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Glider conversion in the Alps:

While I had enjoyed sailplane rides a few times around Montreal, I never had taken the time to engage myself in this extremely social activity. Vacations in France finally allowed me to fulfill this dream, beyond all expectations.

A day on a Glider base:

Soaring is an activity where each participant puts himself both socially and physically to the service of the community.

The day begins with a briefing, just as we see in old war movies (the resemblance is particularly striking considering that the audience counts many nationalities aside from the French minority : Dutch, English, Swiss, but especially Germans, some of whom have certainly flown during the Second World War). An animator outlines the events of the previous day, difficulties and suggestions to improve security. Then the NOTAMs follow, as well a as a comprehensive presentation of the weather and gliding condition. In this regard, I was extremely impressed by the quality of weather tools available, including weather tools specific to gliding. I do not know if the same information is available to glider pilots in Canada but the content seems to be light years ahead of what we have in America, in terms of general aviation. The briefings are conducted in French with simultaneous translation in German or English.

After the sailplanes distribution, everyone helps out pulling gliders and tow planes out of the hangars. Although pulling the gliders out requires less skill than their settling in, the operation must be carried out under the supervision of an experienced person. Out of the hangars, the gliders are fitted with batteries and parachutes, and then taken close to runway threshold.

Once on the field, everyone spontaneously assumes the tasks necessary for the proper operation of the community: Holding the wing during the early phase of tow, picking up the lines dropped by the tow planes prior to their landing, recovery of gliders as they land and stop out of the way along the runway (their recovery generally involve the use of really beaten 4x4 clunkers).

As the evening sets in, the pilots wash the planes, store the parachutes away and gather all batteries for an overnight charge. The gliders are then inexorably stacked in the hangars (to an unbelievable level of aircraft density, hence the need for intense and expert supervision). In August, the day ends toward 20:30. There is a restaurant right on the field which offers excellent meals. Many will eat right at the restaurant while others will just join their family on the campground right behind the restaurant.

Photo by Anne Fonteneau

Gliders:

Each more beautiful than the one sitting next to it, those enchanted creations are equipped with sophisticated instruments that we do not commonly encounter in our aircrafts:

• FLARM: That is an active collision avoidance system whereby each so equipped aircraft (tow planes are also equipped with this system) continuously and automatically exchange their 3D GPS position with the others similarly equipped aircrafts. This system does not rely nor does it make any use of transponders replies. An onboard computer analyses the position and tracking of all the nearby traffic and displays traffic alerts on a simple display: one of a dozen LEDs arranged in a circle displays the approximate azimuth of other glider as well as their respective altitude (higher, lower, same altitude). A beep whose length is proportional to the collision risk alerts you of the most critical traffic. If the system continually whistles to warn you that a glider coming straight at you at the same altitude, it may be advantageous to drastically change course, if only to allow the pilot of the upcoming glider to see you, hopefully before you get acquainted in a more spiritual manner.
  
  
• A second difference in equipment is a GPS flight computer. I can picture yourself thinking that your Garmin does everything you need but those GPS are really different and bear more resemblance to air data computer as found on airliners: Equipped with an electronic compass (your GPS only deduct your true course and knows nothing of your magnetic heading) as well as connections to the pitot and static ports, the calculator instantly and continually displays the wind strength and direction. Useful for gliders, that information would also prove helpful in our airplanes, to optimize our cruising altitudes, saving time and gasoline in the process.
  
  
• Last is that simple thread of wool, held on the windshield by a piece of transparent tape : This most sensitive thread, is used to ensure that the flight is well coordinated ( "conjugated" in French) without having to look at the "ball". It is also much more sensitive than the classical instrument. Interpreted in the forward direction, it points to the one rudder pedal that would like to see more action from your foot. It is unfortunate that such a low tech device could not work while subjected to the prop-wash (you "pusher" flyers may want to try this, provided the middle of the windshield is not occupied by some aluminum post).

Traffic:

The gliders are equipped with batteries for radio and accessories but are rarely equipped with strobes. Also, just looking at the front profile of a glider, you immediately notice how thin this profile really is, which obviously reduces your chances of seeing it coming upon you, especially if it sits exactly at the limit between the sky and the mountains that surround the Sisteron Valley. Since all gliders are not equipped with collision avoidance system and that in any case, this system is not perfect, extreme and permanent vigilance is the price to pay in order to fly in one of the most beautiful and busiest region of the world. This being said, the risk of collision exists everywhere, as evidenced by the collisions that have occurred in Quebec. Except in special cases, the gliders do not benefit from being tracked by radar, under the wing of a watchful controller. Thus, at any time, your safety is up to your vigilance and that of fellow glider pilots who shares the same air space. As on a two-lane road, lack of vigilance of a single person just half a second, is enough to get you suddenly soaring forever.

