When I've spoken to people, they've always said, "Yes, there's a lee, everyone knows that." Only I didn't know it, and now I can say that if I don't know it, then probably no one else does either. And things like that, it was just incomprehensible to me that you don't give that back to the community or explain it. Or if a valley wind in a normal situation always flows from here to here over there and always creates difficult conditions, or there are even accidents or something, then that has to be accessible to every person somehow. Because otherwise, not everyone has to have the same negative experience or every...
Podz-Glidz, the Lu-Glidz podcast. Stories from the cosmos of paragliding. Today with Bernie Herz. And Lucian Haas on the mic. It
They say there's an app for everything. That applies to paragliding too. Weather apps, thermal forecasts, launch site databases, precipitation radar, live tracking, wind values, variometers, topo maps, hike-and-fly routes, flight planning, and so on and so forth. If you want, you can fill your entire smartphone screen with start icons for all these helper programs. Or you can trust an app that integrates almost all of these functions at once. The most versatile offering of this kind in the app stores is the Burn-Air app, which can also be found on the internet as the website burnair.cloud. Over the past two years, Burn-Air has seen an ever-increasing reach within the German-speaking paragliding scene.
That's probably also because there isn't a typical programming nerd behind the app, but rather a flying practitioner. For about ten years, Bernie Herz has been offering guided flight trips and events in Switzerland under the brand Burn-Air, specifically targeting pilots who have finished their training but don't have much experience yet. From the questions he received and still receives from his customers about flight areas, weather, thermals, etc., the idea grew: why not make such information generally accessible at the touch of a button, tailored to average pilots? In this episode 79 of Podz-Glidz, Bernie tells the Burn-Air story. It's less about what his app can do; I was much more interested in what drives the 39-year-old.
What lies behind Burn-Air in terms of both ideas and flight philosophy, as well as work and technology. And why Bernie is so convinced that the future of paragliding also lies heavily in the digital world and networking.
If you enjoy Podz-Glidz, why not support my work on this podcast as a patron? You can find out how that's possible, easily and without any obligation, on the page of my blog Lu-Glidz website. Bernie,
how often do you fly completely without instruments?
Yeah, that's a good question. It doesn't happen that often, effectively. Because I usually, yeah, when flying thermals or cross-country, I obviously need instruments. But there are also moments where I do it without them. Especially, for example, when I'm flying at the beach or doing some soaring or top-landing exercises and so on. But there are also situations—or actually mostly—where I'm supposed to test certain things, whether they're my own apps or whatever, or devices from other manufacturers.
So that means you actually always have a device with you when flying in the mountains. If you didn't have one and said, I have to fly thermals or something, would you feel somewhat naked, in a technical sense?
So there are probably aspects to that, yeah. For example, I like to know how strong the wind is on the ground or something, so I have an idea of what to expect when I land or if I can still fly around this corner. When it comes to thermals flying itself, I often turn the sound off and just fly by feel, that happens too. But this info regarding wind, and of course when working—so when I do coachings and stuff—I have to know where my people are. And sometimes, if they're flying around the mountain, I know they're pretty quickly gone because I can't see them anymore. But otherwise naked, I guess, yeah, a bit for sure. But I also do a lot of hike-flights and so on, and it's certainly not the case that I always need, I don't know, what kind of apps and so on.
For me, live tracking is always a must, because if something happens, I can't predict it, and I'd like someone to know where the last signal was.
There are those questions where it says, if you went to a deserted island and could only take three things with you, what would you take? But we're not going to a deserted island; instead, you're going flying alone or something like that. What's the minimum of technical aids where you'd say, I definitely wouldn't want to do without those? I think probably
effectively the phone. So, the phone with its own app or something like that, I think that would be enough. So you don't need
...not much more. Yes, I mean a phone with its own app—there's an app for everything, so you could say you basically have everything with you. But if you were to ask what the minimum information setup you'd need for flying is, from the app... effectively for
I think, if I'm not supposed to do a cross-country flight right now, then I don't need anything. So, if it's just a flight somewhere, just to have a nice flight in the evening, I don't need any electronic support. And with the wind, the window is so short, I don't need support in the sense that I have to know the wind already, because I have an idea of what's going to happen. So the forecasts are good enough there. But I think if I have a cross-country flight, then I think the minimum information is probably already,
the knowledge of where there is, like, this thermal assistance—knowing where it's rising—and just information on what the wind systems are like at the moment, how strong the flow is
...and so on. You've said that a few times now, like, what's the current wind doing, what's the ground wind, and stuff like that. Was that actually a motivation for you to start this Burn Air Map project?
No, that actually goes back much further. The story there is a bit different. I did the "Pröbe" as we call it here, and then the second time I made it through; the first time I wasn't so successful, I made it through the second time. And there, when I did the second flight and basically had the stamp, the person—the examiner, so to speak—asked me if I wanted to go up again. But I wasn't allowed to take off from the same launch site. And there I realized pretty quickly that I can't actually fly that well. And that's how this whole Burn Air story started, so basically, how should I put it, if you fly little or are still early in your flying career, you suddenly have a bit of a lesson or, yeah, a valley that you have to cross.
And that's how Burn Air came about. And then, a bit later, I started offering events for people who have just gotten their license to show them new flying areas, do weather assessments, and so on. And of course, for these events, I had to do correspondingly good weather and also area briefings. And with the area briefings, in Switzerland, there are these PDF sheets with certain information on them—sometimes there's a map on them and so on. But that was never good enough for me. So I started preparing them somehow using PowerPoint with Google Earth and screenshots, and I could reuse these briefings over and over again because you always end up going back to similar areas, to the same 40 or 50 spots.
And then people started saying, okay, it makes sense to have a briefing like this. Then I started drawing these things using something called My Maps—Google My Maps, I think it's still called that today. And the real breakthrough came when I wrote an article on how to fly 50 kilometers in Farnasse. Farnasse is such a typical cross-country flight area right now in the spring; I was actually out in this region with some people this weekend. It's a real gem of an area for beautiful cross-country flights. And that article included a Google My Maps. It had the thermals hotspots, take-off and landing sites, no-fly zones, and so on. And that one got a lot of engagement.
And then there was version 1, so moving quickly forward, there was version 1, this Burner Map. And today we are at the third version. And with the third version, that's actually the one that really, how should I put it, exploded, if you look at it...
as I was saying. Let's talk a bit more intensively about this third version. I'd like to jump back because you said you got your license once and then stood at the launch site and realized, okay, I can't quite do that. If I saw it correctly, I believe you got your license in 2011. You founded Burn Air in 2012. So just a year later, when people usually say, well, a lot of flight experience, of course you can fly a lot, but it's actually very fast for someone to say, okay, and now I'm going to pass on my knowledge and offer corresponding tours to other people and guide them and stuff like that. Where did this motivation come from? Or how did it happen that just a year later you knew, okay, this is what I actually want to do?
