What happened
On January 2, 2004, a Glaser Dirks DG-600 glider, registration EC-FIZ, departed from the Fuentemilanos Aerodrome for a planned slope flight. The aircraft was being towed by a powered aircraft and was released at an altitude of approximately 700 meters above the aerodrome, near the village of Otero de Herreros.
Following the release, the pilot headed toward the Hoya de Otero area within the Sierra del Quintanar mountains. While the initial stages of the flight were conducted under visible conditions, the area was experiencing orographic cloud cover. As the glider maneuvered through the mountains, it entered a layer of clouds that had descended to altitudes between 600 and 700 meters. During this period, the pilot lost visual contact with the ground, leading to a high-speed impact with the terrain.
The investigation
The investigation examined the flight path using recovered data from the aircraft's onboard GPS and flight calculator. Although the flight recorder's primary logger was unreadable, investigators successfully retrieved data from the SR 940 calculator, which confirmed the flight's parameters. The data indicated that the glider had been descending smoothly before a significant increase in airspeed occurred just prior to the impact.
Investigators also reviewed the meteorological conditions, noting that while the pilot was qualified and the aircraft was fully airworthy, the presence of low-hanging clouds significantly restricted visibility. The search for the wreckage was delayed by two days due to adverse weather and the lack of an emergency locator transmitter (ELT) on the glider, which hindered the rapid identification of the crash site.