Instructors:

An impressive team of well-coloured unconditional fans that tirelessly fly with students. An exciting but very demanding profession. A real ability to cope with the bizarre reflexes of an aircraft trained student glider pilot.

Tristan: Chief Pilot, friendly and calm as can be, Tristan was, during my first and last flight, able to raise my qualities as well as difficulties in the most pedagogic way. A real ability to allow the student to develop himself without excessive confidence.

Christian: German part-time instructor, Christian naturally encourages you to improve yourself when he says, with touching delicacy and profound sincerity: "Pierre, I am sorry but yhour whool yarn ist not centhered" or, after my particularly pathetic landing: "Pierre, by the hend, your spirals where nhot soo bhad, bhut your lhanding, I ham sorry to say, vas sheet". Faced with such compassion, you can only improve in order to avoid disappointing your instructor on the next flight.

In flight for an hour, Christian had mentioned that it is generally suggested that students limit their flights to an hour. Presumptuous, I remained unmoved by the implied suggestion. Glider training is very demanding and beyond an hour, a certain fatigue may adversely affect the landing performance of the student : You'll be warned!

Jean-Pierre: Absolute and undisputed master of the manoeuvres and manipulations of gliders in the hangars, we can easily imagine Jean-Pierre as the captain of a parachutists commando (indeed, we are all equipped with parachutes!). Man of heart, lively ''communication'' is characteristic of Jean-Pierre : Like other instructors, Jean-Pierre will not let any goofing go un-noticed but let say that his way of letting you know is particular ! And then, once in a life, one must hear Jean-Pierre do the morning briefing in English - a most enjoyable moment!

Again on storing gliders: The smooth integration of a dozen assembled gliders in a hangar where I would barely store two planes is almost miraculous. I am left speechless at the incredible entanglement of wings, fuselages and tails. Incredible space optimization !

Rene: I had a single flight with René and was glad to benefit from the smooth tone of experience. Prior to that flight, I have had the chance to witness his diplomatic skills, calming a horde of grumpy old pilots during a briefing where an unsafe behaviour had been noted among one of them the previous day. Unanimous applause was the response to his intervention that had restored peace between nations

Remi: I have not had the pleasure of flying with Remi, but I witnessed his animation of a morning briefing. Another communicator whose smile reflects a love of gliding!

Students:

At 47, I was certainly the dean of student pilots. My comrades were mostly 14, 15 or 16 years old. Many have soloed on their fifteenth birthday and most are preparing to get their license on the day of their 16th! In this regard, the glider is a wonderful school which fosters maturity for the young guys and gals that have the chance to attend. The French government plays an active role and the activity is heavily subsidized for those under 25 years. Wonderful initiative: The flying club has assembled a glider right in the yard of a local school, in order to attract young people who can only fall in love with a beautiful glider. In Quebec, to promote aviation, aside from formal or informal Young Eagle Flights, we offer hot dogs to old confirmed pilot, or some guy will celebrate on the speakers, during an informal air meeting, ''the extraordinary ability demonstrated by Mr. Doe, mastering his Cessna 172 in straight flight at 1000 feet above the Lac à la Tortue" ...

Photo by Anne Fonteneau

Fellow pilots :

The camaraderie on the field is a most enjoyable part of the stay at the aerodrome: I have had the privilege of exchanging flight experiences with the younger students but also, with the many very experienced pilots such as Christophe, René, Jean...

Jean, a French aeronautical engineering and occasional French-German interpreter for some of the briefings, explained why slips are no longer taught in France. Unlike most aircraft, a glider has a very slick profile, even while slipping. Thus even with commands against their stops, the glider can easily exceed the manoeuvring speed or even, the VNE, with possible consequences one can imagine ... On the other hand, with the wingspan of a 737, failure to emerge from a prolonged side slip upon landing could prove just as annoying. Since then, I have read in the pilot's manual of an LS4 glider that side slips are actually completely forbidden for this specific glider, as wind flow would interfere with the effectiveness of the rudder (and not of the elevator if my memory serves me right!).