By the time I got my Brevet, I had already done quite a few flights—a lot of flights, actually, because typically in Switzerland, you go to the exam with, let's say, at least 50 flights. Many people might have 60 or 70 flights when they take the exam. I had well over 100 because I messed up my first attempt, specifically on the landing. So I already had a relatively high number of flights. And I had already worked there as a launch helper at the flight school where I was practically still a student myself. And that's how it happened. And that's also something you mentioned regarding it happening relatively quickly, it was still quite early. And that also brought in a lot of criticism. I saw that on social media and so on. There were quite a few people who said he had no clue at all and so on.
And of course, you have to see, those first events—they weren't events about flying as far as possible or flying long distances and so on. Instead, it was about showing the launch site, landing sites, maybe something about the weather and so on. And it's just that everything was adjusted to that level. So the customers, they weren't customers who wanted to do these monster flights or anything, they just wanted—I remember my first event well, it was in the winter in Davos. And there, it was simply about maybe doing two or three thermals, starting nicely, and having a cool landing. And for that, for this area, I think I was qualified enough, also with launch leader experience. And after that, it just kept developing and developing.
In that sense, yes, I think that actually fit very well at the time. And it's funny because so many of those customers from the first day are still with us today. That really makes me particularly happy.
Do you have the status of a flight school with Burn Air, or are you really just a service travel provider? What are you registered as, or how do you officially describe it?
Exactly, so it's exclusively for licensed or private pilots. I don't do basic training; I take on people who already have the corresponding license. So it's a completely normal company. I'd say advanced training, selling things, selling digital services, and so on. A completely normal private one, it's basically a GmbH, right?
You just said that this actually came out of your own Burn Air service business, where you said, okay, I want to explain to my customers how an flight area works. And I do that on a digital level by first using these Google My Maps—which is a way where you can mark certain things on Google Maps—and then it grew from there. Where does this affinity for the digital stuff come from for you? Like, where do you say, now Google My Maps, and then the custom-programmed maps with Fly Map, and later Burn Air Map, and so on?
My original training is as a chemical laboratory technician, then I studied business administration, but I've always worked in the chemical sector as an international product manager. There, I was actually always responsible for software or services close to software, and most recently also in the hardware area, from glass down to firmware, software, and always with large teams, also with large budgets from the industry, so with corresponding sales volumes. And so this affinity just developed, or knowing how to talk to the developers, what their needs are. I then did further training in requirements engineering, so how to write down, how should I put it, these needs of a customer and so on.
And this way of seeing things was kind of ingrained in me from a young age. It's not always an advantage, because you're always seeing improvements everywhere. And that was also somewhat difficult in my old job as a chemical laboratory technician, where you can't always voice those things. Often, it's expected that you just do the work and don't stop to think about how you could improve it. So, I moved relatively quickly from the lab itself to the manufacturing industry, where I got really good opportunities to develop further and see those kinds of things. And that also led to more and more contact, including internationally. So, I'm very internationally networked, and that just helps when dealing with people.
And besides that, there was also the fact that I started early; it was exciting in school back then. So in school, I started with the periodic table, where you always had to add up molecular masses, and those molecular masses were always relatively tedious, and there were always mistakes on exams because people would forget something under stress. So I made a little microprogram where you could just enter the sum formulas—you know, those chemical formulas—and then press Enter, and then it would spit out the molecular mass, and I started selling that for very small prices, and it was such a fun...
Early experience in the development field. But if I understand this correctly, okay, you worked as a chemical laboratory technician later in the industry, but Burn Air ran in parallel at the beginning; you basically did both. Always.
So it always ran in parallel until about two years ago. It was always alongside my main job—at the beginning it was always 100%, then later 80%, and now 0, or 100% on the Burn Air side, exactly.
That means you were basically a workhorse. You worked in the chemical industry during the week and then offered your flight tours on the weekends. Yeah, exactly.
That's certainly true. I mean, even today, I really enjoy working and I think I have more joy in it than I ever had before, even though it's significantly more exhausting and demands a lot. It's a job that's effectively day and night, yeah, but overall, the proportion of joy—or pleasure, or just those moments where you're in the flow while working and so on—is just very, very high. That's why I actually like it very, very much.
Now you just said Burn Air is now 100 percent. That means you eventually gave up your other job. Was that hard for you? Yes, it was...
hard. It's just, since childhood, I always had this, yeah, this standard path, right? You work, you're safe, you pay into these insurances and so on. It's all secure, or at least, feels secure, right? And at some point, one of my employees told me, from my perspective, you should just switch. And that was really a kick, he said, okay, you're doing your job well and all, but I sense the energy or this passion has changed or has shifted. And at some point, it was just really time to say, okay, let's try it.
Because, what's the worst that could happen? And I think I sat in that, yeah, in that ship for a long time, where you say, okay, it's this safe, this safe sailing on the water, and to jump out and take a risk, that wasn't easy, yeah.
When did you give that up? In what year was that? Oh,
I don't know the year, about two years ago. That must have been 2020.
So, the start of the Corona era, you said—now I'm doing... well, probably not because of that, but I saw with horror, oh, now we have Corona, what do I do now?
Exactly, that was, that was really a, a, yeah, looking back it was great. It worked out well now, but it was very exciting. I think in November or so, I resigned and then in February, I was basically after three months or six, I don't remember exactly, it was finished with the, with the normal, proper work, so to speak. And I was then with a group in South Africa and I remember well, we were on our last evening and, we were there in Cape Town, sitting there in the restaurant and we all looked at a mobile phone together and listened to the speech of the Swiss Federal Council, where they made, yeah, made or decided all the heavy measures. And I, I sat there and I really, my whole world collapsed, because what I had done with my shift was basically gone in one stroke, because travel was just immediately gone.
And that occupied me quite a bit, but those who were there remember that evening very well because we were flying back the next day; we weren't affected in that sense, or were we, but yeah. And the following day, I called my developers and told them all, okay, we're starting again, because typically we scale back development a bit during the season since I have less time and can do fewer needs analyses and so on. And I called and said, guys, we're starting again. And then we ramped it back up as far as we could, and then more and more, and now, during Corona, quite a lot has been happening.
