Glider pilot dies after mid-air collision with light aircraft

A man died after two gliders and a light aircraft collided yesterday afternoon.

Melvin Brown, an aviation historian from Buckinghamshire, spoke of his horror as he saw the pilot falling to his death. "I heard a tremendous loud bang in the sky above me. I realised straight away it was probably a plane," he said.

"The next thing I saw was bits of aeroplane tumbling out of the sky all around us. I was frightened that some of it was going to hit us.

"Then I saw the pilot coming down with his parachute deployed, but it was a Roman candle ? that's when the chute doesn't open properly.

"He was coming down fast and I could hear him screaming. He landed only about 50 feet from us. I rushed over but it was obvious he was dead.

"It was terrible, there was absolutely nothing we could do," Mr Brown said.

The accident happened over the border of Warwickshire and Worcestershire, when a glider being towed by a light aircraft collided with a second glider, which was already in free flight, at about 1,500ft (450m).

One glider came down in a field near the village of South Littleton, and a paramedic at the scene confirmed that the pilot had died in the wreckage. Police said the tug, or aeroplane towing one of the gliders, managed to fly back to its base in the gliding centre to make a safe landing.

All the aircraft were based at the nearby Bidford Gliding Centre in Warwickshire. Two RAF helicopters flew to the scene. A West Midlands air ambulance and a police helicopter also attended. A second pilot was taken to Worcester Royal Infirmary for treatment but was not believed to be seriously injured. No one on the ground was hurt in the accident.

Inspector Mark Steel, of West Mercia police, said: "The dead man was in one of the gliders. We are not sure which aircraft the injured man, who is not seriously hurt, was in at this stage." Police sealed off the site, and officers from the Air Accident Investigation Branch were on their way to the scene.

A pilot was seriously hurt in another gliding accident near Usk in south Wales yesterday.