ORIGINAL: go vertical
in feb. i started a thread in the 3d forom about how i felt 3d flying was geting out of hand at some events i got crusifid by the guys who thought i was trying to cut into there fun it became a ego thing but we were having at least a debate about saftey when RCU locked the thread and ended the thread now that this tragic event has happend lets see if they lock this out [:@]
I don't think the type of flying (3D, F3A, scale, turbines or whatever) makes a whole lot of difference -- in fact a 3D plane is more likely to be flying low and slow if/when problems hit and is therefore less likely to have a lot of kinetic energy or travel as far before hitting the ground.
I think I'd rather be hit by a large, slow-flying plane than a smaller one with a sharp nose and wings travelling at 200mph.
But the bottom line is that it behoves *all* fliers to consider safety as their *first* priority at all times.
Plan your turns and flight paths so that if something does happen, the plane is pointing in a safe direction as often as possible throughout the flight (ie: limit the amount of time the model spends pointed directly at the flight-line/public.
We have a lot of turbine activity at our field and I've only seen one plan crash (just) behind the area we consider to be the safety line. Neither PCM nor PPM would have saved that baby -- an onboard fire burnt up the servo leads and all control was lost at the last minute. All the other (not too infrequent) crashes have been well away from the flight line and public area -- due mainly to very sensible and safe flying practices.