"Jim Logajan" wrote in message
...
wrote:
Amazing video...

I just noticed that the pilot appears to have been following another
aircraft (white winged). At least that is the way it looks because the
white area moves relative to the ground at times.


Yes, he was attempting to film a buddy.

From rec.aviation.soaring:

From:
Newsgroups: rec.aviation.soaring
Subject: Video of midair with tow rope
Date: 2 Jan 2007 10:57:13 -0800

Following is a translation of the French text posted regarding this
incident:

"The team (tow plane & glider) had just taken off and was in its
initial climb at speed between 110 & 130 kmh (68 - 81 mph), a normal
climb speed with a Duo-discuss on tow. A witness on the ground
confirmed that the ultralight and the towplane flew pretty much at the
same speed with converging tracks. The towplane did come from the
right but did not cross his path. As can be seen on the film, the
pilot of the ultralight, busy with filming the other
ultralightabsolutely did not react to avoid the accident. No avoidance
maneuver is seen on the film. This was confirmed to me by the witness
on the ground. The ultralight did not move to avoid the tow plane.
The tow plane, a DR400, turned knife-edge to the right (one sees the
belly of the plane on the film) in order not to take the full brunt of
the ultralight. I am a tow pilot and can assure you that one very
seldom banks over 30 degrees with a glider on tow. Furthermore the tow
pilot released the rope even before he felt the contact with the
ultralight. The accident would have been much worse if he had not done
so. The glider pilot also maneuvered to avoid the out-of-control
ultralight. His altitude allowed him to return to his field with part
of the cable below his port wing and trailing behind the glider.

Luckily the use of the ballistic parachute on the ultralight proved its
undeniable advantage as can be seen on the other video of the spin
tests of the MCR 01.

Other comments:

I confirm that the two ultralight pilots are Germans. The pilot was
not on the correct frequency, he merely followed his pal and filmed
him. When one knows the volume of traffic at Tallard (between 80,000
and 90,000 flights per year), that's frightening. Either that guy had
not studied navigation or his neurons were not all connected."

Cheers, Charles


--
Geoff
The Sea Hawk at Wow Way d0t Com
remove spaces and make the obvious substitutions to reply by mail
When immigration is outlawed, only outlaws will immigrate.