Some of us have lost pilot friends, and there have been a number recently.
Two weeks ago I witnessed an accident. Two friends died as a result of a mid-air collision between an ASK-21 and the C-182 which had just released it. The towplane severed the glider's tailboom at the base of the fin. The descent was mercifully quick.
Allan W. was a few years younger than me. He had started gliding quite late in life, but quickly progressed and by the time I rejoined my club in 2015 after an overseas assignment, he was the CFI. He had imposed a strong safety culture on the club and was well-respected and was a very nice, sociable person. As a friend said "He was one of the good guys."
Adam L. was an 18 year-old post-solo student, who was doing a pre-license flight with Allan. I had known him for two years as a friendly, outgoing club-member, who was very keen, always helping out if he was not flying. His instructors universally described him as a very good pilot. What I didn't know was his achievements in other fields. He had been doing Taekwondo since the age of five, was an instructor and had recently become a Second Dan Black Belt. He was also a very popular and well respected WO2 in a local Air Cadet squadron. He had graduated from High School this year and was going to study Physics at university this fall.
A tragic loss of two such nice people. This was the first time I had been involved with the aftermath of a fatal accident and I had often wondered how I would react in this situation. I discovered that I was able to separate the events after the accident from my interaction with my two friends earlier in the day. I went into a kind of automatic mode when dealing with police and emergency personnel at the crash site.
I have been lucky in that only one other friend has been killed in an aircraft accident. Bruce Handyside was a school friend of mine. We did RAF Special Flying Awards together at White Waltham in 1966 and then he went on to Cranwell and I went to university. After getting his wings, he went onto helicopters. He was killed in Oman in the early 70s when an underslung load hit his Huey.