What I actually want with Paragliding Safety is to put the fun in the foreground, to have this positive approach, just together. We have a scene in the community that takes very good care of one another, which is very, very positive, but I think sometimes you could care even more about the others at the launch site. I often have an attitude where I think, okay, everyone is responsible for themselves, that's very strongly pronounced in flying and that's not my business, I don't want anything to do with it. But actually, I think it's a bad attitude. I have this very often, but I don't like it myself.
Podz-Glidz, the Lu-Glidz podcast. Stories from the cosmos of paragliding. Today with Timo Schlee, and I'm Lucian Haas.
Timo Schlee is an ordinary Gleitschirm-Blog that has taken on an unusual topic: safety. Timo feels that there is far too little talk in the scene about dealing with flight risks and how to reduce them. You could complain about this situation, or you can do something to change things in the scene. Timo has approached this in his own unique way. Over the years, he has collected and cataloged a lot of material on the topic of safety in paragliding. At first, just for himself, because he noticed that dealing with the things that interest him while flying isn't easy. Additionally, it motivated him to become a better pilot. Later, the now 32-year-old realized in conversations that his collection could also help others.
He launched a website called paraglidingsafety.com. There, you can dive as deep as you like into various safety topics and subtopics. The linked documents range from the mental side of flying to glider control, risk management, equipment choice, weather, assessing and choosing flight sites, all the way to the physical condition you're in when you take off. Why it's worth diving deep into this treasure trove of information—I'll be discussing that with Timo Schlee in this 119th episode of Podz-Glidz.
If you enjoy the podcast, please consider supporting my work as a patron. You can find out how to do that very easily on my Gleitschirm-Blog Lu-Glidz, specifically on the Fördern page.
Timo, you have a website called Paragliding Safety, and there's a quote by Paulo Coelho featured very prominently. It says that there is only one thing that makes a dream unreachable: the fear of failure. What does this sentence mean to you?
So I actually only discovered or, I think, first encountered the quote when I set up the website. But I think, for me personally, the content has stayed with me. Because in paragliding, or in general, yeah, sometimes you just have to take a step forward, try something new. And in paragliding, at least regularly, I think about what could go wrong. But to realize a dream, you just have to take that step.
When you go paragliding, what did you do? Were you afraid of failing while paragliding?
Not acutely, but I think you do feel fear during demanding flights or when trying out a new maneuver. For me, it's more like the typical bodily reactions, like tension or clear nervousness from the takeoff. So I don't really have fears of failure in that sense when flying. I think it's just too much fun for that. I usually have to brake myself when I want to try something new. And maybe think about it again to see if it's really a good idea. But I think if you prefer a steep learning curve, which is what I do, then fear is also part of it. In a healthy measure, I think.
Have you ever really failed while flying?
Sure, quite often, yeah. Usually, it's very funny in hindsight. I've flown over the garden. At Radarsee, during water training, I've had a few water landings, half-water landings, and so on, which were all good learning experiences. But in hindsight, they were clearly wrong decisions, a long chain of wrong decisions. I mean, you're over water to take the consequences out of the equation. That's why it's fun. But I've had that quite often, or on other flights, I think. Sometimes you do notice. Okay, now I've crossed boundaries here, my own or weather-related. And for me, that's already a failure.
Even if it turns out well. So if you say, I took off and should have recognized this bad weather front or whatever beforehand. I might still come down safely, but basically, I failed. I put myself in danger.
Exactly. I remember the flight. Back then, I was still flying a High-B glider and had a C glider just to get rid of it. I was in Greifenburg with that one, tried the Kreuzekrunde, and there wasn't a huge amount of wind, but there was some. I flew in relatively low behind a ridge and thought, okay, if I fly in the gas, it'll still be enough to get over, which it did. But then I hit a rotor and took a collapse. It wasn't a major event. I stalled out the hang-up. But I needed those skills. Because I had the wrong flight planning, the wrong flight path. I mean, in that case, you could have just flown an arc and then turned around on the other side without any problems.
It was pure speed versus risk.
Did you analyze it for yourself in a way that you later said, basically, I failed there?
Yeah, I am. I mean, I had two collapses or something, small ones, on the flight before that too. And for me, a collapse is actually almost a failure. So, for me, there shouldn't be any collapses when I fly, when I fly under normal conditions, for me.
Are you a safety fanatic?
Yeah, probably. But I think I also, sometimes I like to go out on purpose and do something sporty, something interesting. Or maybe I am a safety fanatic because I know that I sometimes like to overdo it a bit, whether it's flying or driving or whatever. And in those cases, you have to regulate yourself a bit.
