On 13 Oct 2016, at 11:51 AM, Angus Stewart <[email protected]> wrote: > > Anyone else got some interesting eagle attack stories?
I heard a radio call from a bird-struck glider at Whyalla while I was soaring near Lochiel many years ago. A wedgie attacked one of AUGC’s gliders a long time ago (before my time). It was a known offender, and the club spent the rest of the day with the entire fleet swooping repeatedly over its nesting tree on the ridge while it looked on indignantly and, I supposed, occasionally ducked. I’m guessing we’ve all been dive-bombed during nesting season heaps of times. They usually come out of the sun, so you don’t see them until you catch them flashing past in the corner of your eye. I gather they think we’re birds, and they aim for the eyes (cockpit) or wingtip feathers, just like they do when they’re attacking other avians. I doubt their sense of scale is very well developed, and I reckon they almost always miss because they break off at the last second in surprise at the fact that we’re bigger than they are. I’ve always kept an eagle eye (heh) on them when thermalling, and never trust them when they’re above me. One of my best experiences in my life, though, was watching a wedgie playing in my wingtip vortices while I was turning in lift, slowly move up the span of the wing towards the fuselage, and look at me. Close enough that I could see the feathers around its eyes rustling in the wind. You really know you’ve been looked at when you’ve been looked at by an eagle in flight. - mark
_______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list [email protected] http://lists.base64.com.au/listinfo/aus-soaring