Exactly. You just said developers. So I understand, okay, Burn Air Map, what's being programmed in the background there, you don't do that at all, but there's a team behind it. Correct.
yeah. I do very little because I'm not a professional developer. I'm more like, when it's small things, I understand it—I'd say I understand it relatively well, including what the code or the code quality is like and so on. But you have to imagine, this Burn Air Map is now heavily used by various corners of the DACH region, let's say. And to give an example, for instance the live tracking, that's really a big beast; it's a huge amount of effort to run this live tracking, and it needs professional developers behind it who are aware of these magnitudes, who can develop it, or also the frontend—those are pros, so for every area, there are pros who
...developing it. Are those people who are employed by you in some way, or are they all freelancers, like a team you commission? Well, they're all freelancers,
they are people, but some of them have been working for me for many years now, maybe 5 or 6 years; they did projects with me early on, and now of course more, but they are freelancers. That means, yes, if there are corresponding projects during that time, you ask them. But the coordination lies with me, so there isn't much exchange between the different developers; those are relatively clearly defined interfaces, where they, yes, how they talk to each other, software-technically, and thus, yes, it actually works very well, I have to be honest, yes. And
Are they all based in Switzerland, or do you also have, let's say, I had a coder in Ukraine or China or India or wherever? Exactly, so they
aren't based in Switzerland, there are no developers in Switzerland working for Burner, at least not currently, I do get applications every now and then, which is also great, so I think if something interesting comes up with someone who really has experience or wants to bring in their, yeah, their knowledge or their capacity, then definitely, but basically, they aren't in Switzerland, but they aren't just some low-wage countries, there are actually some, I actually have a small developer in China, but that's one of my best developers, they are just, they are just capacities in their fields and the country actually doesn't matter to me at all, they are good people, I can work well with them, they can all speak English well for example
and develop well, document cleanly, and so on. They're just good people, regardless of where they're from, that they now
...come. Did you get to know them during your time in the industry and build them up, or how did you find them? I mean, how do you find a developer in China who speaks English and can ultimately co-program a Burn-Air-Map where everything is in German and so on? Well, there are different variants,
One thing is definitely networks, partly from the industry, but partly afterwards, or you ask around; there are also portals where you can find such people and so on, so there are different ways to get in touch with people. And of course, the art is then choosing the right people—that's actually the art—and there are also setbacks, and I always have to consider why it didn't work this time. What I've also learned is that if I notice something isn't right, if I get the feeling that something isn't working, I have to pull the plug early. In the past, I'd always say, "Well, okay, let's try it again," and so on, we'll keep going a bit further. I don't do that anymore; in the industry, that's called sunk costs—costs that are simply already gone—and you create those by holding on to things where you think, "Actually, no, but I don't want to give up yet." Those sunk costs just get bigger, and that's why I started cutting them off relatively early.
yes, but overall I have to say, I'm actually very satisfied, so there are relatively few people where I say, okay, there...
didn't fit at all. To what extent, even if you have your team in the background, but you say they're all freelancers, is Burner in a way actually a one-man show? I mean, you're the boss and everything, so also CTO, Chief Technical Officer, and all that, are you all in one person? Yes, well, I
I think that's actually the case at the moment; I still have one position open in the marketing area, but it's true that it all converges in the end. That's a risk, and I'm fully aware of that, but it's relatively difficult to build someone up so closely that they can cover that breadth, that they could take it over. What does exist are emergency scenarios—so if I were to have something really serious, an accident or something like that, how things continue is secured for a certain period, but that's effectively how it is. But I think I've noticed this a lot in the industry too; you're always trying to figure out how to replace someone, you're always supposed to keep everyone replaceable at any time.
I don't think that's necessarily sensible because every human being has a certain capacity, and I don't think wanting to replace everyone at any time is necessarily optimal. And yes, it's true that if something happens, it will become quite tedious very quickly, that's how it is. But I think it's difficult—you can see this in the paragliding industry in general—if someone dies or can't do it anymore or suffers a major tragedy or something like that, then a lot of things crumble around that. It's always people, individuals, humans who drive certain things forward. And if they are gone, then it's just... something collapses. I believe that's how it is, and it's not wrong.
So I think it's better to have someone who does something with motivation and will, rather than just trying to replace everyone at any given time.
Did you actually have a kind of master plan for that from the beginning, or was it really more like, oh, I could do this, it works well, now I could add something else, something else on top?
So, how did that all go down?
I think it's a mix, a mix between a master plan or the other way around—I'll explain that in a bit—a master plan and simply opportunities. The master plan in the sense that what I always have in front of me, so effectively, visually also in my office, what I always have in front of me are the needs of the paragliding pilot. And these needs don't really change. For example, when or where should I go flying tomorrow, or when on the next day is it good, or can I fly at this launch site, and so on. And those kinds of things don't change over time. And I think there are simply different ones, if you align yourself with these needs, there are like different puzzle pieces,
what's needed so that you can support someone. And the ultimate goal is for people to have as many and as long flights as possible—not in terms of x kilometers, that's less relevant to me—but as beautiful flights as possible, for as long as they want, without any incidents and so on. And that's the basic motivation. And then you think about what's needed for that. And one issue was always, when I talked to people, they always said, "Yeah, there's a lee here, everyone knows that." Only I didn't know it, and now I can say, if I don't know it, then probably no one else does either. And things like that, for me, it was simply,
it's incomprehensible that you don't give that back to the community or explain it. If a valley wind always, or at least in a normal situation, always flows from here to here over there and always creates difficult conditions, or even causes accidents or something, then that has to be accessible to everyone somehow. Because otherwise, not everyone has to have the same negative experience or everyone. That's why I think that was already the motivation, and then there are different parts where you have to think, okay, what else is needed now to prevent situations that effectively or possibly trigger negative emotions or experiences.
could. That means you're always looking at it from the user's side, also from your customers' perspective, who have asked you questions and where you've said I can't represent or explain that on the map yet, but I could maybe integrate it somehow. For example, thermals forecasts; I can then look three or four days in advance at which regions you might be able to go flying or where it could get really interesting. Or as a next step, where you've also integrated the actual weather forecasts with the ICON D2 model, where you say, then I'll show it there, and then you can look directly at it and see where there's a lot of wind and where there's little.
And that's the thing, so if you take the example of weather forecasts, there are so many portals. The amount of data is gigantic and there are all these different weather forecasts. And the question is really and only, what does a person need to know so that they don't put themselves in danger? And of course, you could say that everyone has to learn that themselves and so on. And I think the top pros might not even need that anymore, right? Because they'd say, I'm flying anyway, whether it's windy or not, I'm flying regardless. But for the majority of pilots who fly maybe 20 to 50 hours a year. They might have 20 flights or maybe, I don't know, 15 flights. And there, it's about choosing the right day, so that the return on investment is as high as possible, that you don't go somewhere where it's not doable afterwards.
