Pilot reported safety concerns; including an near midair collision; related to glider operations at ...

Attributes
ACN	1537380
Time
Date	201804
Local Time Of Day	1201-1800
Place
Locale Reference	N57.Airport
State Reference	PA
Environment
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Any Unknown or Unlisted Aircraft Manufacturer
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Parked
Flight Plan	None
Person 1
Function	Pilot Flying Single Pilot
Qualification	Flight Crew Instrument Flight Crew Private
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 31 Flight Crew Total 1410 Flight Crew Type 1410
Events
Anomaly	Conflict NMAC Deviation - Procedural FAR Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy
Miss Distance	Horizontal 20 Vertical 100

Narrative:

Glider operations for N57 are conducted on the grass area next to the active runway (6/24). This grass area is not an approved runway and it is described in the AFD as a recovery area for gliders. In fact; gliders are towed and launched from the grass area.I observed; while on the ground; a go-around by a powered aircraft due to a glider landing in the opposite direction to all other aircraft. The glider wing ended up on the active runway and a pilot was forced to go-around to avoid a collision. Gliders frequently do not announce their position in the pattern which compounds the risk.the members of the glider operation also remove the runway lights on one side of the runway and it was discovered later that two of the lights were re-installed in the wrong direction. At a minimum this creates confusion for planes landing at night.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Pilot reported safety concerns; including an NMAC; related to glider operations at N57.

Narrative: Glider operations for N57 are conducted on the grass area next to the active runway (6/24). This grass area is not an approved runway and it is described in the AFD as a recovery area for gliders. In fact; gliders are towed and launched from the grass area.I observed; while on the ground; a go-around by a powered aircraft due to a glider landing in the opposite direction to all other aircraft. The glider wing ended up on the active runway and a pilot was forced to go-around to avoid a collision. Gliders frequently do not announce their position in the pattern which compounds the risk.The members of the glider operation also remove the runway lights on one side of the runway and it was discovered later that two of the lights were re-installed in the wrong direction. At a minimum this creates confusion for planes landing at night.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.

Pilot reported safety concerns; including an near midair collision; related to glider operations at N57.