Location and Position Reporting

When you look down and ahead to your left, you see a lake; you are not over it yet. However, when pilots call on the radio, they claim they are over it. The lack of position knowledge leads to some confusion, especially when it is a radio call when entering the pattern. Based on experience at uncontrolled airports, saying ‘entering the 45’ narrows your position down to about five sq miles, which doesn’t help anyone else, because on paper it should be a pretty small area.

One of my favorite interactions on the Unicom was (I will change the call signs to protect the pilots):

“Warner Springs Traffic glider XX over Goose Lake at 4100ft entering the pattern Warner Springs traffic.”

“XX I am over Goose Lake at 4000ft I don’t see you, do you see me” in a panicked voice

“Oh, I’m still about a mile away.”

If you are going to use the radio for position reporting, you need to make sure you are accurately reporting your position. Saying you are ‘one mile southwest of Goose Lake’ would be just as easy on the radio and slightly more accurate if someone else is out there. That someone else is out there is the reason we are talking on the radio.

If you don't know where you are, this leads to problems for the pilot entering the pattern and trying to enter at the appropriate height. When you are over something that generally means it is directly underneath you, which you cannot see. So if you are using a landmark, you shouldn’t be able to see it. If you are trying to get there at a certain altitude, you have to account for the altitude loss from the point you are over until you are overhead of that point.

Flying in a Crab

 Imagine you are on downwind with a crosswind that is blowing you toward the airport. To maintain proper alignment, you have to crab away from the airport. If you are looking at 90 degrees from the glider, you will be looking ahead of where you are abeam. You need to be looking perpendicular to the runway. This throws a lot of students off.

The crab becomes more of a visual error when the student got too close to the airport and is not only crabbing but trying to work back away from the airport to a proper downwind. I notice students saying they are abeam the landing area while they are still a few 1000ft away. Potentially leading to a few hundred feet of error in altitude from where they think they should be.

Outside of the pattern

 Turnpoints

With everyone posting on the OLC, you can see where pilots are actually turning, like the fishing story. "I turned Jacumba today" when, in fact, their GPS trace shows they turned five miles short of Jacumba, flying ten fewer miles. Once you add a few more turnpoints in there, the flight just got a significant amount shorter.

Those of us that raced with cameras know what it was really like getting over the target. It would disappear, and you might have to lower a wing and strain your neck to look down. Then hope you went far enough and pull up and turn, hoping your point was off your wingtip. I only raced one contest with a camera; they were being phased out when I started racing. I did, however, do my badge flights with a camera. We still have the declaration forms hanging in the instructor's office.

Position reporting

When you are flying with someone, and you are trying to meet up or share information. You have to be doing a good job reporting your actual position. When you look down at a 45-degree angle to the north edge of the city, and you tell your buddy, you are over the city. He might be looking at the cloud over the city and head for that expecting to find you there. FLARM has really been a game-changer on finding those that are geographically challenged.

Banner Photo by Mam'zailes SoFi

 Garret Willat holds a flight instructor rating with over 8000 hours in sailplanes. His parents have owned Sky Sailing Inc. since 1979. He started instructing the day after his 18th birthday. Since then, Garret has represented the US Junior team in 2003 and 2005. He graduated from Embry-Riddle with a bachelor's degree in Professional Aeronautics. Garret represented the US Open Class team in 2008 and 2010 and the Club Class team in 2014. Garret has won 3 US National Championships.