And the other thing is, they don't know the weather models and all that. They can't say, "Oh yeah, I've got some Föhn here," but they have to be able to see it. They have to click on a map and it has to be obvious: "Here it's not good, something's wrong." And if they then say, "Well, I'm in the Stubaital for a week anyway," and they maybe find a corner where it actually works, that's also great. But I think visualizing this data for paraglider pilots—I believe that was actually the key, or is the key, regarding weather forecasting.
Let's take a look at the technical background for a bit. So, what is actually needed for this Burn Air Map to run the way it does? I mean, what's going on there? Give us some data for the tech nerds among the listeners so they can say, "Wow, I didn't know there was so much behind it," or "Wow, so little," depending on how they see it.
Yeah, so the art of running this setup is that it has to scale incredibly well, because I'd say in 80 or 85 percent of the time, or probably even more—probably 90 percent of the time—I practically need no computing capacity because it's bad weather, no one is flying, it's night, it's raining, and so on. And then there are the days—there are some, but not extremely many, let's say in the best-case scenario 40 or 50 days. And those are only a few hours, say from 11 a.m. until, let's say, 4 p.m. or so, where it suddenly explodes and incredible amounts of lifetracking or whatever are generated.
And that means it needs an infrastructure that scales massively, but is cheap when nothing is running and then more expensive when a lot is running. And that's actually the art of it. And then, regarding lifetracking, you can consider that on a good lifetracking day or a good flight day, you get around 5,000 to 8,000 track points per minute. So those are incredible amounts of data being generated. That's several million data points per day. So it's truly massive. And then, the topic of weather forecasts has presented us with relatively big challenges because when this data comes out from ICON—that is, from the German Weather Service—we have to visualize and transform it into, let's say, a digital format, because it comes in as a sort of table in the broadest sense.
It's a grid format. And the instruction to the developers was: you have to visualize these files—let's say tables—and you only have a few minutes to do it. Five minutes, six minutes, because as soon as the files are there, the DWD takes hours to process them, but I want to update them within minutes. And the trick was being able to do that. Currently, there are several hundred computers working in parallel to prepare these weather forecasts. And they only run for a few minutes and then go back to sleep. Building and operating infrastructures like that, especially in the long term, is quite demanding and requires more and more knowledge.
That
...cloud-based. You buy this computing power, and that's what you use. I think you don't have to go into too much technical detail, but you basically buy these computing minutes, if you will, and then it scales up and then back down accordingly. So that, yeah, that's actually the state of the art today. Does everything then work cloud-based or how is it—do you actually have 100 servers standing around somewhere? No, no, no. That's all
Cloud-based. You buy the computing power, and you pay for it. I think you don't have to go into too much technical detail, but you basically buy these computing minutes, if you will, and then it scales up and then back down accordingly. So that, yeah, that's actually the state of the art today.
I'd say. And in terms of live tracking, you just said that on a good day, you get 8,000 points per minute and so on. You also save all the flights from all the registered users—maybe even from everyone—you save all the flights somehow. And they're stored for longer periods too. So, I can go into your system, if I'm registered with you, go to my flights and see what came in via live tracking, I can also look at flights from a few weeks ago and so on. So you have these huge data stores where you deposit all of that. Yes.
That's right, yes. And I think that's also something we're working on now or will work on in the future. And these are data points that are valuable in the sense that you can say, okay, you can look at which wind situations or which weather forecasts result in how well or how high people fly. That's perfectly clear. It's actually independent of the user. It has nothing to do with a specific user in that sense, but rather the question that arises is, yes, if I have a humidity of X, for example, how high can you get at that launch site, or things like that. And I think there will be exciting approaches in the future to learn from that and also issue corresponding warnings. It goes as far as considering where the large sink zones are and when they form, or where accidents or large turbulence occur, and under which situations.
And those are certainly exciting topics that we can look into more closely in the future. And what's more, I've already had inquiries from weather services, because the exciting thing is, of course, when we fly thermals, thermals are essentially the source of thunderstorms, right? That means it's like an early diagnosis system,
to predict corresponding thunderstorms or large thunderstorms in advance. And those kinds of stories are exciting. Nothing has happened yet, nothing has gone down and so on. But you just see these real-time data points; they are already interesting sources.
for the future. That means you could say, I have the average climb speeds measured by 100 pilots in a region and I see that on one day it was always only 1 m, while on another day it's always 3 m in that region. So it's much more liftable there, for example—that's what you could read out from that.
Exactly. Yes, those would be possibilities. And of course, we use that, for example, to cross-reference weather models, right? So if we have a few pilots flying at a certain speed, we can also see, for instance, how strong the wind is accordingly, or where it's blowing over, or three-dimensionally, how the thermals work, and so on, or even four-dimensionally over time. So those are certainly exciting approaches. Also, as you say, this topic of thermal strength—that's also part of the thermal forecast, so how strong is the thermal for today at what altitude. And of course, you have to cross-reference that to see if it's even correct. And we really like using that to see if it's correct, plus or minus, or not.
That means if I'm being live-tracked as a paraglider by Burn Air, I'm basically becoming a kind of measuring buoy?
Yes, and it's even the case that we now publish these points—we call them Live Thermals—again. So for the people who use it, that provides a layer where you can see, virtually live, where it's going up accordingly. Not just from one person, but from different ones. You see a kind of 3D tube, if you will. And more recently, even the strong sink zones. So if I'm flying and I see that a few people have already gone through here and it's sunk heavily in the last 20 minutes or so, you can see that symbolized with color dots, so you know, okay, you have to avoid this line.
Interesting story. I'll get back to that in a moment regarding what you can actually extract from such technical tools. You could also discuss whether it's still "free flying" then or not. But I'll get back to that in a bit. First, let's stay with the Burn Air Map for a moment. Which part of the Burn Air Map is actually the most technically demanding? Yes, there are several.
So I think all parts involve significant technical effort. For example, the flight area information is drawn manually. That means it's labor-intensive in human terms. Then there's the lifetracking, which simply generates massive amounts of data. On one hand, it's the data coming in, but people also love tracking paragliders, whether it's their partner or seeing where they're flying right now and how well they're positioned, which routes they're taking, and so on. We also recently made a change so that this tail, as we call it—basically the little tail behind the pilot—which was previously updated every 20 minutes, is now actually open for the whole day, because people are so curious about where people are flying through and they also spend a lot of time in the office. So that's also technically demanding, and the weather forecasts are, of course, truly massive in terms of technical or computational effort.
