You are NEVER hooked in.

General discussion about the sport of hang gliding
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NMERider
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Joined: 2014/07/02 19:46:36 UTC

Re: You are NEVER hooked in.

Post by NMERider »

Tad Eareckson wrote: http://www.shga.com/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=5376
hook in faliure (almost)
Steve D - 2016/10/06 07:40:14 UTC
Jay Devorak - 2016/09/22 16:26:42 UTC

My normal procedure is to hook in my harness to the glider and then get into my harness. A new step was added to the procedure because my new radio PTT is hard wired and needs to be dealt with.
Have you considered adhering to the requirements of your proficiency rating, jdevorak?
Fuck no. He has a whole bunch of other bulletproof procedures to ensure that he's safely connected to his glider before he gets anywhere NEAR the ramp. (Cantchya READ?) And that could translate - depending factors like launch line length, potatoing, conditions, distractions - to five, ten, fifteen, thirty MINUTES prior to launch. Safety margins don't get much wider than that.

Why would any SANE person wanna give himself a false sense of security a couple seconds or less before commencing a launch run? :roll:
Discussing hook-in checks with hang glider pilots is like arguing about chain lube with cyclists or the advantages/disadvantages of helmet wearing. It's a fool's errand. :roll: :roll:
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TheFjordflier
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Re: You are NEVER hooked in.

Post by TheFjordflier »

Ha ha ha
This is so funny.
And I need to stop throwing myself off cliffs.
Because:
I don't use the "aussie method", I even walk around in my harness looking like an idiot.
I don't do any hang check.
I don't have any line not to cross before checking everything.
I don't have any "hooked in?" checklist mounted to the basebar.
And no "hook in" signs to view at my launches.
I must be in great danger ;)
Maybe I could get some advice?

http://vimeo.com/181376843


BTW. Seriously, the last hook-in check (lift and tug) just prior to launching is THE best tool I could ever have for my kind of flying.
And it should be for everyone else too.
Thanks for giving it to me :)
Dave Gills
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Joined: 2014/12/15 17:54:14 UTC

Re: You are NEVER hooked in.

Post by Dave Gills »

And it should be for everyone else too.
One of the best ever posts regarding hook-in check I have ever read.
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Tad Eareckson
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Joined: 2010/11/25 03:48:55 UTC

Re: You are NEVER hooked in.

Post by Tad Eareckson »

Discussing hook-in checks...
And we have the instructors, schools, u$hPa, Tim Herr to thank for that. Do (insert -whatever- here) so you can get onto the ramp 100.00 percent confident that any time you're on the ramp with a glider you're hooked into it. "You're not hooked in." "Fuck you. Clear."
I even walk around in my harness looking like an idiot.
You walk around in your harness looking like an idiot because you think it makes you look cool. Even in crap weather in the short window between drizzle cycles with no one else for miles around. You still want God to think you look cool.
Seriously, the last hook-in check (lift and tug) just prior to launching is THE best tool I could ever have...
Any foot launcher.
...for my kind of flying.
If the launches in California looked like the launches in Norway the fatality rate would be spectacular. EXCEPT for the ones that look like the launches in Norway...

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...which are too dangerous to approach...

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...hooked in.

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Dead man's line is on the ramp an inch in front of launch position.

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THE best tool I could ever have for my kind of flying.
Me too. After I was taught to hang check before I first ran a trainer off a dune and became aware of the unhooked launch issue I was sure I would die within two years if I continued in the sport. Then about six and a half months later when I was back at Kitty Hawk Kites teaching, another instructor (wish I could recall who) tipped me off and so much for idiot hang checks from then on.

