Bill Arras <<billarras>>
writes:

After returning to Bend, in the space of 10 days I had a string of
aviation near disasters, unlike anything I've ever before experienced. Two were
with the hang glider and two with the ultralight motor-glider.

The first incident was a flight on my new-to-me used hang glider, which I was
assured was in excellent condition, with nothing wrong with it. After inspecting
it, I took off from Pine Mountain. At first I thought something was unusual
about the air, before eventually realizing something was wrong with the glider.
It had a severe left turn. It took enormous strength to force the glider to fly
straight or to turn properly. It's now weeks later and my right shoulder is
still sore from the flight. My biggest concern during the flight was whether or
not it would be possible to land the glider safely, so I flew until the air
mellowed out and had a fine landing. The next day, I phoned the former owner to
ask if he knew about the turn. He said he did and he had adjusted the wingtip,
The problem was, he made the adjustment in the wrong direction, which made the
turn significantly worse!

The next close call was during a fantastic thermal flight. I took off from Bend
Airport in the motor-glider, climbed until I found a thermal and then turned off
the engine. With the engine off, the motor-glider flies the same as a hang
glider. The lift that day was fairly good, big and smooth, but not so plentiful.
Every now & then I got low, then turned on the engine until another thermal was
found. About two hours into the flight I was low again, so I flipped the switch
on and pressed the start button, but nothing happened. My position was low over
the edge of the forest on the west side of Bend, 10 miles from the airport, with
nowhere suitable to land out. It looked likely I would have to pick a place to
make a controlled crash landing. The bottom line is I stayed cool and used all
my skills -and all my luck- and was fortunate enough to encounter a couple
thermals and make it back up to cloudbase, then make my way back to the airport.
The problem turned out to be a broken ground wire to the starter.

After repairing the wire and doing a thorough check of the aircraft, the very
next morning I took off at sunrise and headed towards the mountains. After less
than an hour in the air, the engine stopped abruptly and wouldn't re-start.
Normally it starts very easily and never quits, so this wasn't good!
Fortunately, I had been climbing since taking off, but there was a headwind to
get back to the airport. I was happy to make it there with almost 2000' to
spare, then made my second dead-stick landing in as many days. The problem this
time was a spark plug wire, which had amazingly become detached in the air. That
will never happen again.

The fourth incident was with the hang glider. While Scott and Charlie finished
setting up their gliders, I carried mine to launch and was waiting there for the
right launch conditions. All of a sudden I heard the unmistakable sound of a
dust-devil and saw the grass churning about 30' directly in front of me. The
dust-devil moved straight towards me, while I made myself as heavy as
possible... If anyone had seen what happened next, it would have looked like
surreal ballet. The dust-devil picked up the glider, with me still attached to
it and hanging on for dear life. It gently stood the glider on its nose, spun it
180°, then set the glider and me gently back down on the ground- upside down!
Scott and Charlie came to my rescue. The only damage was a few small tears in
the top of the sail from sharp stones. They were easily repaired, so I was able
to take off and enjoy a beautiful flight.

The photos at the first link below are from a flight made with the motor-glider
on the morning after the two previous episodes with engine failure. Although I
didn't really feel like I was getting back in the saddle again, the flight did
instill confidence, as the engine worked properly for the entire flight,
something I really like. The maximum altitude during this flight on June 5th was
18,000'.

Here's the link to photos from the 18,000' flight:
https://balloonbill.smugmug.com/Other/High-As-A-Kite-June-5-2016/

The gallery at this link has a photos from a South Sister climb:
https://balloonbill.smugmug.com/Other/First-South-Sister-Climb-in/

Here's another gallery from another hike last week:
https://balloonbill.smugmug.com/Other/A-Walk-In-The-Park-June-16/

And lastly, these photos are from a sunrise flight yesterday:
https://balloonbill.smugmug.com/Other/Continuing-Aerial-Adventures/