No injuries. Cause unknown according to the journalist… I reckon it may have been an engine failure?
Most of the times I came across such a nasty issue was that simply the glider pilot ran out of beer.
It is still unclear to pedestrians that not every off airport landing is an emergency. Many decades ago I had to land on a field with a Ka8. While resting under the wing waiting for my team to pick me up with a trailer i was approached by passers by who had seen me land. When they started giving cpr to me i woke up and kindly refused.
Obviously it’s controlled off-field landing. He either didn’t have other options at that moment or underestimated grass hight. I had few off-field landings in my gliding career but never to grass so high. It should be a non event for any glider pilot.
slowflyer wrote:
While resting under the wing waiting for my team to pick me up with a trailer i was approached by passers by who had seen me land. When they started giving cpr to me i woke up
That is hilarious
It is still unclear to pedestrians that not every off airport landing is an emergency. Many decades ago I had to land on a field with a Ka8.
While ago I landed in a field near a car road, I had coast guards, police and ambulance…seems everybody passing around reported a crash, this when we decided to walk back as it start to get serious instead of going to the nearby pub to hang with the locals
In the other hand it’s easy to break a glider in a field like the one in the news article, the tail comes out first with tall crops
Our club went on a field trip to Aboyne (Deeside Glider Club) for a week of flying a few years ago. One of our members couldn’t quite make it back to the airfield, and landed the PZL Junior in a field about 5 miles out.
The person in the nearby house was obviously a new resident, because she had an English accent and she called the police reporting a “plane crash” (longer standing residents are used to the occasional glider setting down in a field). A horde of police showed up to the “plane crash” (and breathalyzed our pilot!). Of course we did the usual thing and showed up with the trailer, derigged the glider, and towed it back to the airfield.
In days of yore I drove a steam roller around the countryside each summer (the clue is in my avatar). Not the quietest of conveyances, it’s unusual to hear anything above the sound of the steel wheels and clanging gears. One day, energetically tackling a steep hill, a ‘swooshing’ noise that could only be a burst steam pipe got my attention. But there was no escaping steam … instead a glider swooped right overhead and landed in the field directly alongside. My belching funnel must have given him a last minute into wind line up.
Unfortunately I could not stop and chat – steep hills and steam rollers are not best bedfellows!