You've set up a website, as I mentioned at the beginning, paragliding-safety.com. Why?
That has a long history. Many years ago, I started structuring safety topics for myself in a mind map. Back then, it was mainly podcasts from Cloud-Based Mayhem. There are many of them that are very content-rich. Very central. A lot on the topic of security as well. I picked out the highlights for myself. And then I kept collecting more and more topics in this mind map. For me, it was simply a structuring tool. I actually haven't worked on it much since then, like looking at things again or anything like that. But I collected it for myself like that.
And since I started flying, I've been part of a CVRTM during a leisure trip. I did the training there. It's an event where you can do the training as part of a leisure trip. And at some point, I thought we could talk about the topic of safety. Maybe especially in the direction of self-reflection. Where do you stand? Where are your blind spots? Where are you doing well? And that's when the idea came to me to use this mind map. And the others who organize the leisure trip liked it quite well. So I prepared something. And I think I carried it out with the participants about a year ago. It was very positive.
So, using a mind map, people reflected on where they stand regarding the various points—whether it's weather, flight technology, terrain selection, and so on. The feedback was so good that I thought I'd like to make it available to them. My mind map with the content, too—meaning with the links where they can find more information. Then I thought about the technical side. I realized that a website would be the best option for the others. In the end, it was quite a lot of work for me, but I think it was worth it. And that's how it developed from there.
Mind map, just so people can visualize it. It's basically like a topic tree. You say the main topic is safety—that would be the trunk. And from there, all sorts of different branches stem off, which you could then explore. And at the end, there are maybe individual links, like the leaves on the branches of a tree. You have one for, say, technical equipment. Another for weather questions. Another for terrain selection, which you just mentioned. And then, in your mind map, you find further links for each one, where you could dive much deeper into those specific topics individually.
Exactly. Everything is built with branches to structure the whole thing. The first level is topics like equipment, weather, terrain. The mental side, risk management. Just a few basics. And then it goes further. Under the mental side, there's psychology, human factors—the human element—and so on. That's how it's subdivided. At the end, there are always links, because we already have great content in the scene, just scattered around. My goal was more about making them quickly accessible. In that sense, if I want to look into psychology now, I can quickly find the aviation-specific topics and also find good stuff.
I mean, there isn't always great content on the internet—stuff that might not be very substantial or deep enough. So, based on my feeling, I just picked out the things I liked. Over time, whenever I came across something, I just added it. And that's the only way it could grow like this, because it just developed over the years.
It also says on this page that diving into all the topics surrounding safety in paragliding was a game changer for me. So, you're writing about yourself there. In what way was it a game changer?
I think it helped me just have more fun. Because I think if I feel like I'm flying sensibly, that I have enough safety margin, then I can relax more in the air. If I know something isn't right or that what I'm doing is somehow very risky, then you tend to tense up. I'm not as capable, not as open to observation when I'm flying XC. Or not as present for a maneuver when I'm trying something out. And I think that helped me. And also just having more things in view. So even small things that are safety-relevant. For example? Yes, well, the example actually comes to mind.
Because I also had the eVY2 podcast. And there I also heard about the brake line. That is really, I think, such a small thing that can have very large consequences. And I only discovered that for myself a few years ago. I then retrofitted all my gliders that didn't have vortices. And it's now a standard for me to pay attention to that. But if you don't know and don't pay attention. Yeah, and it's like that with many things. You can't know everything at the beginning. And you don't have that much systematic support to inform yourself broadly. You have very good podcasts, content, YouTube videos selectively. You might know Flybubble or Fly with Greg, your podcast. Also Cloudbase Mayhem, there's a lot in English. The DHV has good articles in DHV-Info, for example, DHV-Magazin.
But systematically gathering information across the board—I felt like that doesn't really exist in the scene yet. And that was also a justification for me to really put the work into this website, Paragliding Safety, the mind map. Otherwise, I wouldn't have done it. I didn't want to do anything that already exists.
Now, just briefly again for the people who were wondering earlier, what was it about the brake line? It was about the fact that if you wrap the brakes and you don't have brake twists on them where they automatically keep turning, the brake lines can wind up over time so that they shorten, and can even shorten dramatically, so that in the end it could become a safety issue. Which was then the case with Eva Wojtun's brake line, which led to her having an accident with it. The topic of safety. But if you now say, yeah, that was a game changer for me and I flew better with it, isn't safety also sometimes a fun-killer? Or this focus on safety, let's say, that you don't sometimes, yeah, that you basically deny yourself some experiences by looking at safety too much?
