I believe that the Italian team and Alex Ploner deserved to win
the 2009 World Championships

We are staying with Scott Barrett and Monica in Belmont North near
Newcastle (Australia) for a few days and we were discussing
telemetrics in the
evening of my first day here. He stated that he had earlier been interested in
developing a telemetric system for hang gliding, but when he consulted with Paul
Mollison, who works nearby at
Airborne, and who wrote parts of the
CIVL Sporting Code, he found out that Paul had written the rules to
specifically disallow telemetric systems. Scott therefore stopped thinking about
how to develop such a system.

Here is the section of the CIVL sporting code that is relevant to telemetrics:

"2. 19.2 Radio

When radio transmitters are permitted in the local regulations one transmitter
is permitted in each competing glider,..."

In early November of 2009 I received an email from Flavio Tebaldi,
the Italian team leader and organizer of the 2011 World Championships, with
attachments that highlighted the
DSX telemetry system
for hang gliding. I published an
article about the
system in the Oz Report.

Before I published the article I asked Flavio a series of questions about the
DSX system. He wrote back on November 5th at 3:41 PM:

"During last world championship in Laragne my team used five of
these prototypes and I was able to follow my pilots on my netbook in real time.
Safly helped us to win significantly, especially for tactics."

I didn't think any more about this (other than wonder how this
would all play out in the future if we adopted these systems). But, after
discussing this issue with Scott, I went back to look at this email from Flavio,
especially after Scott stated that if he had known that the Italians were using
this system at the time he would have registered a protest. Flavio's statement
here is pretty strong and if true is in direct violation of the CIVL Sporting
Code for Category 1 competitions, like the Worlds.

I wrote to Flavio again that evening asking him how he squared his statement
above with the rule quoted above. He wrote back quickly:

"Unfortunately we couldn't use DSX system as we would because
Vodafone didn't activate the special offer for data communication in France. The
result was that the four instruments we had, stopped to work the day before the
competition started... :-(

Over the next few days I tried many times to call Vodafone in Italy to
reactivate the offer, but finally I was able to only follow one pilot on the
last competition task (Christian). For sure it was very useful to follow
Christian's movements on my netbook and to know where he was respect to the
other pilots that were following him some kilometers behind."

I have slightly edited Flavio's responses to correct errors in his
English. This is a much different statement of what went on at the 2009 Worlds
than his previous version. What was going on?

After receiving this post from Flavio I asked him right away if CIVL is going to
change its rules to allow for a telemetric system. He wrote back that evening:

I hope they can change the rules at the next 2011 plenary, to use
the system in the Worlds. For sure this year we will try to use it with a couple
of pilots to test the system.

From Flavio's responses it seems to be the case that in fact at
least Christian was carrying a second transmitter and transmitting with it on
the last day of the 2009 Worlds in violation of the CIVL Sporting Code. Flavio's
November 5th response indicates that all Italian pilots on the five member team
were carrying second transmitters and transmitting on them in violation of the
CIVL Sporting Code (if they carried a standard 2 meter radio for voice
communication).

Flavio's last statement (and his earlier response) indicates pretty clearly that
he knows that the use of these instruments is in violation of the CIVL Sporting
Code (if the pilot also has a standard 2 meter radio that he is transmitting on
using voice communications). It is also the case that he and the Italian team at
least intended to use the Safly transmitters during the 2009 Worlds. Just to be
clear, a cell phone or a satellite phone is a radio.

I don't believe that the section of the CIVL Sporting Code above would be
interpreted to disallow pilots from carrying cell phones that were turned off
and essentially inaccessible in the air. But that it would be interpreted
(especially as it was written with this purpose in mind) to disallow telemetry
systems as were apparently being used by the Italians at the 2009 Worlds, unless
they were the only radio transmitters carried by the pilots.

The local regulations of the 2009 Worlds state:

5. 1 RADIOS & MOBILE PHONES:

A 2m, VHF (widebanded: 140 to 144MHz) radio transceiver compatible with the
competition frequency and able to receive and transmit on the FFVL frequency,
143.9875MHz is mandatory. Team leaders must be able to monitor the competition
frequency during tasks as must pilots without a team leader. Radios are for
communication between competitors, team leaders, drivers and the organisers.
Only frequencies in the range allocated by the organisers may be used.
Information on the competition radio frequency and the range allocated for pilot
use will be available at registration. All pilots and crews MUST submit their
team frequencies and mobile telephone numbers at registration. This information
will be used by the competition and/or safety directors for safety purposes.
(2.19.2)

As 2 meter radios were required to be carried by the competitors,
this would rule out the use of a telemetry system at the 2009 Worlds.

What am I missing here?

Upon further questioning I got the following from Flavio the next day:

Christian used it only on one flight and I decided to give to him
the only working tracker for safety reasons because his radio was discharged.
No, the system didn't work in real time (very bad French cellular net). There
was a long delay (about 15/20 minutes), was impossible to collect any vocal
information in the same time with Christian track.

Which edition of Flavio am I to believe?