BERLIN (AP) — German police say a small aircraft has crashed midair with a helicopter northwest of Stuttgart, killing four people.
Police in Karlsruhe told the dpa news agency Tuesday the two aircraft crashed outside of Philippsburg, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) from Stuttgart.
Article here
From discussions on other chat boards, the helicopter was a HEMS EC135 on a training flight with two pilots from the DRF-Training centre at EDSB; the instructor was named as Jochen H., the head of the EMS helicopter unit in Weiden (full name here:
http://www.otv.de/mediathek/video/gr...ttungspiloten/). The aeroplane was also a training flight, with an ATPL student and an instructor (former airline pilot) routing from Basel to Speyer; names not released at this time.
Weather was fairly good: METAR EDFM 231120Z 20006KT 170V230 9999 OVC048 08/06 Q1027=
The helicopter was at 800ft, and it looks like the aeroplane descended into the helicopter from behind; clear visibility and well clear of cloud (NOTE: that may or not be the case once the accident investigation reports).
Regardless, my question (not being a fixed wing pilot) is this: Do fixed wing pilots routinely descend into airspace they cannot see & have not cleared (the descent ahead is hidden by the nose / engine cowl), or are they taught to make clearing turns throughout the descent to avoid running into someone else? If not, why not?