What happened
On October 6, 2001, a Centrair 201 B1 glider, registered F-CGMS, was performing a local flight after being towed from the Toulouse Bourg-Saint-Bernard aerodrome. Approximately twenty minutes into the flight, the pilot realized they had drifted too far from the airfield and were unable to locate sufficient rising air to maintain altitude.
Unable to return to the aerodrome, which was roughly five kilometers away, the pilot opted to perform an off-field landing in a cleared field. The terrain consisted of two distinct sections: a portion of harvested stubble and an area of previously cut alfalfa. The aircraft made initial contact with the ground on the stubble section. However, as the glider transitioned into the second section of the field, the tail boom fractured at the trailing edge of the wings.
The investigation
Investigators examined the site conditions and the aircraft's flight path. The meteorological conditions at the time of the accident included visibility greater than 10 km, scattered clouds at 3,000 feet, and broken clouds at 10,000 feet, with winds from 150 degrees at 8 to 12 knots.
An examination of the landing site revealed a slight, nearly imperceptible elevation change of approximately twenty centimeters between the two different types of vegetation in the field. The investigation focused on the impact of the terrain transition on the structural integrity of the F-CGMS during the landing roll.