# BC Hanglider pilot eats evidence of passenger falling to her death



## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

This one has to be catagorized as "weird news". :biggrin:

A 50 yr old experienced hanglider pilot takes up a 27yr old female passenger and she somehow gets unstrapped from
her suspension from the hanglider and plummets to 1000 meters to earth! At terminal velocity that is around 4-5 seconds
where she experienced complete terror. 

Realizing that some kind of mistake was made...he swallows the evidence out of the inflight digital camera.. a small
micro SDHC? removable memory in the camera when he landed, before he may have gone over to check on his passenger. 

The woman's boyfriend was on the ground. Cops arrested him for obstructing justice and have him incarcerated until he
"produces" the evidence. They have gone as far as taken xrays of him and find the memory card (or what remains of it)
in intestinal tract.

If this was an accident, why would someone "eat" the evidence? 

cops are confident, they can recover the evidence.. here's why...

_"The nice thing about the storage cards that were probably used . . . is that they don't have a lot of moving parts, like a memory drive, so there is less likelihood of mechanical destruction that would void recovery of any information from the card itself," said McKay, who also served as a civilian RCMP forensic investigator from 2003 to 2008, specializing in video forensics.

But working against them is the possibility of corrosion.

"On a lot of the cards, the interface of the devices uses little copper strips, so there could be a concern based on the human body, how acidic it is, and how much salt there would be in their system, because that could corrode the card and cause a lot of damage," he said.

Even so, a damaged card could still likely yield some recorded data, he stressed._

Yup..that's the RCMP for you these days. 
IF he didn't actually chew up the mem card (some people have been known to chew glass), it may still have some
recoverable data, as long as the cops can find a way to interface what's left..and that would mean plugging it
into another camcorder....what's the probability that it will still be working......
Provided of course, he doesn't flush it down the toilet..when the cops are not watching..
Uh-Huh!

http://business.topnewstoday.org/Money/article/2152372/


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## LondonHomes (Dec 29, 2010)

carverman said:


> They have gone as far as taken xrays of him and find the memory card (or what remains of it)
> in intestinal tract.


I wonder what the judge thought we he/she read the request for this search warrant?

Clearly it's going to be the junior CSI tech who gets to retrieve this evidence.


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

I'm sure the BC cops can handle this one..retrieving the evidence. 
"here...Mr. <?> is some nice tasty "chocolate"for you"...courtesy of the RCMP.:biggrin:

Passing the evidence to the RCMP may be a painful exercise though...square pegs vs round holes may apply...ouch! :biggrin:


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## Dibs (May 26, 2011)

Anyone care to speculate what we'll find on the memory card? :hororr:


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

Tragic accident! Can't imagine the horror the poor woman must have felt in those few seconds.

The gliding pilot had 16 years experience, so it's hard to understand what may have gone wrong; there may have been nothing to hide, but he probably got scared.


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

He could have just snapped the card and put it back in? I recently bought a few of these micro cards for $10 and broke the first one by accident. They're not made nearly as durable as the old ones. I'm qualified sky diving and I never once strapped myself to someone else, that's just insanity! Poor girl. I guess that's why they have all those waivers. Waivers don't actually let him off free though. Reminds me of the skydiver who jumped without his chute on because he was so focused on making a cool video, this dude was probably distracted by having a girl half his age strapped to him.


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## steve41 (Apr 18, 2009)

I don't know how these tandem jumps work, but I imagine the two of them start off running down the slope until they got up to speed. What if she chickened out part way and tried to bail? Strange and tragic.


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Toronto.gal said:


> Tragic accident! Can't imagine the horror the poor woman must have felt in those few seconds.
> 
> The gliding pilot had 16 years experience, so it's hard to understand what may have gone wrong; there may have been nothing to hide, but he probably got scared.


Lot of things can go wrong when you are in the air on a kite, let alone carrying a passenger.

Fine, if you want to take the risk (like skydiving),and face possible death if something goes wrong..but to strap a passenger to you on a kite, and without a parachute to recover....

I'm trying to understand how anyone so foolish would agree to go for a ride in one of these contraptions..don't you have to jump off a cliff to get
airborne? It's not like para-sailing where you get towed by a motorboat. 