Yes,
If you exaggerate, then certainly. But I think there are differences. You can see whether I have many things in view or know about them and can then make conscious decisions. So, I also make conscious decisions for riskier activities or flights where I hope to have fun, but I can also consciously weigh whether I'm getting something out of the risk I'm taking. In English, that's called Risk and Reward. Risk-reward ratio comes a bit from business administration or economics. And that you can simply make a conscious decision there. And I don't think it has put any limits on the fun. I think I do things every now and then where I
take on more risk. Maybe an average flight. But where I already know relatively precisely beforehand, do I have the skills for it? Have I trained for it? Am I prepared for it? And I also invest a lot in training, ground handling, training over water, just so I can do more sporty flights that open up new landscapes for me or simply represent an adventure for me.
How can you bring the topic of safety—both for yourself and with your flying buddies or within your own club—more to the forefront without the people who are afraid of it feeling like they might lose their fun because of it?
Very difficult. I asked myself that a lot when I set up the website. And I just tried to convey my experience. That's why the claim is "have fun in the sky." I think it can actually be fun. How to convey it exactly, I have no idea. I don't have a golden path for that. I think a lot about conversation, just about being out there together. Maybe also about sensitizing people in the right way sometimes. In city squares or something, I find that very difficult. I often go there too, but I'd rather pull back than intervene somewhere because I don't know how I can phrase it positively so that it actually lands. I mean, you can always say something, but it's easier to create a defensive attitude.
But above all, with pilots you know well, just being open while out there, being open about it—not saying, "I had a collapse, but I pulled through and it was insane." Instead, just being honest and having a culture of honest exchange; I think that's already the key to moving this forward. Other than that, I don't have any particularly brilliant approaches for it.
Would it make sense to maybe do a kind of safety debriefing after every flight, either by yourself or with others you were with, where you just look back at what wasn't so great during the flight or where there was a risk? Could that have been avoided in any way, so you can move forward from there?
Yes, I definitely think so. When I was a very motivated beginner, I looked at every flight in my digital logbook and asked myself: where can I learn something? So, not just performance-oriented, but also safety-oriented, thinking about landings in bullet points. I eventually stopped doing that. I think that initial motivation fades away to some extent. And I often procrastinate on my flight debriefings, even with cross-country flights, because I'm not that performance-oriented with cross-country flying now—more so with aqua flying, where I do a lot of analysis afterwards. But I think I've experienced it with Flugreisen, for example, when a flight instructor brings up topics he observed in the group and you talk about them. I think that has a very big effect if you manage to recognize your own mistakes, which is often very difficult.
It often helps if you can tell each other. Especially with takeoffs, for example, if you watch videos of your own takeoff, you can see it if you're making very gross mistakes. But the details often remain hidden from yourself. And we already did that on flight trips. We made videos of the takeoffs and then discussed them together. That of course assumes a good feedback culture, or maybe just that you already know each other a bit or treat each other fairly. And we then pretty much dissected the takeoffs, which ultimately helped everyone. You can do things like that too. Even alone, if you have a track from a cross-country flight and know a bit about the weather, I've already received good debriefings from flight instructors.
Let's take a look
...into your side a bit. And I'm just picking out a few individual sentences or topics. And you can tell me a bit about them, the ones I simply find interesting. Among others, you quote there the US paraglider and ice climber Will Gatt, who likes to talk about the positive power of negative thinking. Do you like that sentence?
Yes, I like that one very much. That's why I included it there. The sentence comes from a podcast, the Cloud Press Mayhem Podcast by Gavin McClurg, which I listen to a lot. It's about how we have this mentality in our society today where, if I think positively, I can achieve anything. I need a positive mindset and then I can accomplish things, I can start a business, and I can move everything forward. But he, through his background in climbing as well, presents a different perspective. He says that this mentality is very dangerous when you do extreme sports or when you simply do things where you need risk management, where you have risks that might go beyond the usual extent.
And he says he tries to think more about what could go wrong here. He says, "I will look for the stone that will break the glass." So he looks for which stone will break the glass. He thinks about what could go wrong here without maneuvering himself into a negative mood, which is also a topic for some people before they start. But he just looks at it constructively, and then he has it on the face and can go into the move and deal with it. From that perspective, I found it very interesting because I think it's easy to get carried away. It's nice when you're out with a group, too.
And again, I look at it and think, if I do this and that, for me, the question is, is this maybe a stupid idea? I sometimes ask myself that. You like doing crazy things, and yeah, it's nice if you can keep doing that for longer.