That's why I don't think you can just answer the question by saying this part, but every single one has a certain
complexity
for yourself. Which of these features are you personally particularly proud of, where you'd say, my solution there, I think that's really great?
I think it's also difficult to pick out something specific there. I think the visualization of the thermals forecast is really well done. I'm relatively proud of these PreviTemps; it's also a bit of a nerdy way to show these weather soundings, the predictive soundings and so on. If you want to put it that way, you don't just see a typical hour with some graph you don't understand, but you can actually look at this chart and see the visualization. But it's also the whole thing. Personally, I work with this map a lot, whether it's for my groups, for myself, however. And there are so many corners where I keep thinking, that's well solved. And if not, we get feedback relatively quickly where someone says, okay, I don't find that funny, and for example, what was well received is this XC planning tool, where you calculate the takeoff altitudes and so on.
I think it's also difficult to pick out something specific there. That's also something that's a topic with the Burner Map. It's huge, there are all different parts, it covers almost all areas of digital paragliding. And it takes a moment to get into it. And I often hear that you can't just open the map and it's just information, but you have to think about what you want from it. And then you find the corresponding data or symbols.
or graphics.
Would you say that, regarding normal paragliding, the Burner Map is actually finished in terms of features? You just mentioned things like, yes, you can extract data and, for example, forward it to weather services. That's of course a different level. But now, regarding what I get displayed with a Burner Map and a Burner App accordingly, is there still any feature where you'd say, it's actually still missing, I'd like to include that too? I can already say, it...
is definitely not finished at all. I mean, I'm reinvesting—the whole thing was planned to be commercial from the very beginning, it was. It's crystal clear, it's not the idea to run it for free. And the reason for that is that you can reinvest, that you can buy data, weather data or whatever you need. And everything you need for flying, so that you can actually use it, so that I can pay the developers well and so on. And so, it never stands still. And the stupid thing is, it rarely stands still in my head either. That means if I organize something somewhere, like right now in Prättigau with my group, then afterwards I have a list of ten topics again that annoy me or things that don't work, or I definitely get feedback on topics at every launch site.
Yeah, well, it's never finished. And what's at the very top of the list right now? Well, I can't reveal too much at the very top of the list, but I can say something that hasn't been communicated yet. The big topic for me at the moment is making the information we already show today on the Burnham app available during flight. And we are in the final stages of developing a new app, in addition to the Burnham app, which uses the info from the Burnham app and can be used during flight. And our big vision here is simply to open this app and then just take off. Without settings and without configuration efforts and so on. And that's currently in alpha testing with about 12, 13 customers who are already using it, are absolutely thrilled, and don't want to turn it off anymore.
That's a really cool story. And there's an opportunity now to be among the first to become actual alpha testers. Yeah, let's see. I think it won't be long now, and then we'll be ready to really put out something cool.
So I understand it as a flight vario app that can also use things from the Burnham data background as a map and information base.
Exactly. So the focus isn't necessarily on the vario, because in our assessment, I think it will be a long time before people fly with just a phone. I believe good hydros are still needed. They might not have to be extensively large, and I don't know what all they need to have. But they must have good sensors. They probably need a thermals assistant, altitude and so on. Just typical vario examples. And I see more and more people having a phone or a small tablet on the side, where they have things like wind values or rain radar or where my friends are or where the current live thermals are and so on. And there are so many of these topics that have to be presented graphically as simply as possible, so that someone can just fly and one considers what context they are in right now.
For example, he's flying straight ahead, and I have to show him where the next landing field is and if he can make it there. Or where the next thermals are and how good they are? Or where my friends are, where have they flown through? And those are many of these small topics that you try to concentrate into an app that just runs in the background. If you need it, it's there, showing the right thing. And if you don't need it, then the vario is there for you.
That would be as an app on a smartphone. Now, you're also working on bringing the Burner Map to other devices and integrating it there. I mean, specifically, you're working with Skytrax. For example, on the Skytrax 4, you can already display some of the features from the Burner Map, like live wind values and other things. How did this cooperation between you and a variometer manufacturer, specifically Skytrax, actually come about?
The
I'd say the origin is the Farnet topic. So, a few years ago, Skytrax developed what is now almost a standard Farnet—an open standard. And for me, that was also about how the wind values were handled. You always have to put that into context. In the mountains, wind values are essential, in my view. It's less of an issue in lowland flying. But in the mountains, how the wind blows over which passes and peaks, and in which valleys and in which direction, is essential for flight decisions and, therefore, for safety. And there was actually this issue of Farnet being able to detect these wind values, and that's where we started developing a ground station that broadcasts these wind values from the surrounding area.
This isn't a wind measurement station; rather, it takes the official wind values, for example from MeteoSchweiz or ZAMG or from various avalanche services or from the Austrian or Italian state and so on. We have many collaborations there and it takes these wind values and broadcasts them so that people have them on their devices. And I approached Skytrax with this topic, as far as I know, back then, but that was also a long time ago and this closer cooperation has developed since then. However, it's not exclusive; I also speak with Navito or with other device manufacturers, and those collaborations are also good. We also have a meeting in the near future with the different vario manufacturers to talk about standards or things like, for example, what a task file format should be and so on.
So, it's actually going well; it started that way and is still going very well. And I think what you just have to see is that a lot of people simply fly very little. They go up the hill, they need a device they can switch on with big buttons that just shows the altitude, and they can take off and it beeps. And I think that's the masses. Those are really many people who are like that. And there are a few, but loud people, who then want really crazy things. Like, I don't know, really with apps and lots of functions, and that's no longer the masses. And you can see that very clearly in the user numbers, also in live tracking and so on, that the masses just want a simple device that just has certain
...functions. Now you're currently with the Skytrax 4, and it's not just that you say, okay, Farnet can display your data, but you're basically integrated into the system. You can also say, show me certain Burn-Air stuff. You're basically inside the menu. The name Burn-Air even appears in there. How involved are you actually in the direct development of such devices?
Yes, I think so. I mean, I am involved. I get relatively early versions of the variometers from several manufacturers to test things, without of course swapping them with the other manufacturers, because I believe that in the end—to be honest, I think most manufacturers themselves don't test that much in real life. They don't fly with the devices that much. And in that case, feedback helps quite a bit when they say, okay, it crashes there or things like that. And yes, I think that helps both sides. On one hand, I see what's coming, so I can adjust and prepare. On the other hand, it's good for the manufacturers because they get feedback very early,
how it looks, what's good and what's not so good. And like I said, I don't represent a specific group, like long-range combat pilots or anything, that's not my clientele; it's more really the casual flyers, the bulk of the pilots.