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And it should be for everyone else too.
No. We really don't want the kinds of morons we see on the Grebloville forum thread that just reignited this discussion with better ideas remaining in the gene pool and continuing to influence others. If I had a magic wand everyone who omitted this procedure would be dead within the next five seconds. You can bet that would get things solidly on the right track after two or three weekends.
Thanks for giving it to me :)
Thanks for being one of the half dozen or so individuals to whom I've been able to get through and for producing these really excellent videos.
One of the best ever posts regarding hook-in check I have ever read.
I've always been fond of:

http://www.rmhpa.org/messageboard/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=4258
HG accident in Vancouver
Tom Galvin - 2012/10/31 22:17:21 UTC

I don't teach lift and tug, as it gives a false sense of security.
Haven't heard much from that total asshole on this issue subsequent to that post and his shitty little club banning me from its shitty little forum and deleting all of my posts.
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Tad Eareckson
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Re: You are NEVER hooked in.

Post by Tad Eareckson »

http://www.shga.com/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=5376
hook in faliure (almost)
Lisa Wendt - 2016/10/06 20:22:53 UTC
Chatsworth, California

There's nothing like a visual. Turn around and look to see if you're hooked in. I do it on launch all the time.
Oh good. A female Grebloville dickhead incapable of:
- completing her preflight before getting to the downwind end of the runway
- understanding the difference between a preflight and hook-in check
- adhering to any semblance of u$hPa's most fundamental and critical safety regulation
- recognizing any risk involved in repeatedly setting down and picking up a glider at launch position
- having any consideration for people with their shit together in line behind her

Any relation to...

http://www.chgpa.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1166
Thoughts on responsibility...
Scott Wilkinson - 2005/10/05 14:10:56 UTC

We visited Steve Wendt yesterday, who was visibly choked up over Bill's death. For Steve, it all comes down to one thing: you've got to hook in. Period.
...Steve? Hard to beat his take on the issue - try as one might.
Also, my good friend J Shelly used to tell me, "Never refuse a hang check."
And fuck your dickheaded friends too.
I understand pilots are in the moment when they are walking to launch but one more check doesn't hurt.
Luen Miller - 1994/11

After a short flight the pilot carried his glider back up a slope to relaunch. The wind was "about ten miles per hour or so, blowing straight in." Just before launch he reached back to make sure his carabiner was locked. A "crosswind" blew through, his right wing lifted, and before he was able to react he was gusted sixty feet to the left side of launch into a pile of "nasty-looking rocks." He suffered a compound fracture (bone sticking out through the skin) of his upper right leg. "Rookie mistake cost me my job and my summer. I have a lot of medical bills and will be on crutches for about five months."
As someone who has been on pilots' nose wires when they did their hang check, I was frequently asked, "How does everything look?" by the pilot--who was looking down.
1. Pilots hanging prone and looking down. What assholes.
2. Name some of the issues you and the "pilot" have discovered in the courses of those exercises.
My response was, "Think it looks fine but you may want to look for yourself."
What if they connected their harnesses to their gliders first, preflighted, then suited up? And/or did walk-throughs subsequent to connection and checked suspension?
Best not to rely on others' eyeballs.
No. One should always rely in his own...
Jay Devorak - 2016/09/22 16:26:42 UTC

I remember looking at my hang strap and back up. I remember screwing my carbineer closed.
...the way Jay did sometime before moving to the ramp and getting in an extended argument with Andy about whether or not he was hooked in.
There is no ONE solution--ALL are wonderful.
Spoken with such authority by yet another Grebloville product with her head a couple feet up her ass.

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=25550
Failure to hook in.
Steve Davy - 2011/10/24 10:27:04 UTC

OK- how many times does he need confirm that he is hooked in? And when would be the best time to make that confirmation?
Brian McMahon - 2011/10/24 21:04:17 UTC

Once, just prior to launch.
Christian Williams - 2011/10/25 03:59:58 UTC

I agree with that statement.

What's more, I believe that all hooked-in checks prior to the last one before takeoff are a waste of time, not to say dangerous, because they build a sense of security which should not be built more than one instant before commitment to flight.
Boy do we need another nice definitive kill - preferably in Southern California - to liven up the conversation a bit. Most of the launches out there are WAY...

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...too survivable.;

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Steve Davy
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Re: You are NEVER hooked in.

Post by Steve Davy »

Boy do we need another nice definitive kill...
That would lead to more idiots doing a bunch more hang checks, and a few more idiots hooking their harnesses onto their main and backup loops, and thus assuming that they are hooked into their gliders, just prior to launch.
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Tad Eareckson
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Re: You are NEVER hooked in.