On the page, you also mention the traffic light principle. What's the idea behind that?
Yes, if you imagine, for example, I arrive at the launch site and then, if I'm tired, there's a lot of wind, I might have a new glider recently, then I have several factors that are yellow for me now, maybe not red, let's say, so I've had the glider for a while, the wind is still there, I'm just a bit tired, but I have several factors that are yellow, then in total I might have a red for the day or for the launch or for the moment, and then I might skip the flight or decide on a more conservative flight.
or maybe I'll skip the dynamic moves at altitude. It's simply a tool you can use to more consciously deal with the whole risk management topic again. Right there at the launch site, simply and quickly.
Have you ever behaved according to this traffic light principle in a way where you actually said, "I've climbed up the mountain now, and I'm going to check in with myself, and then I realize, oh, this is on yellow, that's also yellow again, and I don't know, the line was twisted, it's showing me something during the start wasn't quite right. No, this is actually the stop sign for me. I'm going back down now." Have you ever experienced something like that, or did you actually push through?
Yeah, the longer I fly, the more often. Unfortunately, I didn't do it often at the beginning, but just started anyway. I learned from that. So, I recently at the Flying Chair event,
I was relatively tired and not that fit, and I just regularly, I'd go to the launch site—the others went to the upper launch site, I went to the lower launch site, and sometimes I even slept at the launch site for an hour, and then while the others were struggling with sinking, I slept and then later just geared up and flew for a while and landed earlier just to get something to eat and recover a bit. So, I've done that more often, or if I notice I'm out with a group and it's getting late in the evening, then in the morning I'm relatively,
not unfocused, but I'm just not that fit for flying and need a while to get into the swing of things, so I've already just delayed the takeoff. Often you don't lose much by doing that if you're not planning long distances, and then I was just fitter in the air and automatically had a shorter flight, so I had more energy left, maybe for the landing, but I have to admit, I haven't noticed that as often.
In that context, there's also that great sentence: you should keep an eye on the things that will probably kill you.
I think that's a really nice concept because it's very direct. For me, I've had this list for a year or two and I try to update it every now and then. Actually, nothing on my list has changed for a year now. For me, it's flying too aggressive, like too close to the terrain, flying in high winds—which I really enjoy, but as everyone knows, carries risks—or if I'm flying when I'm tired or after a long period of high stress and little sleep. Those are the factors for me, and I think it really helps to just deal with things very consciously and very concretely. I don't think it's for everyone to deal with it so offensively; it's more my personal style, which also helps me say, okay, maybe I'll leave that last stall alone or I don't need to try a heli now, I'm going to land.
That just helps me personally.
Killing is a pretty strong word. Probably many people won't want to associate that with flying, at least mentally, because they'd say if I were always thinking about something like that, it could kill me, then I'd rather not go up at all. Simply because, as they say, if I wanted to avoid this risk, I'd have to stay on the ground entirely. But you don't have that.
No, I think, similar to the topic "The Positive Power of Negative Thinking," it's more about awareness, about simply being sensitized. And for me, as I said, it's also a personal style. I mean, when I go driving, I have the same risk, and I also like to take a more sporty drive or something like that. And I know what kind of risk I'm taking. I mean, there are many ways to die and life is finite. For me, that's also something I consciously deal with and I don't have a problem with it. And the more you deal with things consciously and don't repress them, the...
better, actually. Another interesting topic on your side that I find is also the
Risk homeostasis. It's about people's willingness to take risks and how that changes under certain circumstances. Explain the background of that. What is it about?
I can't explain the etymology, but it's about perceived risk. Everyone has their own threshold regarding that; everyone has their own sense of risk, which is shaped by the past or by temperament. The concept of risk homeostasis states that if I reduce my risk now—whether through passive safety, for example, by using a lower-classified glider or saying I have a large protector or something like that—people tend to automatically increase the risk they take to get back to the same perceived risk. This was studied in the automotive sector, and I believe it was about the introduction of airbags back then.
and it was found that the number of accidents went up afterwards. Because people felt safer due to these safety mechanisms that were added, and since everyone's threshold is somehow always the same, well, that can change over your life of course, but roughly speaking, people just adjusted their risk tolerance again. I don't know how I became aware of this topic, probably again in the Cloudbase Mayhem podcast, but I've taken note of it because I think we have this danger in paragliding, especially with the whole glider discussion or the topic of how much glider control I actually need, the path taken is often, yeah, I'll take a lower-classified glider but I won't invest any time in my
...actual skills, and in this field, I think that plays a...