How different is the mindset actually? I mean, a manufacturer like Skytrax comes more from the hardware side,
What can I specifically code to make sure my hardware works well? You're now, I'd say, the creative digital person who still says, "I'm thinking from the user's perspective and looking at what I can provide for them." How is that reconciled, or is there sometimes a real "clash of cultures" or something like that?
Yes, that exists. I think you can say that it does. It's often the case that engineers develop these devices from different brands and they don't necessarily have this customer mindset, or maybe less so. And there are times—you can see it too—there are devices that have so much data on the screen that isn't relevant at all for an average pilot. They actually need very little, and you can see that it's often relatively heavily engineer-driven. And that's also a trap that I often fall into myself.
and I just can't... just because someone says, I'd like to have some special figure on the screen, is that really what the person actually wants, or what is the need behind it? And for example, I recently had some intense discussions about the topic of how much altitude I've already gained in the current thermals, right? And the need behind that isn't actually a number, but the need behind it is, I don't know at the moment, whether to stay there or not? And these needs behind the needs, that's actually what has to be considered. And I think that's the perspective I try to bring into each case.
In many ways, with your focus on how to use digital tools meaningfully in flying, I'd say you're also a bit of a pioneer. How often do you get attacked for that?
Yes, well, that happens. There are loud people who
aren't always friendly. You have to learn, and I still have to learn this, to take it, because the majority of people, when I go to any launch site and they already know my face from the YouTube videos or something, they approach me and they're happy, they might have a problem they want to clear up quickly or something, like some settings or something they didn't quite understand. Overall, it's incredibly positive. There are very few who are just a bit loud or so-called trolls who troll around on the internet, whom you can ignore a bit or something
have to tune out. On the other hand, I worked in support for a long time myself and still do almost all the burnout support myself today; you learn an incredible amount from trolls, well, not from them, but from people who give feedback—even if it's not always positive—you learn a lot and see early on, they're like early indicators for problems that come later or negative emotions or something. And I believe you can't just put it aside and say, I'll just ignore,
that you're just trolling. You have to
then overlook it. One of the, let's say, extreme digital functions of Burn Air, where the technical setup of Burn Air becomes very usable for the user in the air again, are those, as you mentioned earlier, these live thermals. Tell me again in more detail what that's all about. I mean, how do live thermals get onto my screen? What data is behind that and what do I actually see?
So there are two things. One is that the Farnet devices from Naviter and also from Skytrax—if you center them, there is a centering assistant—as soon as it detects a meaningful thermal, it basically sends out this thermal as a Farnet package into the air and says, "Hello people, I found a thermal, it's here, and it has a corresponding wind offset." So that's the advanced version. And these thermal points, I then show them on the map, they're called Live Thermal Centers. Because that really is the center. But you can also see that in almost 3D, if you will. Those are different altitudes and you can see the wind offset. And then there's also Live Thermal, and that's quite trivial.
These are simply where others have soared and at what lift value.
It's just color-coded. The redder it is, the stronger the lift. And when there are many, those are very small dots. If it has many of these dots, then the corresponding thermals are there. And I think especially in the mountains, the thermals shift throughout the day, but within the same period, they're often in pretty much the identical location. In the lowlands, from my experience too, it's like, it often—it pulses, sure, but it's often back in a similar location.
But it works relatively well. And I've often been grateful when you're low and someone flew through there 20 minutes ago and produced those points, or even several people, then it's just relatively efficient.
Is that really still something like real, free flying or something, if you're constantly staring at your glider in the air and looking for where the next deep red point is that I have to fly towards, instead of learning, okay, where am I looking in the landscape, where is the sun? And, for yourself, to understand the systems at all—not to understand the systems technically by saying, I have to look at where the red point is and then I fly towards it.
Good question. For me, free flying means being free in your thoughts, free in your decisions. And whether someone finds that too much, technically or not, that's their freedom to consider whether it works for them or not. Now, what's important for me is that people have early successes in flying. Because of course, you have to learn how to deal with frustration, and paragliding is one of the really good sports for learning how to deal with frustration, because you often end up on the ground and think, why am I on the ground now and everyone else is up there, and so on.
And I think this learning curve in paragliding is relatively steep. That means it's not that easy to become a good cross-country flight pilot, unless of course you have a lot of time, you fly a lot, and so on. And as I said, the majority of pilots don't fly that much. And from my point of view, it's about giving them beautiful experiences and making sure they can do what they'd like to do as much as possible—for example, they finally want to, I don't know, fly back to their home, or fly from one mountain to the next town, or whatever. There's this Interlaken region here in Switzerland, and for many, it's a dream to fly from Grindelwald to Interlaken. And you only have to turn up three times, actually. It's quite simple, but for that, you have to be in the right place and you have to turn up long enough, and so on.
There are some very small things. And when people land in Interlaken, once they've made it, they're so happy. And I think in the end, that's worth more than the consideration of whether it's free flight or not. Because learning—I can give them many lectures about where the thermals are and so on. But if they end up standing on the ground, then they're frustrated, and that's not good either. And if they can do this flight, realize it, then I believe it's a joy and the progress comes naturally. I think it's just that the curve is very steep at the bottom, and making that easier, I believe, is
Goal.
This story. Do you also see this as the future of flying, that we will basically be more and more connected in the air? And that's, well, where we basically have the beginnings of free paragliding—those were the real wild years and maybe there weren't any decent variometers yet and people just had to try things out—and nowadays you just swing yourself into the air and you're already, I mean, your smartphone is enough for that, you're technically fully equipped and you say, I'm actually getting info that the generations of paragliders before me didn't have at all. Now I get ground wind displayed, I get live thermals from others, I can see where others are flying, I can even see where my buddies are currently climbing and can then fly there and all that.
So, in the end, do you believe that the new generation of flying will be a connected one?
I definitely believe that. There will also be a group of people who don't want that, and that is completely acceptable. I don't see any problem with that at all. I also think it's wonderful, like you asked at the beginning, to just turn it off once in a while and just fly around a bit and enjoy it—that's also wonderful. But you have to see that when you compare it to the past—and I haven't been flying for that long myself—when you compare it, the performance of the gliders, etc., has simply increased incredibly. In the old days, old days, old days, from a startup, you could hardly take off because it was too flat and then it went straight down to the landing field. If you were lucky, you reached it. And now it's just... yes, the day before yesterday in March, we did an Alpine crossing from the Engadin towards Davos and then further to Squall.
