Watch out for those gliders!!

ScottM

ScottM

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iBazinga!
Got this in the email today and verified it with ANS
Yikes
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Boys: FWD from Tom Stowers:

Rick

As I was flying the Citation into Carson City this afternoon I was diverted to Reno because of a disabled aircraft on the Carson runway. This Fractional crew flying a Hawker with 5 pax hit a glider over Alpine Co. (south of Minden) at between 13- 14,000 feet. They lost an engine, all electrical and hydraulic power and the captain ( a female) was injured slightly. They landed gear up at carson city and everyone walked off the plane. Not sure at this time if the co-pilot or the captain landed the plane but they obvously could not reach Reno Airport.
You can still see the part of the glider spar sticking out of the pilot's side of the Hawker. Billy Stowers identified the spar as an ASW series. As I write this they have found the pilot who was flying Jim Indrebo's brand new ASW-29 as he was walking off the mountain. If you saw the Hawker you would find this hard to believe.
To all my glider pilot friends: Lets put transponders into our planes. I put one in mine and it cost about 1500 bucks! Lets not have this happen again and certainly not with an airliner full of people. Thank God that no one was hurt! Unbelievable!
Fly safe!
Jim

James Richardson
jrichsunv@earthlink.ne
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All Safe After Collision At 16,000 Feet

This is nothing short of amazing... as everyone is safe after a glider collided with a business jet traveling at 16,000 feet over the Pine Nut Mountains of western Nevada Monday.
Akihiro Hirao of Japan was flying his Schleicher ASH 27 glider (a similar 25 model is shown in the graphic below) over the mountains at about 3:10 pm just as a Hawker 800XP was starting its descent into the Carson City airport. The glider struck the jet's nose -- sending both planes briefly out of control.
As Hirao attempted to bail out of his stricken plane, which lost a wing in the collision -- the pilot of the NetJets Hawker was dealing with a shattered instrument panel. Passengers onboard the charted jet from San Diego say she was able to stabilize the jet quickly, after banking sharply immediately after the impact and descending several thousand feet.
Local media reports state Hirao jumped from the glider, and parachuted into the mountains. He was found by Washoe Tribal Police at about 5:45 pm - two-and-a-half hours after the incident began -- walking near the mouth of Lone Pine Canyon.
"He has no apparent injuries but they will take him to get checked out," said Lyon County Sheriffs Department spokesman Lt. Jeff Page. "He hit a jet at 300 knots and had the presence of mind to bail out. He is a very lucky man."
​
Meanwhile, onboard the Hawker the plane's pilot set up for an emergency landing at Carson City. The pilot circled Washoe Lake several times in order to burn off fuel, and then executed what sounds like a flawless wheels-up landing at the airport.
"I've had wheels-down landings that were a lot rougher," said Hawker passenger Steve DiZio.
Pieces of the glider were found to be embedded in the Hawker's radome. The unidentified pilot of the charter plane suffered a cut between her lip and chin -- but no one else was injured in the ordeal.
"This woman is a miracle worker," passenger Evy Chipman of Incline Village said of the pilot.
Sounds like there were plenty of miracles going around...
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Re: Be Careful Tony!

I would like to see pics of these AC
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

Make a *really* light transponder for cheap and you might see gliders adding them.
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

jangell said:
Make a *really* light transponder for cheap and you might see gliders adding them.
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There is still the issue of an electrical system aka as a battery. Depends on what the weight to collision avoidence trade offs would be.

I wonder if you could make a low power consumption transponder, VFR only , that would be a resonable price?
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

Certainly not an enginer, but could you install a very small propeller and by this I mean perhpas and inch or two in diameter that is positioned somewhere on the plane ( perhpas like a pitot tube). The small propeller would spin by wind flowing over it and power the Tansponder.

I think Big Commercial aircraft have these that pop out in the event of a total power failure to supply critical power to the cockpit.
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

AdamZ said:
Certainly not an enginer, but could you install a very small propeller and by this I mean perhpas and inch or two in diameter that is positioned somewhere on the plane ( perhpas like a pitot tube). The small propeller would spin by wind flowing over it and power the Tansponder.

I think Big Commercial aircraft have these that pop out in the event of a total power failure to supply critical power to the cockpit.
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I saw one installed on a J-3 and have seen back up systems for C210's similar to what you describe. Can't be too awfully difficult...
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

prop = drag
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

NC Pilot said:
I saw one installed on a J-3 and have seen back up systems for C210's similar to what you describe. Can't be too awfully difficult...
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Military planes have back up generators like that. I think the Grumman :) A-6 Intruder had something like that to run the hydraulics if the electrical system failed???
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

There has been a big push lately in the SSA to get the guys out west and near Class B to start flying with transponders. With the high altitudes they get in thermal and even wave, they are often up playing in Jet altitudes, especially those descending for landing on the west coast. Thankfully everyone escaped from this OK. At the altitudes I fly at, I only have to worry about this when near an airport, and I keep my eyes out!