Risk homeostasis is already in there. Have you experienced that yourself? In your career, have you noticed, okay, at some point I just accepted more risk because I saw, okay, I'm making up for it by investing in whatever, in training or I have the new harness with the thicker protector or whatever.
Yeah, definitely, for me it was more along the lines of investing in training and then feeling safer, and maybe being safer in some aspects—I have to think about what exactly that was. So, I did a lot of SIV training relatively early on and then practiced a lot on my own and realized I could master these things, in a controlled environment, mind you, and then I think I let myself be tempted many times to do things where I'd say, I like flying in the air, so the risk is still elevated, and I tried things even in demanding conditions that I probably wouldn't have done if I hadn't had that SIV training experience. And the problem with that is that in my case, SIV training is a great tool, but it only teaches me, so to speak, to master my glider well if something goes wrong, or clearly to keep it open, logically, ground handling experience and so on, but it doesn't teach me, perhaps, to assess the weather correctly, the terrain, to choose a different flight route, or to simply act intelligently beforehand so that I don't have to call upon that safety in the first place.
That's what I learned, and I'm at the point now where I try to make myself aware of it: okay, I might feel safer than I actually am because I've done a lot of training, but especially if you only train one-sidedly, you still have open flanks somewhere.
That's the great thing about your website; you also offer a PDF for self-reflection where you can just fill it out, and it brings up all sorts of different topics, so you can see where you actually stand. Do you still do that regularly today, like saying, I'll print this thing out and go through it for myself again?
I've done it twice now, not more often, I have to admit. I did it once myself when I did it with the participants during the leisure trip, which was the first time I ever did it with a group, and I looked at it again later—how did I just assess myself by gut feeling back then? It's more about that gut feeling assessment, not about overthinking it forever, because I think you're actually pretty accurate; you already have a sense of where your problems are, so to speak, you often know that quite well. And then I did it again very consciously when I had a tree landing, as an accident debriefing, to see where I'm actually getting stuck, why I had that tree landing, and I already saw some very clear focal points there.
From that perspective, I think it's a great tool, actually a good idea to do it on a regular basis. The only thing I actually do on a regular basis, which I only recently started, is a bit of a safety debriefing for myself to see what my weak points are, where I want to develop further, exactly.
One more thing that's also mentioned on your side is survivor bias. What is that?
Yes, I think it's very similar to the topic of risk homeostasis, or you could also call it built-up risk homeostasis—so a built-up risk homeostasis. If you, for example, do demanding top landings and you do them often, and it always goes well, then the perceived risk for this specific action will decrease. It's simply this habituation effect; it always went well, but it's possible that it was very, very close every time, and in flying, it's also a problem that you don't have a direct feedback loop. You can do things that are very risky and get away with it without ever understanding what you did, that it might...
it was very close, but you only had a hard time getting injured, or even having a fatal accident. In psychology, I think it's called Survivorship Bias; there are studies in psychology that show how this affects every human being, and in flying, I think it's simply repeated risky actions where you get a perceived sense of safety that isn't actually there. I think there's also flying in high winds, or there are many different examples.
So you have a collapse, for example, it opens up, and you say, oh, everything was fine. Then you have another collapse, and then five times, and five times it's fine, and you say, I can actually handle a collapse, more or less, but it was never actually the decisive one, or the one where you're in turbulent air where the glider then does something completely different, and doesn't just obediently open up again like you did yourself during the SIV training in somewhat dead air over the lake, and then maybe thought, ah, I can do that, everything's going fine like this. Yeah, exactly. At the launch site, when you act like that and are with other people, are you known as the "worrywart" in your circle of friends? Rather not, I'd say.
Hard to say. I sometimes feel uncomfortable when I fly with very mixed pilot levels, because you're always thinking, yeah, this and that can happen. I personally, I often hold back too much, I don't know, even at the launch site where I fly regularly, at the Wanne in Pullingen, in Klippenstadt, I've asked myself many times after, for example, a tree landing, yeah, maybe I should have said something. When you see it, you see the pilots who are at risk, you see it immediately when people are scared, have never been to Klippenstadt, have group pressure because there are four other men with them, making big speeches and so on, but I
I don't think I... well, maybe I'm the one raising concerns beforehand, but at the launch site itself, I at least don't hope for it, because I don't like that at all. I think when you fly, your head has to be clear; there shouldn't be any bad stories or concerns. That's everyone's personal business, but even on the way to the launch site, I don't like it at all when people tell stories about collapses or put themselves down, in the sense of, "Yeah, it's so turbulent right now," or simply that it's important to do a conscious analysis. But this talk or these accident stories, even in the evening—accident stories—I find them only very limited in their usefulness if they are analyzed properly, but mostly they're just stories like, "it would be like this," and I don't think that's very useful.