That's simply unthinkable. It might not be that many kilometers, but you're flying over glaciers, over deep valleys, and so on. It's incredible. And I think this kind of beauty might not be as easily possible because then I wouldn't know, yeah, is the valley wind already too strong or would you maybe get grounded somewhere where it becomes more dangerous, etc. I think, yeah, I think this future will probably be the case, even if not for everyone, and those who don't want it will still be able to fly just as they did before. With the exception, of course, regarding airspace, where there will tend to be more restrictions or rather more regulations regarding visibility.
If we look at, you're talking about what I'd call average pilots who don't know that much yet, let's look at the other extreme: the truly performance-oriented pilots or people who participate in the X-Alps or something like that. What kind of advantages can they get from such a technology? Well, I believe...
So, the X-Alps have shown that; some of the teams in the leading ranks used the Burner Map. I'm convinced that the X-Alps will increasingly be won digitally, I'm pretty sure of that. For example, if I know where there are thermals, I can simply increase efficiency significantly again; if I know what the wind is like, I can use it to my advantage; if I know what the forecasts are in certain valleys, where the wind is flowing, at what altitude—I believe I can use all of that to my advantage, and I really think that, yes, that for whoever has these tools under control—and you don't have to be, they don't even have to be a top athlete themselves, it can be someone analyzing it in the background, which is actually already happening, and massively so—then I think you can get an efficiency out of that which is relatively difficult because you always have to know. I'm not that deep into these sports, but in Formula 1, I'd say, they are probably the...
Engine differences and the vehicles and so on, and even the pilots probably aren't that different—I don't know enough about it, but they won't be that different. The mental side surely makes a massive difference, like whether I take a risk or not. This willingness to take risks, let's say, is certainly a factor, and from my perspective, this digital flying, whether it's during the flight or the forecasting and so on, I think that's going to be very, very decisive in such longer races. In smaller races, where it's somehow about racing up somewhere and flying around, it doesn't matter, but in such longer races, I think this tactic regarding forecasts and where you have to be and when, and so on, I think is very, very, very
essential. Can a pilot still process all of that? I mean, you have to handle all the individual values—if you were to say, okay, you can retrieve the wind, you can retrieve the thermals and so on—is that something where you're basically just starting on a screen and clicking through some lists to say, I need to retrieve the next value now, and then, what does the airport over there say and so on? Are there also things where you're wondering, can we get away from the screen, can we for example do a voice output for the most important current things or something, so that you don't have to look at it anymore?
Yeah, well, we might need to expand on that bracket. The question is almost two-fold. One thing is, can a single pilot still do this? I think for an X-Alps or a similar race, whatever it is, which lasts for days, I think it's probably difficult. I mean, of course you can do it, but it takes resources from this athlete. And he actually needs to put those resources into his legs, or into his flying skills, and so on. So I think he will increasingly become a pawn, actually, of such tactical decisions that he already makes himself, but the basics will probably be worked out by others. And that's often how it is. For the average flyer, I think it all might sound a bit overdimensioned now, but if someone is flying in a valley, just a bit to the left and a bit to the right and simply enjoying it, then maybe the wind at the landing field still plays a role and nothing else.
And I think, in that case, there's zero digital overload. Because then you check it every now and then and look at the wind value, which even simple variometers can do today, over a flag, for example. And I think the overload really isn't that big. But the longer or bigger the routes you want to fly, the bigger the adventures, the greater the need to have that kind of information becomes. But along with that, the mental capacity of such people also increases. That means if someone is busy keeping the glider over their head in weak thermals, or it's still at the beginning and it's all about centering, then that's definitely too much, and they don't need it anyway.
But with longer distances or a greater desire for adventure, you probably also need more of these tools.
Let's talk a bit about your own flying towards the end. How much do you actually get into the air yourself with all these, how shall I put it, administrative tasks you have with Burner, with the development and the day-to-day business?
So, a lot. I don't fly that much privately, to be honest, I mean really privately. There, it's mostly Hike & Fly and a few circuits just for the fun of it. Also with very light harness, light gear and so on. So I'd rather be out in nature, trail running or whatever, or snowshoeing or whatever. But I do get a lot of flying in. Of course, when I'm doing this guiding for, say, 4 days, then I'm in the air every day for about 5 hours or something. That adds up massively. So it comes to many hundreds of hours per year. That means I do spend a lot of time in the air.
If you're doing guiding like that, just from the idea of it, you're probably following your customers who are with you, a small group, you're tracking everything via live tracking, probably on your device. Do you also have radio contact with them, or is it just a matter of agreeing on what to do and trying to stay as close together as possible?
No, not necessarily. I mean, we always have radio contact. They don't have to say anything, of course. Most of them can't take their hands off the brakes or anything like that. But I usually fly a bit ahead, maybe a few hundred meters or so. Sometimes I also tell them, okay, I'm going to test something out, wait a moment in the thermals, see if the line is already good or if there's some turbulence or something like that; I'll fly that a bit ahead, but I also tell them what my basis for decisions is, why I'm flying this way, and so on, so that they can really benefit from it, and in most cases, there are really beautiful flights. But there are also times when I crash somewhere and then I just have to do it from the ground, exactly.
So, you're basically offering guided flying. Have you ever flown for performance yourself, or XC-point oriented, where you'd say, I really want to be at the top of some rankings?
So, in terms of performance,
Yeah. I've done some smaller competitions, but I realized pretty quickly that I don't have a handle on my own risk. I just get into this mode because of that competitive spirit that develops so quickly when you're flying in a thermal with 120 others and everyone is racing along these mountain forests or whatever, you just immediately switch into that mode. And looking back, I reflected and said, okay, I actually took too much risk for what it's ultimately worth. And that's probably why I don't fit into this scene very well. Even though it's super helpful, you learn a lot, and there are definitely people who manage this risk better than I do now.
I noticed that. I was with a group in Krushevo in North Macedonia last year, I think, or the year before; there were some European championships or something going on at the same time, and then this pool passed me and I had my group trailing behind, and then this pool went by and suddenly I was back in that mode, full throttle and just flying along with them. And it's just, you notice immediately, it goes bang and then you're right back in it. But yeah, that is, I think personally I didn't have the risk under control, and I think a lot of people probably don't either. There are always accidents that aren't necessary because you're flying too close to stuff, at full acceleration, maybe two meters above some woods, where if anything happens, there's just not much you can do.
