to site conditions. I recommend flying in easier (stronger) conditions and take on the lighter conditions later.
deslightfly 1 year ago
Nicely produced video!
NMERider 1 year ago
Can I ask...what type camera are you using. These videos look great!
supernova227 1 year ago
@supernova227 It's a ContourHD 1080. I've only had it for a couple of weeks and I really like it.
lpartna 1 year ago
better not still be flying the cape when i come down there to teach a bunch of guys soon will be dragging you north if you are.
my daughter was the one who was hiking all around the cape when they had the bike ride last month. long blond hair, very fit!(into vertical pole work and yoga) we used to spend weeks camping on the coast in fall and early spring , Florence beach, right on the beach!! w/ camper and odysseys and 3 wheelers. Cant do that now. part of their Home schooling. gota love sand
acrazedmaniac 1 year ago
was more than decent. ive been watching you here for months now. even my daughter asked me why you wee still here. Now i gota ask..why are you not getting some real air time with some real air space between the ground and you, where you can practice, with out chance of contact with the ground.
you got it down, turns control, take off and landings!
come on go for it!
you were here! flying close to the ground is chancy, gota be on top of it, leaving options open.
go a further north!! ucandoit!
acrazedmaniac 1 year ago
@acrazedmaniac Thanks for the vote of confidence. To tell you the truth, I was feeling just about ready for a mountain flight. I've been trying to gain confidence at lower altitudes over softer terrain. You're probably right; altitude would be helpful for practicing.
lpartna 1 year ago
Nice training video. Sometimes our best lessons come from our mistakes. What did you learn from the experience? Just before your left wing dug in, did you see (on the video) a chance to avoid the crash? Close proximity flying requires advanced techniques done by experienced pilots - even then there is little room for error.
penrynbigbird 1 year ago
@penrynbigbird Here's what I learned: 1) Wind and lift are unpredictable; they can't be trusted. 2) I'm not very good yet. 3) I'm glad I was flying over sand and not trees or rocks. I'm not sure about the possible solution that you're referring to. I have thought that perhaps if I would have quickly gotten my feet out of the harness when I got low, that maybe I could have landed on my feet, or even just taken a few running steps before getting in the air again. I don't know. What did you see?
lpartna 1 year ago
Right after your left wheel touched; that was the time to shift your weight "strongly to the right", IMHO. The one essential you didn't have was ground clearance. Flying straight away from the dune instead of across it would have given you the clearance you needed. Of course it's easy to second guess your situation from the comfort of a chair, but that's what it looked like to me.
Thanks for sharing your learning experience!!!
penrynbigbird 1 year ago
@penrynbigbird Excellent point. Looking at it now, I think to myself, "what was I thinking." In the heat of the moment, it's hard to think rationally. Hopefully, more experience will give me the ability to think clearly when the unexpected happens. Thanks for your input.
lpartna 1 year ago