You should rather foster a positive culture, like, wow, I managed that today, no matter how small it was, or I had fun, or something. These horror stories aren't good for us.
How do you bring the topic of safety to your conscious mind before a flight? Do you have some kind of checklist, at least in your head, an internal checklist where you say, there are just a few safety points that I go through again for myself before takeoff? Or do you say, no, I should have gone through that much earlier; before takeoff, I just want to look forward to flying?
Yeah, I think it mostly happens subconsciously; I think you have to put in the work beforehand. After the tree landing back then, I thought of a checklist, but I don't consciously follow it step-by-step very often. Instead, I think about whether I'm being impatient right now, because that was an issue for me—whether I'm being uncomfortable or comfortable, in the sense of wanting to make things easy for myself. I just check, what's my headspace like today? That's not something that just comes to me naturally; I just skip over it, including what my state of mind is like that day. At least I try to make myself aware of that, and what I actually use, I think about quite often before I really start—so once I've finished my start check, these three rules of thumb, I call them that,
I look at whether I've made mistakes beforehand, like some little things—did I somehow forget my radio, did I not connect my phone to the power bank, did I...
I somehow mess up something during the hook-up or the pre-flight check, and if there are three things, whether it's on the way to the flight area or right at takeoff, then for me that's a warning sign—something's not right here. I actually do a final check, like what my internal state is, my condition is; am I too tired or is something distracting me? But it usually happens quite unconsciously, and above all, I often only notice it when I haven't paid attention to it, I notice it afterwards: oh, those four things happened, I maybe should have skipped it that time. But I just have a few steps, I've also been looking into this Threat and Error Management concept more over the last year to see where the threats are, so to speak, like...
bad weather or being in a bad state for my flight, which can then lead to errors—basically, the errors just become more likely.
You've mentioned this tree landing several times now; it seems to have been quite a defining experience for you. From your perspective, what led to you landing in the tree?
Yeah, several things, as is often the case, it's often several things. I had worked a lot in the weeks before, I was stressed, I hadn't slept much and I was pretty—well, I'd say in hindsight, pretty flight-crazy. So in the analysis I said I was a bit flight-crazy, but I'd say I was already pretty flight-crazy and I already knew, there's quite a bit of wind, I'd better take my small glider instead. I still have an XXS glider that I loaded up properly and thought, well, then I can switch to that if necessary, because I always want to fly with that whenever possible. And then I already noticed down near the landing field, well, no chance of flying with the normal glider,
Alright, packed the other glider, heading up, nobody's starting at the top, thermal gusts, relatively windy, it's relatively flat after the launch site and then it was clear, no, no chance, not flying, and then I just lay down on a bench, tried to doze off a bit, I was tired, or chatted a bit with the pilot there, and then some cirrus clouds came in, completely full-scale, shaded it out and because of that the gusts dropped significantly, and then I watched it for a while, I think I was at the launch site for two hours, watched it for another half hour then got ready, the others didn't get ready with the normal big gliders, I started and it was mega, I mean, beautiful, demanding, with strong thermals in between every now and then, you could do wingovers, and and and
but not much forward speed with the small glider, then I was already getting a bit nervous and thought, if it stalls now, then I have a problem, the terrain flattens out and then there's a valley and then another mountain and you have to go over another small mountain to the landing field, and this valley already has many traps, so tree landings there are very risky, and then I got nervous, pretty nervous, and I think I just got scared and wondered what I'm going to do now, okay, do I try to fly to the landing field or do I top land at the large launch site, which isn't necessarily common there and certainly not easy to approach because it's flat, and then I thought, no chance, my skill level doesn't allow for that top landing, and then I saw a small spot down there, there's a hiking hut, thought as a last resort, I'll land there, I'll just wait now, I'll gain a bit more altitude, I'll just stay here, it's working out quite well
and then it went down, decelerating, and I just kept trying, trying, because I knew there was still a landing field below another launch site, and then at some point it was too low to fly to the landing field, and I tried to do a top landing at that small spot by the hiking hut—so a very, very demanding top landing, way above my level, because I don't do many top landings and even then only in the Swabian Alps, which I find relatively easy, and I messed up the approach, so then with climbing, thermals, turbulence and so on, and I realized, this isn't going to work, I knew a botched top landing on hard ground is extremely dangerous, so I turned into the wind and there was some small, dense vegetation to the left of the spot and then I...