There was some mention that he tried to sissor his legs around her to stop her from falling..but obviously that didn't work.

Apparently he was in the business and contracted for carrying her..

Usually with those kind of things, the feet have be be ready to hit the ground first as you land. If she was a total novice without proper instruction and pre-flight training of what to do in the air and on landing, then perhaps a mistake was made..
but why try to eat the camcorder memory? ..fear of a lawsuit? 

If he had a release form signed..maybe his lawyer can get him off a criminal negligence charge, but if he jury rigged some kind of harness that wasn't completely safe (not that you can be in one of those things), then a negligence lawsuit will be forthcoming.

Probably that's what the accident investigators want to find out..what was going on before she fell out. I'm sure they have siezed the hang gliding kite as evidence and the sling or whatever was used to suspend her.


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

steve41 said:


> I don't know how these tandem jumps work, but I imagine the two of them start off running down the slope until they got up to speed. What if she chickened out part way and tried to bail? Strange and tragic.


Possibly
It was shortly after takeoff and from a height of 300 meters. 
Apparently he WAS contracted to provide that service for her.
heres some info on it..
http://instinct.pro/faq
http://www.vancouversun.com/health/...pts+scrutiny+safety+checks/6539513/story.html

apparently she fell out of her harness shortly after takeoff, so maybe the straps were not tight enough or something
like that..because he knew something was wrong just after takeoff. He tried to grab her by the harness.
http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Se...+Mills+missing+hang+glider/6536019/story.html


Someone is watching the guy 24/7 to make sure the memory card is not disposed of down the toilet.
Can you imagine...I'm sure he has to go on some kind of bucket, so he can't flush it. Forensic investigation can
be quite a er..smelly job sometimes.


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

carverman said:


> 1. Lot of things can go wrong when you are in the air on a kite, let alone carrying a passenger..
> 2.I'm trying to understand how anyone so foolish would agree to go for a ride in one of these contraptions.....


1. But I read that it was the first such fall/death in Canada, but maybe I misinterpreted the article.
2. It was an anniversary gift from the boyfriend; pretty bizarre gift considering it had been her 1st time.


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## marina628 (Dec 14, 2010)

I cannot imagine what the poor girl went through ,falling to your death not top on anniversary list!


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Toronto.gal said:


> 2. It was an anniversary gift from the boyfriend; pretty bizarre gift considering it had been her 1st time.


Interesting anniversary gift..I'm sure the intentions were there, just like those that jump off a 200 ft high canyon bridge with a bungee cord
tied to their legs..the andrenaline rush must be fantastic...just like jumping off a cliff in a hanglider..

How many people would normally do that if not assured that it was completely safe beforehand. But getting on a plane is similar..it's routine
and acceptable risk..until something happens.

In my youth 17-18, I was employed by CB radio contractor here in Ottawa to put up these triangular tv tower sections for
CB radio base stations. It was the most dangerous thing I have every done (next to riding a motorcycle and crashing it
on a curve) and one tower was 150ft high buiding was about 40-50ft and the tower was on top of the roof of
the garage. That last section (even with a safety belt) was scary, with the guyed tower wiggling and moving and
I had to place a 10ft antenna in the middle of it. My knees started to shake as it took all my strength to hoist a 10 foot
section into the next and bolt it down in 3 places. It took all the adrenaline and strength I could muster as each
section weighed about 35 or 40lbs, but I finished the job,climbed down and never did it again.
Too risky for me.


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## OhGreatGuru (May 24, 2009)

One suspects the pilot realized he had done something wrong in his pre-flight check. Otherwise why try to destroy the recording?


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

OhGreatGuru said:


> One suspects the pilot realized he had done something wrong in his pre-flight check. Otherwise why try to destroy the recording?


I would expect that the harness to fasten her in would have a special strap and buckle that goes between the legs to prevent a person from slipping out of the rest of the harness. This is all speculation of course, but it is possible that that snap buckle was not fastened and he did not ensure it was before taking off the cliff. If this was her first flight and he didn't check it was fastened and secured properly..it would be a case for a negligence lawsuit.
Other wise, why would he eat the camcorder memory chip?


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