Lemmy Tanner update

From Otago Daily Times:
http://www.odt.co.nz/the-regions/nor...-memory-impact

Glider pilot Lemmy Tanner cannot remember the moment his aircraft
slammed into a hillside at Omarama last Friday.

The crash - which is being investigated by the Civil Aviation
Authority - killed fellow glider pilot Ichiro Murai (54), of Japan,
and left Mr Tanner with serious injuries.

Speaking to the Otago Daily Times from Dunedin Hospital yesterday, the
68-year-old Englishman said his last recollection in the moments
leading up to the crash was of warning Mr Murai the glider was too
close to the slopes of Mount St Cuthbert.

The Duo Discus two-seater glider was being piloted by Mr Murai, seated
in front of Mr Tanner, when the accident occurred about 2pm, Mr Tanner
said.

"I just remember saying we were too close in to the hillside, and then
I don't remember anything until waking up in the wreckage," he said.

The glider had just launched from the nearby Omarama airfield, and was
undertaking a normal thermalling manoeuvre to gain height - which
involved circling near the hillside to take advantage of air currents
- when the accident happened.

Mr Murai - with about 1000 hours' flying experience to his name - was
in Omarama for a series of gliding flights with Omarama-based
instructors, including Mr Tanner, and had undertaken other flights
earlier in the week without incident, Mr Tanner said.

Mr Tanner only met Mr Murai that week, and "hadn't really had much to
do with him" prior to Friday's fatal flight.

Mr Tanner said he could not confirm an account by GlideOmarama owner
Gavin Wills, published in a community newsletter, that the glider's
wing had struck a partially obscured rock.

"I can't say that because I don't remember hitting the ground," he
said.

Mr Wills yesterday told the ODT the crash may have also been the
result of a "miscommunication" between the pair, leading to Mr Murai
trying a last - fatal - turn when too close, having mistakenly thought
that was Mr Tanner's instruction.

The complete story might never be known unless Mr Tanner's
recollection of the crash returned, Mr Wills said.

Mr Tanner received two broken ribs, a punctured lung and fractures of
a lumbar vertebrae, his pelvis, sternum and right heel bone.

He was flown to Omarama and then on to Dunedin Hospital, underwent an
operation, and remained in the hospital's intensive care unit until
being transferred to a ward on Monday.

He faces about three weeks of rehabilitation before he can expect to
be released.

A large group of friends had gathered to support Mr Tanner - a former
RAF fighter-bomber pilot and commercial helicopter pilot with
worldwide experience.

He plans to return to the UK a few weeks after his release from
hospital and has no plans to give up gliding.