Lherm parachuted safely and started walking over difficult terrain to the main road about five kilometres from where he landed. Excellent on-ground team work and coordination by the World Glide organisation personnel enabled a helicopter and two doctors to be at the scene within 50 minutes of the accident. GPS position reports from the observing USA team glider materially assisted in immediately locating the pilot and the crash site. The sailplane is a total write-off and is being retrieved tonight . It will be assessed tomorrow and hopefully the true cause of the accident will be pinpointed.
Nothing is salvageable.
It appears that the pilot was trying to jump from one wave system to another before he became engulfed in the primary rotor system. Lherm is uninjured but obviously shaken and is at present resting back at the Omarama airfield French team headquarters. Lherm has been gliding for 26 years, has flown 12000 hours and is the current national French champion gliding pilot. He has also been three time European champion and has had considerable experience flying in the Alps and Pyrennees. All remaining 90 sailplanes had a successful day's flying at Omarama today, some reaching heights of 11,000 feet.