cloud suck

tonycondon

tonycondon

Gastons CRO (Chief Dinner Reservation Officer)
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Tony
hang gliders and paraglider (especially paragliders) and even low performance (weak airbraked) sailplanes sometimes have problems where the updraft strength near cloudbase exceeds their abilities wrt sink rate. I once had my Cherokee II at 90 mph at cloudbase and was still climbing and i was really hoping i would get to the edge of the cloud before it started to get dark. the hang/para glider guys call this phenomenon "cloud suck". it sucks.

http://ozreport.com/1310478704
 
Holy crap. But how did his chute lines get twisted up like that?
 
i have no idea, did not look like fun though.
 
I wanna learn to hang glide in the worst way. I'll try and stay away from clouds though. Ain't that hard, been doing it in the Free Bird for a lot of years.
 
Well you do want some clouds. Clouds = lift. Lift = more time aloft.
 
steingar said:
I wanna learn to hang glide in the worst way. I'll try and stay away from clouds though. Ain't that hard, been doing it in the Free Bird for a lot of years.
Click to expand...

Yeah but in the Cherokee you have a engine to help you decend away from the cloud if you need to. In a parasailer or hang glider you don't.

The whole time that guy was spinining I kept thinking crap there is no ball to step on there is no power to pull and no alieron to go neutral. Scary as hell.
 
So much for the whole "Oh, I've got a parachute, so it must be safe" thing.
 
parachutes don't work so good when exposed to less than 0 G's
 
Wow - that was scary. I don't know if there's anything you can do to recover from a situation like that. If not, I think I'd want to faint and wake up (or not) after it was over. I guess he survived, but I assume he got hurt pretty bad.


Tony, is there a preferred way to handle getting sucked into a cloud in a glider?
 
shenanigans said:
Tony, is there a preferred way to handle getting sucked into a cloud in a glider?
Click to expand...

lots of discussion on various ways to escape without losing total control. some gliders have fairly stable hands off spiral modes. others have very stable spins. some have speed limiting dive brakes (which is really choice).

one guy wrote an article in Soaring a few years back about getting sucked into a cloud. He spent something like 3 minutes in the cloud. the article was named "Into the Bowels of Darkness" He presented his flight trace at the SSA Convention. it was crazy. He did one hammerhead but then managed to get control of the airspeed. he actually used a technique he had read about in Soaring years ago to keep the wings generally level. he would move the stick in a given direction. if the G loading increased then he would move the stick in the opposite direction. so basically he tried to hold a steady-ish airspeed with pitch and used bank to keep the G's from getting away and eventually flew out of the cloud. He was really lucky.
 
EdFred said:
Well you do want some clouds. Clouds = lift. Lift = more time aloft.
Click to expand...
It's true only to a point. I got lucky once with the 1-26; a big flat-bottom Cu parked over the airport, and there was nothing but lift everywhere under that thing; I stayed up over 1.5 hrs, and could have lingered longer. Normal speed the whole time, and only had to turn to stay under the cloud, which was huge. It was intense! But not enough that one couldn't descend without much trouble. I skirted the edge, though, just in case. When they are still maturing, the "suck" can be wicked.

This lady, in an Australian paragliding comp a while back, got pulled into a Cb and spit out in the flight levels, unconscious... and iced up!! :yikes:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-436584/Amazing-escape-paraglider-sucked-32-000ft-storm.html
 
shenanigans said:
Wow - that was scary. I don't know if there's anything you can do to recover from a situation like that. If not, I think I'd want to faint and wake up (or not) after it was over. I guess he survived, but I assume he got hurt pretty bad.


Tony, is there a preferred way to handle getting sucked into a cloud in a glider?
Click to expand...


The Preferred way is with a Gyro and an Instrument Rating. Known as Cloud flying. Rarely done in the U.S.

Brian
 
tonycondon said:
hang gliders and paraglider (especially paragliders) and even low performance (weak airbraked) sailplanes sometimes have problems where the updraft strength near cloudbase exceeds their abilities wrt sink rate. I once had my Cherokee II at 90 mph at cloudbase and was still climbing and i was really hoping i would get to the edge of the cloud before it started to get dark. the hang/para glider guys call this phenomenon "cloud suck". it sucks.

http://ozreport.com/1310478704
Click to expand...


Wow - no flight plan, I bet. And his shoe looked untied - improper preflight.

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I remember the article in Soaring a few years ago that you were referring to.

--

Does something like this sneak up on you or is this something that just grabs you?
 
Wow that is intense! I can't imagine being in that situation. Wonder what his reaction was watching that video
 
TangoWhiskey said:
Cut the lines then pull a reserve chute? That assumes you have one.
Click to expand...

Reading the Paraglider writeup in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paraglider it appears that there are means of effecting rapid descents - assuming that the pilot knows how. Perhaps this guy was inexperienced - or suffered a panic attack.

BTW - I have never tried skydiving, paragliding or any other form of unpowered flight except a demo in a glider (on an overcast day with zero thermal activity).

Dave
 
this wasn't a powered parachute, just a paraglider.
 
It sounds like anyone likely to be affected by cloud suck ought to be thinking about it long before they end up right below the cloud.
 
tonycondon said:
hang gliders and paraglider (especially paragliders) and even low performance (weak airbraked) sailplanes sometimes have problems where the updraft strength near cloudbase exceeds their abilities wrt sink rate. I once had my Cherokee II at 90 mph at cloudbase and was still climbing and i was really hoping i would get to the edge of the cloud before it started to get dark. the hang/para glider guys call this phenomenon "cloud suck". it sucks.

http://ozreport.com/1310478704
Click to expand...

Been there. In a 1-26, racing to the edge of the cloud to get clear.
The dark bottoms of those sucking clouds are not flat!
They are a little higher in the middle. :)
 
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