I was just gliding along, and a red tail killed the glider.
Do you have any idea why ? And how can this be prevented ?

Take a shotgun to the field and get the birds before they get you?

You must have been flying is a "Restricted" zone - as determined NOT by AMA, FCC, FAA, but Red Tailed Zone!!!!

Bummer about your glider. Im guessing that was your first dog fight.[&:]
Im pretty sure Red Tails are very territorial and you invaded his airspace. By scaring or taking your glider out, he thought he would have less compitition for food. JMO
I saw a similar incident here in NC some years ago. Luckily though that glider just suffered some covering damage. What to do about it. I dont know. Most people just steer clear of birds of prey when possible.

I'm hoping nobody takes post #2 seriously, because shooting a red tailed hawk can get you a trip to the grey bar hotel.

Yes, it is a joke.

Well as long as we have established that its illegal to shoot a bird of prey.....I have chased buzzards and I have been chased by buzzards, but these were 1/2a planes, you can bring out of a thermal pretty quick as a rule....Rog

I think it is more probable at this time of year, that you appeared to be a threat to the birds mating territory more than food. I've flown with hawks, eagles, falcons and other birds of prey for years (read that decades) without incident, they are great indicators of lift. I currently fly in bald eagle and redtail territory and have both BE and redtail nests on my property. Would the color scheme of your sailplane be anywhere close to a birds coloring?

simple solution, dont fly a glider ive had birds of prey look at my ENGINE powered planes while i was flying (even follow me around) but once they get close enough to attack they realize theirs a big spinning knife on the front and usually leave, w/o the big spinning knife you have problems (as you have expierenced).
one time the bird wouldnt leave me alone, i had a spad so i wasnt worried about looseing to the bird, so i went from prey to preditor and started chaseing it. it flew away rather quick .
bird vs engine, i bet on the engine every time

Back in the mid to late 80's there was a cub flying at a county park just south of San Jose, Ca. There is a lot of hawks in the area. One guy decided to get into a dog fight with one. and he won. The rangers saw it and the club lost a very nice flying site as a result.

We have a lot of hawks, golden eagles, buzards, ducks, geese, and birds I wouldn't begin to know the name of all of them. We seem to get along OK. We've had one "mid air" with a duck in the almost 5 years I've been in the club, and it was big news at the time, so it isn't very common. If you drive along Hwy 1which is near our field, you will find the cars do much more damage to the bird population than our planes do, maybe three or four magnitudes or more.

Dodge the birds, and if they go after your plane, get it on the ground. Of course, that may not be safe either. When I was early in the training phase, I would go out to the field and taxi up and down the runway without a wing. One day, there was a hawk in the area. I woud run off the runway and tip over, and the hawk was come swooping in for a look. It never attacked the plane, but it made about four or five passes that day in about a 30 minute time. I got a lot of walking out an retriving my plane during the same time. Another day, one of the Hawks made a kill on a ground squirel next to the runway. Imade a dozen or so passes by it, not much more than 20 ft away and it wasn't bothered until I went out to retireve the plane after it ran off the edge of the runway. As soon as I turned away and started back to the pits with the plane, it was back to dinnner.

For the most part, your plane is just another bird in the air to the real birds.

Chalk up your loss to Mother Nature 1, Man 0 for the day.

Don

Did not do great in ornithology at college...but for most animals and even fish for that matter,,dark equals food, bright equals enemy and or mating/territory....this time of year here, food is just starting to become more available in the wild, which in turn, sets the onset of mating........of course it could just as well be..."dang yellow 4 stars, hey guys lets go bust that thing in half"!!!!!!!!!Wierd thing here, a guinea hen has taken up residence, (not my field..my house) lots of us feed it ( I am a critter feeder during the winter) but it is male and crows in the morning for short bursts...inside our city limits you can not have a rooster, but you can have chickens (there's 100k people in town here) so we are in a quandary as to it mating (she disappeared last year)..I feel for the poor bird...Rog

Maybe it had something to do with the gerbil you had strapped into the pilots seat?
Poor Mr McFuzzy, probably scared him worse than your flying

Just like in The World According to Garp, you'll never have to worry about it happening to you again.

Kurt

i like your style

Leave my food alone and I'll leave your plane alone.

note:this pic was taken at a RC airfield.

I chased a hawk once......long story short, after he got on my six I dove for the deck...so did he.......then he broke left...... I turned right on final.....

That's a sweet picture. I don't understand how anyone could kill one of those.

I think it had to be the plane type and color. This happened to me and my bro.
We have red tails around here and we always see them right by where we live. We also see them down at the local field alot where we fly. When we still had our sailplanes...I had a solid yellow plane that was about the size of a hawks wingspan...and my bro and the same plane but it was white with some black. Now, when we did the sailing part of flying with no motor you could mistake it for a bird pretty easily just catching some updrafts. One day I flew mine no problems. I saw a pair of hawks but it was fine. My bro flew up and after it was sailing for a few minutes...it just got wrecked. It was kinda hilarious since they weren't expesnive planes...but I was surpirsed that mine was left unharmed. Try painting your plane some color that red tails find unrealistic or non-threatening...but I honestly have no idea what color. Maybe just regardless the hawk will attack any threat whether it is real-looking or not...

Jester,
I'm not seeing where Tailskid, or anyone else, has suggested shooting
at anything.
What am I missing?
KW_Counter

The most fun I had, one day on the slopes northeast of Flagstaff, AZ, was finding raven talon scars on the BOTTOM of my fuselage and wings after the flight! We must have chased each other around that slope for 10 minutes or more. It was great fun!

The original post #2 has been removed, apparently. Mentioned a shotgun.

Yes, that appears to be the case. I'm surprised at some of the reactions. I was just trying to inject as little humor since I would be pretty bummed if I lost an airplane that way. I wasn't actually advocating going out to the flying field and killing all the wildlife. Watching all of the birds, rabbits, coyotes and other animals is sometimes as interesting as the flying at our club.

Apparently some people can get really sensitive about the subject. If anyone got offended, sorry about that but on the same token, maybe we all need to lighten up about stuff now and then.... just a little.

Some comments made either in jest or if they actually reflect a person's feelings are probably better off just left unsaid. It's sometimes better to judge on the side of caution.

Don't feed the glider mice so the hawk doesn't see it as competion???!!

We had a hawk visit d=uring a fun fly a couple of years ago. It was a bit breazy and the most wouldn't fly. The hawk flew across the end of the runway dropped down to arounf 10' of the deck and stared circling. 10 minutes later he was an 1/8 mile away from the field and to high to see!
We had definately been schooled[8D]
A flock of white pelicans migrated past our field and one of the guys started up after 'em the rest of the guys BOOed him out of that idea pretty quick. Several guys got rather testy that he would even consider chasing birds.

Well, while we may not necessarily agree 100% on the exact nature of the post in question, I understand that there are rules for forum posting and I would never intentionally break them. Plus I understand the position you can be put in as a moderator and the decisions that sometimes have to be made. No problem here on my end.