And yes if you can build me a small electrically efficient transponder that'll run for at least 8 hours on a 12V battery, along with a radio, Ill buy it. Oh of course it has to be cheap.

Windmill generator would never fly. These guys are drag fanatics, they arent going to put a draggy windmill on their 45:1 fiberglass glider.
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

gprellwitz said:
jet @ 300Kt = DRAG. Cost/benefit analysis.
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Yeah, but I was referring to why you wouldn't put on on a glider. Who cares on a jet.
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

N2212R said:
Yeah, but I was referring to why you wouldn't put on on a glider. Who cares on a jet.
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I think he was talking about the relative amounts of drag - you know, between putting a little windmill on the glider or attaching a jet travelling 300 kts to the glider. The jet adds a bit more drag than the windmill!

And yeah, these guys are anti-drag junkies, but really, what would it do? Turn the L/D from 45:1 to 44.3:1?
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

N2212R said:
Yeah, but I was referring to why you wouldn't put on on a glider. Who cares on a jet.
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No, I was comparing adding a 2" propeller to a glider to adding a 300Kt jet to a glider. Not adding a 2" propeller to a jet.:goofy: What Tom said!
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

I think you might be surprised at how much drag it would cause. I also think you would need something bigger than 2" (oh the jokes that come to mind there) to get the job done.
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

To all my glider pilot friends: Lets put transponders into our planes.
Jim
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I would be interested in the flight conditions, ie visibility, and proximity to clouds during this accident.
Part of me wants to rail against the added expense and trouble of yet another electronic box (in this case, for thousands of gliders) to compensate for an operational deficiency. Descending through FL180, it takes a conscious effort to start a serious scan, especially now that everyone is relying (erroneously) on tcas. (Most dont scan at all in CCA, I'd bet).
Is it knee-jerk reflex to throw more electronic safety devices at every problem? eg., They are talking about what 'system' we can design to prevent taking the wrong runway after the lex crash - I hear there already is one being studied, an FMC that says "Abort Abort - incorrect runway!"
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

Anthony said:
Military planes have back up generators like that. I think the Grumman :) A-6 Intruder had something like that to run the hydraulics if the electrical system failed???
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Somebody sells turbine powered electrical generators for GA prop planes. I saw one on a Cherokee 6 type that folds out of the nose baggage area.
 
I find it interesting that "He hit the jet at 300kts" .

That is one fast glider.
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

smigaldi said:
There is still the issue of an electrical system aka as a battery. Depends on what the weight to collision avoidence trade offs would be.

I wonder if you could make a low power consumption transponder, VFR only , that would be a resonable price?
Click to expand...

Weight really isn't that much of an issue in gliders. The serious guys with expensive high performance sailplanes add weight in the form of water to increase their glide speed unless the lift is very light. Panel space, OTOH is tough to come by in most of the sailplanes I've been in. The ideal transponder for a glider would be fairly small and/or have a remote control head and would be as efficient WRT input power as possible, maybe even replying less often than every interrogation. An option to include an internal antenna would probably be a plus.

As to the "little propeller driving a tiny generator" idea, the drag from that would probably be noticeable on many of the slipperier sailplanes, but I have seen some with solar panels to power the avionics.
 
Steve said:
I find it interesting that "He hit the jet at 300kts" .

That is one fast glider.
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And he hit the jet "in the nose" probably with his wing since part of the spar ended up in the jet's radome. Kinda like hitting a big guy's fist with your face or kidney.
 
Scary mid-air!

From today's AINAlerts (available at http://www.ainonline.com):

AINAlerts said:
None Seriously Hurt in Hawker-Sailplane Midair

Remarkably, the two pilots and three passengers on a NetJets Hawker 800XP (N879QS) and the pilot of a Schleicher sailplane escaped serious injury when the two aircraft collided at about 16,000 feet yesterday afternoon near Carson City, Nev. The pilot of the glider bailed out and landed safely, while the jet made a gear-up landing at Carson City Airport. A photo of the Hawker on the runway after the landing shows damage to the nose, including a missing nose cone and imbeded parts of the glider. According to NetJets, the captain of the jet was treated for minor injuries. The company also said the collision caused damage to the underside of the jet, as well as to the nose. The accident happened while the Hawker was descending to land at Reno-Tahoe Airport, Nev., about an hour after taking off from Palomar Airport in Carlsbad, Calif. Weather in the area at the time of the accident was reported as 10 miles visibility and a few clouds at 10,000 feet. The NTSB is investigating.

CarsonCity.jpg
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Wonder what the NTSB will uncover with this one...

Cheers,

-Andrew
 
Re: Be Careful Tony!

jangell said:
Make a *really* light transponder for cheap and you might see gliders adding them.
Click to expand...

They do make light, small transponders for Gliders -- Becker, Microair. They aren't cheap, but they are no more expensive than a Garmin GTX 327 or King KT-76A.

Keep in mind that the glider in question was a Schleicher ASH-27 and I doubt if it cost less than $100K. Anyone that can afford a glider like that could afford a transponder.

... Bill
 
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