But I think there are also people who have that under control, and that's why I recommend that for beginners—competitions can definitely be tried, like a Gin Wide Open or Schaber or whatever, there are various cool, small formats where it's not about winning, but about having an initial experience. Usually, they are accompanied by lectures or something like that, and I think that's a really cool way to move forward.
To what extent were you or are you competitive in cross-country flying, in the sense of saying, "Ah, how many points do I have?" and then comparing it—I go on an XContest and see what I flew and what others flew? Not at all. I observe it.
with growing concern that people have great, great flights and then land, they then almost obligatorily upload their flight—which isn't that big anyway, it's clear that people maintain the opportunities, they don't do 200, 300, 300 triangles. That means they upload it and then spend hours or a long time on the XContest and then, even though they had a wonderful, great flight, they're relatively quickly frustrated again because they say, "But those people flew even further, I could have done that too." And I believe therefore, for me and also for the customers I have, this competitive flying based on points and so on is, from my point of view, not always conducive to the sport of flying.
So, there's certainly the chance to develop yourself, but the chance for casual flyers to stand out up there is relatively low, right? Because there will always be someone who flew further and so on. And if those points are important to you, then it can lead to long-term frustration pretty quickly, I feel. And I don't feel that's particularly conducive to intrinsic motivation. You just said,
would you have a growing concern about that? Why growing?
Yes, you see that especially—I mean, you can already see that it's typically young men who try to compare themselves, who try to measure themselves in some way, maybe they can't even fly thermals properly yet and so on, and then they buy gliders because they think they can fly that far with them, they overextend themselves, and with the corresponding limits, it starts with frustration and ends with serious things. So, I do believe that there's a bit of... well, you really have to form a bit of a counterpoint, and that's also something we're really actively trying to do. You don't see the points with us, you see the routes, you see the day tracks, for example.
I find that very inspiring—the idea that you can say someone branched off a bit earlier, and you can see it all layered on top of each other, so you can say, "Okay, he pushed harder there and I didn't manage it." Or, "Ah, he was on the other side." So it's more about learning than a competition of "I have this many points, the other person has that many points." And that's also how this Alpstein Challenge topic came about, which we recently launched in collaboration with the XC team.
Santis, where it's not about collecting as many points as possible as quickly as you can, but rather about flying certain corners without pressure, simply reaching certain altitudes, getting those points—in the sense of flying those cylinders—and when you do it, or whether you were the highest one there or not, doesn't really matter. What's important is actually that you try it, and maybe it succeeds for one or another, and so far, these kinds of ideas have actually been well received.
Okay, Berni, finally, from all your experience with coaching and everything else, what tip do you have for the average pilot? What should they look out for to be able to say at the end of the day, "That was a great flight day"?
Several things, one of which is choosing the equipment carefully, meaning choosing the equipment that fits his level.
Typically, my recommendation is to fly with low-end material.
Really low-end, that can be A or B, whatever the rating is. You can't buy performance with a new glider or a particularly crazy vario or something like that; in the end, you still have to fly, and yeah, so that's one story of the technical side, if you want to put it that way, and the other, I think, is trying not to...
to set performance-oriented goals, but rather, for example, learning goals or performance goals where you say, today I just want to be the highest, for example, or the highest in the thermals. Or for example, I'd like to see this corner from above or I want to see,
accelerate, how that affects the glide ratio, or whatever goals, but it doesn't always have to be, like today I have to hit 40 kilometers or 40 points or whatever number, but I think you can really have beautiful goals here. I can give an example, I often fly with my groups, really, trying at least together, meaning you try to keep the entire group together permanently. That also means someone or several people always have to wait and others always have to push a bit more, but the experience of flying together, really permanently with only 100 meters between each other, that is so beautiful. It's just, you have such a shared experience, you see the same eagles, you see the same corners of the world, and I think such
Having goals, like saying, okay, today we're just flying together, waiting for each other for example, and stories like that—I think I find those kinds of goals much nicer than just pure performance goals. That
means that this might also be something where this networked flying can help even more in the future, in that paragliding, which is an individual sport, might become even more of a community sport in some way, even in the air.
I'm very convinced of that, yes. And you can already see that today; when thermals forecasts are released, there's a relatively quick discussion in the chats about where we're going tomorrow, which launch site and so on, what we could do together, and the more people who can get themselves out there to have a nice flight, the more they will meet up and land together. I believe, yes, the atmosphere at the landing field is really great; it's simply something wonderful when people are satisfied with themselves, with their performance, regardless of the performance of other people that you would then have to compare yourself to.
Okay, Bernie, thank you. You've talked about everything from technology to flight possibilities with Burn Air, and what people should pay the most attention to for their own happiness when flying. Thanks for the wealth of experience you have and for so much of what you basically contribute to the scene in terms of development and how you move it forward. And how that might ultimately manifest in flying. I'm just missing one thing now, last question, really the last one. Now, Burn Air Map is currently oriented towards the DACH regions—German-speaking regions. Will there ever be an international Burn Air Map, like an English version or at least a version expanded across Europe, which should actually be technically super easy from a basic standpoint, apart from having to translate everything.
Exactly, you have to translate everything. So technically, it's not that big of a deal, that's true. At the moment, it's not in the plans, I have to be honest. The DACH market—Germany, Austria, Switzerland—is just huge and it's still far from being fully covered. And I think I'd rather invest the time in mapping flight areas and capturing standardized XC flights and things like that, rather than spending a lot of time and money on translations right now. Plus, German-speaking pilots like to have a portal that is in German and not in English, where they might not understand it anymore. And I think I spend a relatively lot of time in South Africa each year, and they ask me almost daily if there will ever be an English version.
At least for now, it's not on the roadmap.
Okay. Burn Air will remain in German for now, but it'll be easily usable for everyone. Great. Bernie, thank you. I want to...
I also want to thank you very much, also for your commitment to the scene. I think the podcasts are really great, but also the blog. Seriously, that's a huge compliment. I think it's well-researched journalistically. It's written really neutrally, and even though you often write positively about Burn Air, it's really awesome. Also, sometimes reading feedback that is perhaps formulated more neutrally and is a bit more constructive is really awesome. So, I'm looking forward to what's next. Thank you so much for letting me participate here and for being part of your empire.
Yes, empire—well, if it's an empire, you've got an empire. But anyway, we hope you'll stick with us for a long time and keep pushing things forward, and I'm excited to see what's coming next. Bye, Bernie. Thank you very much.
Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much for being here.
Thank you for being here.