Glider crash caught on film 💥 Instructor reacts!

This was perhaps one of the most dramatic glider accidents caught on video and by a camera, capturing the exact moments of impact. This accident provides another useful lessons for all glider pilots, that shows no matter your experience you can be caught out by optical illusions, and weather conditions.

Original video:
Accident reports:

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00:00 The Crash
00:35 1955 Airshow Crash
01:03 Video Analysis
01:58 Photography Analysis
02:33 Accident Report
03:55 Airspeed Illusion
04:38 Key Lessons

[johnmosesbrowning]

0:44 The reason for this accident was that part of the seatbelt holding the pilot in the upside down cockpit came loose and hit the pilot Albert Falderbaum in the eye. Trough shock and pain he gave a wrong input to the planes controls hitting the tarmac with his vertical stabilizer. Falderbaum survived the Crash after two weeks in a coma. He was killed six years later when testing a new piston engine Aircraft (Siebel SIAT 222 Reg.: D-EKYT. Thanks for the video. Regards from Germany.

[solracer]

My commercial airplane pilot father who started out in biplanes maintained that the three cardinal rules of flying were "1) keep your airspeed, 2) keep your airspeed and 3) God d*mnit keep your airspeed!". The fact that he survived 4 years of naval flying and 27 years of commercial flight during the dangerous 40s, 50s an 60s without a single incident or emergency shows how seriously he took those.

[SubTroppo]

Albert Falderbaum was the pilot in the first crash and he probably got into gliding as a consequence of Germany being constrained (after 1918) in matters of military aviation and developed gliders and gliding in a big way. He did not die in the accident shown but was killed in trying to parachute out of a new sports aircraft (as a test pilot) six years later in 1961. [German Wikipedia]

[mikeandtriciajohnson]

As a relatively inexperienced pilot about 46 years ago I did almost exactly the same in a K18 from an airtow cable break at just under circuit height over the boundary hedge. I made a right turn back to land down wind and found that I needed to make a much tighter turn than I initially planned.
I stalled and came in on the right wing and everything crumbled around me. I broke a lot of bones all down my right side and spent nearly 6 months in hospital, the worst being the physio. However within a further 6 months I was able to take up a flying scholarship.
The crash taught me all about recognising an insipient stall/spin, I never entered an unintentional stall after that.

[ColinWatters]

I'm an ex glider pilot and was at Shorham and saw the crash. Surprised when it appeared he was going for a down wind landing rather than just keeping the turn going and landing into wind. Conditions were breezy but I didn't think it was unflyable.

[keegan]

I would rather be down here wishing I was up there than being up there wishing I was down here.
Instruction I was given when assessing weather conditions prior to flight.

[VanDerKeelenBenny]

I have been flying RC planes for 18 years, but the principle is the same: if you fly low with or without an engine that no longer works, "never take sharp turns" because then you lose speed and control of your plane!

[gregculverwell]

It's actually amazing how survivable accidents in gliders can be.
Back in 90s I used to fly them.
The one day we were watching a guy coming in very low & slow. We expected him to land in the corn fields which were on the end he was approaching from but he persisted.
As he crossed the fence he had to make a 30 deg turn to align with the runway and at that moment his left wing decided to stop flying.
He hit the ground at a near 90 deg bank and sheared of about half the wing. The glider then cartwheeled, rotated 180 without touching the nose and tore of the right wing followed by the tail.
He was completely unharmed sitting in the front half of the fuselage.

[cartmanrlsusall]

That first pilot who clipped off his rudder was a master pilot he kept his cool and made a better landing than you could expect

[mrdjangofreeman]

Thx from a gliding rookie, interesting as not just a show, but an explanation and advises.

[TuomasLehtinen-xm]

I hit the subscribe button because you sold it so well! "It doesn't cost anything, and it really helps the channel out". Brilliant!

[miniphase]

Never noticed before but in the photo where the wing tip has struck the ground, you can see a big crease in the fuselage right through the glad to hear the pilot survived.

[jackoneil]

Thanks for visiting this. Many lessons indeed, but the big one that strikes me, is giving in to pressure when you have a lot of cards clearly showing that are stacked against you. "No Old-Bold Test Pilots" eh? The survivors respect the deck, know how to read the cards and when to fold.
On another note, many years ago I prototyped a voice alert system, that among several parameters monitored airspeed and rate of climb or decent and provides a "SLOW!" alert when a few kts. above stall, "STALL SPEED!" at indicated Stall speed, and "SINK RATE!" when airspeed was at or below normal approach speed and sink rate was above 1000 Feet per min. I test flew it in an old Bonanza I had, as I knew someone who stalled and killed himself and his wife in a Bonanza, and they are a bit insidious when it comes to approach and departure stalls. I found it a worthwhile safety feature, and I would be curious if you or anyone else has any opinion as to if such a device might be useful and of interest in a sailplane or other aircraft?

[andyrbush]

I stopped going to airshows; showoffs cause too many tragedies. I have a UK PPL but also fly RC planes. I could see from my RC experience that he had no chance of a successful turn in that weather and altitude.

[lawrencemartin]

Ouch!! Very glad the pilot survived this. Incredible that he even crawled out unaided!! 😮

[imbok]

Thank you, I always learn something from your expert analysis and this is no different.. Sticking to solid fundamentals and procedures is the key to safe flying. Planning for the worst is the best way to avoid disaster. I'm happy the pilot survived, that was a very scary crash! Let's all stay humble and open minded about flying safely.

[clcaptain]

The glider crashed for one reason and one reason only; he exceeded the critical angle of attack. Plain and simple. You do that, it stalls. It's not necessarily about airspeed; you can stall a wing at almost any airspeed if you exceed the angle of attack. For example, a wing will stall at a significantly higher airspeed when you pull Gs in a turn.

[contessa.adella]

You can see the point of disaster strike at 1:47. He pulls up while still crosswind in a slightly climbing left turn, visibly losing airspeed and the stall kicks in immediately this happens. If he had kept the nose down that wing would have not stalled…but I think he was trying to tighten the base leg turn to line up with the strip before his energy bled away. Too slow, too tight….

[tonyascaso]

The old stall spin, will we ever learn. I really like the still photo right before the crash. Elevator full up!

[Fidd-mcsz]

The cause was not having considered an early pull-off from the tow - and what would happen after that. Had he decided to abandon the aerobatics after ditching the tow, he'd likely have made a safe landing, and "endured" a short retrieval back to the flight-line. This is the same runway at Shoreham (21 as was) which the Hawker Hunter crashed parallel to.