Only works if you have altitude to start with (which might have been lacking if he was trapped in a valley)
That appears to have been precisely his problem, and it looks like I was pretty close to spot-on with my projected scenario, that I posted in post #56, about 4 hrs before the wreckage was spotted.
All the indications are that the impact point is in terrain sloping at around 35°-40°, and that the Dragon was doing a high RoC at substantial speed. The terrain is so steep, the SAR choppers couldn't land at the actual crash site.
(pic courtesy of Jack Tran/The Australian)