Another pilot allowed me to share a remarkable flight: Imagine a 4 hour and 25 minute 250 km loop during which we flew over a glacier (Glacier Blanc) surrounded by dark and very sharp peaks. Such a flight is nothing exceptional in the region, but still requires extensive mountain flying experience and the ability to exploit what the weather has to offer. (A glider pilot is sharing a similar portion of this flight on YouTube - check "Glisse sur le glacier blanc").

Tow plane pilots :

Hadrian (paragliding, glider and aircraft) and Barth have both been trained in Quebec. Two aviation lovers who work with the instructors to peacefully raise us in heaven. As of 2009, those two had moved on and a new crew (Alex and Martin) have since taken command of the tow planes.

Differences for the aircraft pilots :

I've never been comfortable with the concept of good pilot / bad pilot, beyond the pilot who happens to live long. Therefore, I do not believe that one could establish a hierarchy between the glider and the airplane pilot. In my case, the two activities develop reflexes and knowledge that are different altogether. A few of those differences are as follow:

Controls: The stick poses no particular difficulty in relation to the "handlebars" of the Cessna. I would say that the adjustment is instantaneous. However, in a glider it is the right hand that holds the stick and the left hand that controls the speed brakes (which can be imperfectly assimilated to the throttle). Control wise, landing in a glider is somewhat equivalent to landing on soft ground from the right seat of the Cessna (soft field because your engine is then still developing power, the equivalent to having the speed brakes only partially deployed). Since it is not always easy to read the anemometer (the Badin in France) from the right seat, and controlling the plane with the right hand can be a little disconcerting for someone who has always flown with his left hand, it is not necessarily a good idea to prepare yourself this way. Just as I did, your left hand could be wrongfully tempted to "cut the throttle" (full extension of the speed brakes) over the fence...

The use of the rudders is almost opposite to their use on a tail dragger like a Cessna 120 or 140 and quite differently from their use in a tricycle aircraft. Indeed, on a tail wheeled aircraft, one may need to work the rudder with brisk movements of large amplitude during takeoff whereas in a glider, those movements remain of very small amplitude during takeoff. In flight, it is the opposite: Most modern general aviation airplanes are usually flown with very modest input on the rudders while in a glider, the rudder pedals movement are really very important, not to say extreme, as we shall see later.

Takeoff: While being towed, my main challenge was to completely "de couple" ailerons from the rudder: The ailerons are mainly used to replicate, in the glider, the inclination of the tow plane in front of you. The pedals are only used to manage the glider yaw in order to point the glider nose on the tail of the plane or on the tip of the tow plane's outside wing during a turn. There is absolutely no coordination between rudder and ailerons, unless you get into an uncomfortable position from which you will have to recover. With the elevator, we try to keep our glider slightly above the tow plane to keep out the propeller blast from the tow plane. Upon take off in a crosswind, one simply establishes the glider in a crab behind the tow plane, until the tow plane itself leaves the ground (the glider takes off first). Once the two aircrafts are air born, crab is no longer required since they are both moving through the same air mass.

Once freed from the tow line, the coordination of any turn requires a lot of rudder in order to overcome adverse yaw from the ailerons. Actually, the initiation of a turn may begin with a strong input on the rudder, slightly preceding the use of the ailerons. The yaw on a glider is important due to the enormous wing span, as well as to the ailerons that are optimised for performance: On a Cessna, the aileron of the wing which you chose to lower (natural reduction of the drag of that wing) is actually designed to nonetheless generate some drag, thus limiting the adverse yaw. On a glider, performance is foremost and it is the pilot who must adapt himself to the plane. Actually, initiating a strong rudder movement will produce an induced roll which will supports the initiation of the turn (the outside wing, accelerated by the yaw, will be raised).

According to the weather, one goes in search of thermal or moves from one slope to another, enjoying the wind projected upward by the terrain. My companion Anne, who went for a flight initiation, came back delighted: She had particularly enjoyed the spectacular scenery of the flight conducted on the slopes, really close to the landscape. However, the spirals are much tighter than my usual low-angle turns and she did not care so much for those parts of the flight.