Post by Tad Eareckson »

http://www.shga.com/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=5376
hook in faliure (almost)
Steve D - 2016/10/08 07:51:34 UTC

I suspect that Kunio Yoshimura's fatherless kids would disagree with ALL are wonderful solutions.
He - and his idiot fucking club - just didn't implement ENOUGH...

http://www.chgpa.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1167
The way it outa be
Steve Kinsley - 2005/10/04 14:04:25 UTC

One last attempt.

We have now rounded up all the usual suspects and promised renewed vigilance, nine page checklists, hang checks every six feet, et cetera. Bob Gillisse redux.

A hang check is part of preflighting your equipment. You do it in the setup area - not on the launch or the ramp. When you get in line you are hooked in and ready to go. No going down for a hang check cum hook in check.
...wonderful solutions.

The Sylmar Safety Committee - once it gets finished with selecting a Safety Mascot - needs to sit down with Joe Greblo and add some more Cs to the list.

ONE...

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...crappy little award winning DeWeese Brick on the approach to launch? Let's pave the entire approach and launch with award winning DeWeese Bricks! A wonderful solution times A THOUSAND! How could something like that POSSIBLY FAIL?

Build a two foot high wall with them at the Greg Kendall Dead Man's Line that you'd hafta step over on the way to launch. Give me a shadow of ghost of a reason why a wonderful solution of that magnitude wouldn't be ten thousand times more effective a wonderful solution than the single DeWeese Brick that Jay stepped over on his way to his argument with Andy about whether or not he was hooked in.

The one brick wonderful solution was zero percent effective on the hook in faliure (almost) incident day. Multiply that zero by ten thousand and you've got a pretty bulletproof wonderful solution.

Also... Institute a training program for crewmen to enable them to argue more effectively with unhooked pilots at launch position. That last one was a bit of a nail-biter.

And in this vein...

http://www.shga.com/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=5376
hook in faliure (almost)
Jay Devorak - 2016/09/22 16:26:42 UTC

I remember looking at my hang strap and back up.
One backup is a wonderful solution for a main failure. Shouldn't we have a backup for the backup?

http://www.chgpa.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1079
$15 pacifiers
Jim Rooney - 2005/09/20 13:11:43 UTC

Sorry, I don't see the logic in trying to save a couple bucks on equipment that I am litterally entrusting my life to. "Pacifier"? may be... but there's an old saying out there... "You never need the backup, until you need the backup".

I know of at least one pilot out there that flies with two caribiners. His logic makes more sense to me... you can't have too many backups.
AT LEAST? Wouldn't Jay have remembered seeing his main plus two or three backups a lot better than he did just the regular glider suspension?

C'mon people. ALL solutions are wonderful - and we haven't even scratched the surface. As long as we don't start doing hook-in checks which give pilots false senses of security at the worst possible moment there's virtually no way we can go wrong with the Lisa Exceptionally-Knowledgeable Wendt Wonderful Solutions Strategy.
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TheFjordflier
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Re: You are NEVER hooked in.

Post by TheFjordflier »

...which are too dangerous to approach hooked in.
That could go both ways.
If my glider were to fall of the edge, I sure wouldn't want to follow it.
On the other hand, if I were to stumble or fall off the edge, I'm 100% sure
I wish I was connected to the same glider ;)
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Tad Eareckson
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Re: You are NEVER hooked in.

Post by Tad Eareckson »

You'd still have your parachute.

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You'd just be participating in a sport different from the one you'd intended. (And maybe need to use sonar...

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...to find your glider.)
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TheFjordflier
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Re: You are NEVER hooked in.

Post by TheFjordflier »

Valid points.
And talking of BASE jumping. These people also do (not all of them) a final, last check before jumping off.
Moving the right arm backward, to locate and feel the release mechanism for the pilot chute.
There is no time to fumble, or try to locate it when the ground is approaching fast.
They need to know its exact position.
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