Changes Coming to Logger Policies BFA/HACD Rules, Policies and Procedures 2010

During its fall meeting, the HACD reviewed logger scoring as it relates to PDG and FON tasks utilized at the 2009 US Nationals. All aspects of those two tasks including rules for pilot declarations and electronic scoring were reviewed. As a result of this review and experience gained at the 2009 Nationals, the HACD has decided to modify its method of electronic scoring utilizing GPS loggers.

In the 2010 competitive year, competitors will be permitted to utilize their personal GPS for purposes of achieving results of electronic measurements. These personal loggers must comply in all respects to the requirements specified in the event rules. In particular, your GPS must not use barometrically modified altitude. Altitude must be based on GPS satellite only just as previously required for your back-up GPS. In addition, you must provide the event organizer with a working download cable for your logger.

Competitors will also be required to carry the official event logger and it will be attached to the balloon as in the past but that unit will be the back up and validation for any readings taken from the competitor’s logger carried in the basket. The advantage of this method is that competitor’s will be able to see real-time results of their track and proximity to goals. The event organizer will supply competitors with a list of approved intersections available for pilot goal declarations along with the complete UTM coordinate. All pilots will be measured to the stated goal coordinate (even though it may not be the exact physical center of the intersection according to the official GPS due to typical GPS and mapping inaccuracies). We recognize there is no perfect system using logger scoring but we believe this method is the fairest and gives each competitor the ability to fly his GPS logger to the stated goal coordinate. This goal coordinate ‘represents’ the center of the intersection of two roads or a road and a railroad track per the rules.

We wanted to get the news of this change to all competitors in plenty of time for the upcoming flying season to enable you to practice using this method and ensure that you have the correct type of GPS logger for use in logger-based competitions. Keep in mind that if the competitor’s personal logger fails results will be based on the event logger attached to the balloon envelope just as in the past.