Might have helped he

AccidentoccurredMonday, February 19, 1990inCABINS, WV
Probable Cause Approval Date:09/21/1992
Aircraft:ROLLADEN-SCHNEIDER LS-6, registration:N511M
Injuries: 1 Fatal.
WITNESSES REPORTED SEEING THE GLIDER FLYING NORMALLY AT A LOW ALTITUDE
AND APPEARED AS IF IT WAS GOING TO LAND. DURING THE LANDING APPROACH,
THE GLIDER CONTACTED A POWER LINE WHICH SLICED THROUGH THE CANOPY,
FATALLY INJURING THE PILOT. THE GLIDER THEN DESCENDED TO THE TERRAIN AND
CONTACTED A BARBED WIRE FENCE PRIOR TO COMING TO REST. FLAPS WERE FOUND
IN THE FULL DOWN POSITION AND THE LANDING GEAR WAS EXTENDED. OTHER
PILOTS IN THE AREA REPORTED MODERATE TO SEVERE TURBULENCE AND STRONG
ROTOR ACTIVITY IN THE AREA OF THE ACCIDENT SITE.

The National Transportation Safety Board determines the probable
cause(s) of this accident as follows:

* THE PILOT FAILED TO DETECT AND REMAIN CLEAR OF THE POWER LINE WHICH
CROSSED THE FIELD IN WHICH HE WAS ATTEMPTING TO LAND. CONTRIBUTING
TO THE ACCIDENT WAS THE MODERATE TO SEVERE TURBULENCE IN THE AREA AT
THE TIME OF THE ACCIDENT.




On 12/7/2015 8:44 AM, wrote:
On Monday, December 7, 2015 at 10:00:32 AM UTC-5, wrote:
The wire deflectors are no longer mandatory in the Netherlands, due to European regulations considering them to be a hinder to free trade inside the European Union (same with yellow car headlights in France). They are rarely installed in newer gliders, and sometimes deleted from older ones. But they did save some lives in the past.
Our towplane (CalAir) was a cropduster in its previous life. It still
has the anti-wire features: wire cutter up the canopy plus a wire from
the top of the cockpit to the top of the rudder (to avoid having a wire
saw off the rudder). The airport owner spent a lot of time dusting
crops and has quite a few wire encounter stories. I heard of two glider-wire
encounters in the past few years here in the SE US: one in Chilhowee in 2011
and one this past fall at Blue Ridge. Both were cases of hitting power lines
in the air. One resulted in no injuries and a repairable glider, and the other
almost killed the pilot and destroyed the plane. Both were fortunate that
the wire broke without hitting the pilot (as I understand it): the Blue Ridge
pilot was injured by the nose-down impact.

Matt

--
Dan, 5J