forward into the wind with a relatively slowed speed, logically, because of the headwind, flew into these small fir trees; there was denser vegetation behind them and they caught me very well. I was uninjured, somehow 30 centimeters above the ground and with my nose about 20 centimeters in front of the tree trunk, I was able to hang on my tiptoes and then looked to see if I was injured, found nothing, and I didn't have a net, which is also common there; normally you take a radio, I forgot the radio that day because I wanted to go flying quickly, and yeah, so it was many things, I clearly blocked because I was scared in that moment, because I would have easily made it to the landing field,
most likely, I had the nozzle effect, I had the thermals on the slope, I had much more wind up on the slope than out in the valley, let's just say, and it probably wouldn't have sunk that much in the valley either, and I had a glider that is very small, where I would have made good progress again in the gas, so just a lot of stupid decisions. I think if I had been fit, I could have rocked the flight out, but still, it was maybe a bit unnecessary to try it at all, especially since it was easy half an hour later with the normal gliders and they all flew over me and, yeah, had their own thoughts about it.
From your perspective, and based on what you know from your pilot community, which you mainly move in, which aspects of the safety topic do you think are most overlooked or most likely to be suppressed?
I think very clearly, the whole mental side—human error, psychology—because it's simply not dealt with much in training; I've consciously noticed very little, though I can't remember exactly anymore, it's severely overlooked. I think dealing with fear is also rarely discussed, but more and more, I think. You've also had some great podcasts where that came up; it's coming up more, and I think the younger pilots are also open to it.
What else is being neglected? Ground handling, clearly, it's massively neglected across the board, I'd say. The pros do ground handling, or many of them do, I think, but the average commercial pilots do far too little.
And which safety topic has helped you the most personally, would you say?
Ground handling and water training have really helped me progress, and just dealing with it—so maybe risk management, but mainly the practical side—ground handling, feeling comfortable with the glider, and enjoying the launch site.
What do you say about the topic of residual risk? Does it actually exist at all, or is it ultimately just a word for everything we haven't really thought about mentally until now? Is all of that basically the residual risk?
Yes, I think we definitely have a residual risk, because there are things that can happen just above the ground where mastering the world wouldn't help either. If you were to get a severe collapse at a critical altitude or something like that, or maybe clearly weather observation—weather checks are never perfect. Maybe there's a small residual risk there. You definitely have a residual risk, as in many areas of life. And if you can't accept that, I think you shouldn't go paragliding, because the problem is, if you repress it and say there's no residual risk, then you're kind of cheating yourself. And I think you just have to accept it and try to minimize it.
To wrap things up, let's do a little topic jump. You mentioned it relatively early on—you got into flying through the CVJM. What does a Christian association for young people have to do with paragliding?
That's a very good question, and when I found out there was paragliding training as part of a CVJM event, I was really excited. I was active in paragliding back home myself, and paragliding was completely outside the idea of what people thought you did there. You mostly do sports, football, camps, and things like that, but no paragliding. And a CVJM member from CVJM Baden started that. Eckhard Roth, he started it many, many years ago. Yes, that's how I got to my paragliding training and I benefited a lot from it, enjoyed it very much. I'm still at at least one event every year to this day. It's basically a leisure event; there aren't any pilots there either.
You provide your own food with a kitchen team, and there's a partner flight school that handles the training, along with an instructor who accompanies the licensed pilots.
That means you also did, or you also had your training as part of one of those CVJM leisure trips. There was a flight instructor with them who just participated in this leisure trip and said, okay, we're going on a nice CVJM excursion and we can learn to fly, we can do that too.
Exactly, so we even had two flight instructors. One accompanied those who had already gotten their license in the years prior on the various trips to the flying areas, and the beginners were integrated into a course at a flight school that was already mixed at that time—meaning participants from outside the trip and participants from the event itself. And that was in the Southern Black Forest, Skymaster Paragliding, Walter Wagner, who was also a pioneer in the scene, and he did the training with us. And that was a lot of fun, in any case.
Now you said you're still involved in that today. In what way?
So, I'm currently part of the leadership team for paragliding at CVJM Baden, and we organize various events. I'm always just part of the leisure activities. We also have a kick-off flight, a safari where you go camping through the French Alps. Exactly. Are you a very religious person? Yes, definitely. I've been walking in faith since I was a teenager, I'm in a relationship with Jesus Christ, and that has shaped flying for me too—or I'd say, flying was a gift for me, and I always want to treat it as such. So I also have other commitments in different areas.