Photo by René Grenier

The approach and landing: Entering the circuit is preceded by the loss of excessive altitude over a designated area, which also helps regulate the traffic of gliders returning for landing. At mid-downwind, approximately 1000 'above the airfield elevation, the landing gear is lowered, locked and verified, (important to visually check, for the noise obtained before full locking may suggest that the train is locked when in fact, it is not (thanks Tristan !). In base, I was taught to leave the speed brakes half out, which normally gives a proper slope and flare (seated flush to the daisies, the flare is much lower and less "dramatic" than in an airplane). As mentioned earlier, new reflexes are involved in the management of the airbrakes. In normal condition, they will be gradually deployed to their fullest position upon touchdown, allowing access to the wheel brake (the brake on the wheel is accessible through the very end course of the airbrake lever, all the way back). For a strong crosswind, we must increase the speed on a shorter circuit, which means fully extending the airbrakes during the final, in order to retain a proper approach slope. They are subsequently withdrawn at half before landing, and finally, gradually and completely redeployed for rolling out of the runway. It may not sound like much, but for my left hand with 900 hours of aircraft flying holding the stick, handling of the speed brakes proved quite difficult. Having completed my first stay, with 7 hour of flight time in a glider, this inversion of the role of hands relative to the aircraft remained my main concern in landing the sailplane. I had planned on sitting down in a glider, eyes closed, imagining scenarios to indoctrinate my left hand to those entirely new reflexes. I ended up doing just that before my first flight the following year and it worked perfectly. I would suggest this strategy to anyone contemplating such a licence conversion.

Having obtained my glider licence, I am now ready to continue to acquire the experience and skills required to operate in this exquisitely mountainous environment: It is quite common for the experience pilots to complete 7 or 8 hours loops from Sisteron to the Mont Blanc or Cervin (Matterhorn) and back. Of course, it becomes also important to become really familiar with the local toponomy for every piece of terrain has a name (and quite often a piece of local history). A map is helpful but flying a glider in a busy environment does not allow much time for looking at a map, aside from the fact that you are flying such distances that map change becomes necessary. Next time, I think I will bring my Garmin (if I can get hold of the European database). Speaking of GPS, a Belgian glider pilot (Jeremy) was using a program to review his flights: Having downloaded on his laptop the flight recorded by his GPS, he could see his whole flight (including spirals) with, in the background, the scenery that was displayed in a 3D perspective. One can readily observe the effect of lift on slope as the glider is seen rise along the real terrain synthesized in the background. The glider pilots share their flights through Internet, thus providing insights into the strategies adopted by the experienced pilots to conduct absolutely fantastic flights.

Additional comment on the conversion: I obtained my French glider pilot licence at the end of the second stay. It might have been possible to do it during an extended single stay but this would have required some preparation as well as advanced planning. In any case, learning to fly gliders remains my primary objective and there is a lot of territory to be covered, in every sense of the word!

I have covered here a few basic differences that a powered plane pilot must get acquainted with, ideally before getting into a glider. Again, simulating the various landing configuration while sitting in a glider with my eyes closed proved extremely helpful to develop some of the new reflexes mentioned above. Additionally, the aéroclub now has a nice flight simulator that would probably have helped (had I been able to gain access to the key!). Also new is a motor glider which is an interesting training instrument. My holding of a private pilot licence allowed me to get the glider licence without the written exam. As such, there was some ambivalence about my need to purchase and study the Glider Pilot Flight Manual. Finally, I ended up purchasing that manual on the eve of my flight test and found out that I really should have gone through it much earlier! This soaring flight manual covers many aspects that are just not part of a powered plane pilot licence curriculum (getting back on track if drifting too high behind the tow plane, integration already busy thermals, use of an airspeed accessory, flight autonomy calculation, …) If you already have a powered plane pilot licence, I would strongly urge you to read through such a glider flight training manual prior to undertaking the conversion.

As a conclusion, I remember that as a child watching TV, I was fascinated by a documentary on the albatross. Notwithstanding my eventual reincarnation in such a bird, I have already lived the dream, flying over our beautiful Earth in its own way: What a great privilege!

Sincere thanks to everyone on the airfield Vaumeilh-Sisteron: Those two stays are unforgettable - See you soon !

There are gliding clubs throughout the French territory. See the Fédération Française de Vol à Voile. As for the site of the aéroclub de Vaumeilh-Sisteron, googling "aeroclub sisteron" should bring you halfway there.

Pierre Leduc © 2010 - You have my permission to broadcast this article, along with the copyright notice, to any fellow pilot or aspiring pilot. Any comments are welcomed at leduc_pierre@hotmail.com (please note the underscore between leduc and pierre and be sure to include a reference to soaring in any email title)