First Year For Sailplane Club At OSH

In their first year at Oshkosh with a large static display, the Soaring Society of America has done an impressive job with three fully assembled sailplanes on exhibit including a Grob G-103 SL self-launching motor glider with a retraceable pod-mounted engine.

SSA's goal at the Oshkosh air show is inform pilots about how fun and how safe the world of powerless-flight can be.

"One of our aims is to let people know that glider pilots can fly cross-countries. Most people are not aware of that," stated Kathleen Winters, long-time soaring pilot. "A lot of people think that we just take a tow up, glide around for a half hour and land. That's not the case. We can stay up for 8 hours or so and safely complete flights of hundreds of miles."

It (soaring) has such sense of accomplishment," said David Nuss, SSA's Region 6 Director.

"Anytime you stay aloft for more than 20 minutes, you've really done something right. Cheated nature almost. Additionally there's a sense of camaraderie in soaring that exists nowhere else in aviation.

"We're really enjoying helping people see what is available to them through soaring," said Anne Mongiovi, SSA's Volunteer Coordinator. "I'm really glad that the people here get to see what types of aircraft are participating in this sport. The interest has varied from young people who are just entering aviation to power-pilots wanting to transit to gliders.

Mongiovi concluded with, "I soar because my husband is an instructor and he took me for a ride. I was sold from the first flight."

FMI: www.ssa.org