For me, it's also important that flying isn't my main thing, even if it might definitely be my main thing in terms of time during my vacation. But for me, it can actually never become the main thing of what defines me and what makes me who I am.
Does your focus on safety and, let's say, mindfulness also have something to do with your faith?
Maybe, yeah. I mean, I definitely just have a character where I'm very analytical. I'm an engineer, I make my living by analyzing things well and finding solutions. I'm very structured and analytical. It can go so far that it's almost annoying for some people. But it's just my way of approaching things, and I do that with paragliding too. I've seen a lot of how I just bring many character traits along with me into paragliding. You fly as you live, and you live as you fly, somehow.
When you connect safety and things like that with faith, I mean paragliders—safety—the term "safety apostle" immediately came to mind for me. Do you hear something like that often?
Not directly, but I've become a very strong voice of caution within this leadership team, certainly too much so. When you deal with a topic like this website so much and so intensely, it just moves very much to the forefront. I'm not actually trying to be that way and I don't want to be. I don't think I am for myself, either. I like doing crazy things, even outside of flying. I've always done risky things as a child and have survived them unscathed to this day, maybe because I was also very analytical even back then with various crazy things. So I don't actually want to go into that corner. What I actually want with Paragliding Safety is to put the fun in the foreground, to have this positive approach, just together.
We have a scene in the community that takes very good care of one another, which is very, very positive. But I think sometimes you could care even more about others at the launch site. I often have an attitude where I think, okay, everyone is responsible for themselves. That is very pronounced in flying and that's not my cup of tea. I don't want anything to do with that. But actually, I think it's a bad attitude. I have that very often, but I don't like it myself.
In what ways could we look out for each other by the sea without being annoying?
Yeah, by sometimes, when you know someone or just by bringing up things positively that aren't going so well in terms of flying—when people give me feedback on where I might be doing something risky, I find that very positive. Of course, that depends on your character and you have to be very careful with it. But at the launch site for me, it's also about not making it too easy. I've often made it easy for myself, as I said, with that cliff launch I often do. I like it, I have no problem with it, but you often see people who come who have never done a cliff launch before, and I've often made it easy for myself just to take off or turn away and not simply seek out a conversation with the people. Hey, are you new here? Hey, how's it going? Have you had an induction yet? Do you want some tips? I've also had great conversations when you're standing at the edge and people are looking down.
Yeah, that feeling, okay. And then you just chat casually about how to fly well here, where the thermals are, if someone isn't very experienced yet. It's just about taking some of that tension out, giving people a bit of ease, giving them a good feeling, and then maybe, if you have a conversation and someone is really stressed and really notices that it's not going to be good for them if they fly today—so maybe nothing happens, but they won't have a good flight—then you could maybe address something like that. I've often made it easy on myself. If you sometimes push yourself a bit more, it would really help.
In what capacity would you like to be in
...seen in the scene? Just as a normal pilot. I don't know if I'll pin it, but... A
a normal pilot who puts a lot of emphasis on safety, and maybe also a bit in the scene, at least among the people who look at your website and engage with it more intensively, which is highly recommended. I personally came across some topics when I was looking through it. I'll have to do something about that myself and keep going. Timo, thanks for this conversation and thanks for your initiative with this website. I think many people can benefit from it, right up to clubs that might actually say, let's have a club night and we'll each do some self-reflection and then look at where we can improve in joint discussions, or where a club might realize, hey, ten of us are actually having difficulty with the same point.
Maybe we can do something so that we can help each other improve, or take a joint course, or invite a speaker to help us out a bit more, or something like that. I think that based on what you provide on your website, people can make huge progress as a starting point. Thanks for that.
Thank you very much for the invitation, the great conversation, and also for your commitment to the podcast.
Yes, I'd love to.
That was Podz-Glidz episode 119 with Timo Schlee. You can find his website on paragliding safety culture at www.paragliding-safety.com. In the show notes for this episode on the Gleitschirm-Blog Lu-Glidz, you'll find some additional links. If you enjoyed the episode, then please subscribe to Podz-Glidz. You can do that anywhere podcasts are available. If you also leave a positive rating there, you'll be helping to make Podz-Glidz even better known. Or just tell your flying friends about it. You might have noticed that Podz-Glidz and Lu-Glidz are free of advertising. I do this out of conviction and in the interest of independence. Nevertheless, there is a lot of professional work and also costs involved in these products.
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