AIRPROX

[modelman]

Close call

Flying into Duxford really busy day only spotted an aircraft below by his shadow. Also went around twice after tardy runway vacations ahead pity FISOs cannot issue land after instructions would speed things up a lot

[tggzzz]

One easy thing you can do for yourself is to do is to plot your route on a half-mil paper map before setting off - and look carefully at what's underneath the flight path. (And check the NOTAMs, of course!)

I've frequently seen light aircraft overfly active airfields at a dangerous height, i.e. below the height indicated on the half-mil maps. For one example, see airprox report 05207 in <http://www.airproxboard.org.uk/docs/423/ukabbk18.pdf>

I suspect that the relevant airfields are not shown on some (all?) electronic moving maps.

[BlueJays]

Thank you for all the responses. I'll certainly take all the good advice on board.

[fireflybob]

We all know that we should lookout but there don't seem to be many teaching us how to lookout - I think there needs to be more education on this.

Although this is about cycle safety there are some excellent tips about lookout and how the eye and brain work in this respect - well worth a read:-

What an RAF pilot can teach us about being safe on the road

[Dave Wilson]

If I'm ever flying with non pilot friends I always brief them that they are an extra pair of eyes. People enjoy being given that bit of responsibility and I find that because your pax aren't distracted by anything else they tend to spot traffic before you. Always praise them if they do and give them a sweet.

The ones I hate the most are 'A/c on reciprocal heading. no height information' and you can't spot it, is he below me climbing, is he above me descending... always a worrier for me that one and an opener for interesting manouvres as I try to cover the blind spots.

[Pace]

The ones I hate the most are Gliders ! They tend to be white , slow moving and circle close to cloud bases.
They are also very unlikely to be transponding and do not stay at a constant altitudes

That is not against glider pilots but a natural concern over gliders and collision risk

Pace

[Jan Olieslagers]

And how many seconds before one of them turns up to say it is up to you to install flarm

[Dave Wilson]

Interesting Pace, I find them quite easy to spot unless they really are in that dead spot of colour/cloud combination but that can happen with any aircraft. I think it's because they nearly always offer a 'moving target' as it were rather than the constant aspect of most powered aircraft. Plus I flew them for 20 odd years so I guess I'm tuned into spotting them.

[PaulisHome]

The ones I hate the most are Gliders ! They tend to be white , slow moving and circle close to cloud bases.
They are also very unlikely to be transponding and do not stay at a constant altitudes

That is not against glider pilots but a natural concern over gliders and collision risk

That's not really what you should be worrying about. My understanding is that the collision risk is almost exclusively between aircraft of the same class - gliders tend to hit gliders, powered aircraft hit powered aircraft. I guess it's because the operating profiles are different, and collisions tend to happen where there's a high density (in the circuit, gliders in thermals and so on).

A quick search of the AAIB reports database, looking for the keyword "collision", shows about 9 power-power mid airs since 2000, and 3 glider-glider ones. There's only one power-glider, and that was the Tutor near Oxford a couple of years back.

Paul

[mary meagher]

Tutor power hit glider near Oxford

The glider was hit from behind, it was flying in a straight line at the time, as recorded on its datalogger. The power pilot in the Tutor was flying aerobatics in a very busy area, near Didcot, and furthermore was unable to perform a good lookout because of a physical condition that prevented turning his head....

The glider pilot was able to escape by parachute. The RAF investigated very thoroughly and so did the AAIB, read the reports if you need more detail.

[mary meagher]

Pace, couple of points arise in your comments regarding gliders.

The original poster will pick up the point that gliders are often found near cloudbase. In fact if conditions are good they may not even bother to be turning in the thermal, but dolphining along a cloud street. This variation in altitude actually does make them easier to spot, as does the fact they travel in gaggles....if you see one there may be more!

Any glider pilot flying in cloud is probably a professional pilot with the latest FLARM kit. I wonder if the fright you mention with a close call in cloud may have taken place some years ago...

But basically, the glider pilot is flying a craft with superb viz, and is very aware of keeping a good lookout, because they DO fly close to each other.

Though rules of the air require power to give way to gliders, no glider pilot in his right mind would expect the power pilot to have seen him first!

[FullWings]

An important point is that if people drone along on exactly the same track and don't change their height or speed, they're setting themselves up for a "fly on the windscreen" type incident, or worse. Especially if other pilots are doing the same thing plus the state of the windscreens on a lot of GA aircraft I've seen doesn't help...

I fly power aircraft and gliders and given their low frontal area, the density near launch sites or airspace funnels and the close proximity gliders routinely operate in, glider-on-glider events are comparatively rare, some of which is due to the reverse of the above effect. FLARM has extended the "lookout" to places you can't see, as well.

It's a shame that the laws of physics have conspired to make the most difficult target to spot the one that's most likely to hit you but that's how it is.