Glider Falls Out of Deceptive Sky - Will I Make It Home?

A glider pilot fails to recognize a change in soaring conditions and drops out of the lift band until he's left struggling at low altitudes to get back to the home airfield - will he make it back home?

The video includes in-depth commentary and analysis illustrating the lessons learned: (1) Outstanding lift lines made me complacent such that I did not recognize that the conditions ahead were fundamentally different from the conditions behind. - My only defense is that the clouds did look deceiving... (2) By the time I recognized the mistake I was already too low to make it back to the buoyant airmass and had to contend with a powerful inversion layer that suppressed thermal development and dramatically capped the attainable soaring heights. (3) Shifting from cloud-based thermal searching to ground-based thermal searching (as the altitude drops) is an interesting process with no simple, overriding guide posts - you have to take in any clues that exist in the sky and on the ground. - I think I was at times conflicted and unsure which clues to prioritize. There's no easy answer but clear decisions are needed. (4) Knowing and managing Plan B and Plan C are critical while you are still focused on executing Plan A - all Plans: A, B, and C are changing continuously and require attention, situational awareness, and clear decision points - I think I did this well. (5) Exploiting very weak lift requires focus and precision-flying: it is quite tiring - especially mentally - but I think I did ok. (6) Persistence and perseverance are key. Never give up!

The glider is a Ventus 2cxT high performance sailplane rom Schempp-Hirth with a wing span of 18 meters. I flew without water ballast that day.

The flight was on June 5, 2020. The flight trace is here: https://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-3.0/gliding/flightinfo.html?dsId=7839592
If you seek to align the flight trace with the video, the video starts at 19:42 UTC.

Видео Glider Falls Out of Deceptive Sky - Will I Make It Home? канала ChessInTheAir