Some facts regarding North Weald, in view of a few postings higher up this page:
North Weald has no ATC, just A/G radio.
Controlled airspace above North Weald is at 1500' amsl, about 1200' agl. Gliders have permission under a letter of agreement with Stansted/West Drayton to fly up to 2000' agl within a "tube" centred on NW, powered A/C don't. Any R&B's carried out there have some purpose other than spilling surplus height, it seems to me.
Gliders in general in the UK are not required to carry radio; under rules set by the landlord (Epping Forest DC) at North Weald, however, all gliders operating there do have radio, tuned to NW frequency, and all glider pilots acting as pilots in command have RT licences.
There is no dead side at NW. Power circuits are to the west of 02/20, gliders to the east when gliders are flying - which we have the right to do every day except a few reserved for special events. (We were there before any other GA, in case anybody thinks we are interlopers.) Normally, but not exclusively, gliders operate on Wednesdays all year round, and at weekends too during an extended winter period. Other times depend on various factors. I sincerely hope that when gliders are operating, nobody contemplating a VRIAB is trying to position themselves " . . . just to the dead side of the runway and, when close to the airfield, descending to below circuit height ".
Gliders once in circuit cannot do go-arounds, they are then committed to land, even if some power pilot is or believes him/herself to be no. 1 to land, and a glider may therefore have to cut in front of a powered aircraft on the approach. This happens particularly as glider circuits are invariably 3 minutes or less in duration, decending from 7-800 feet (or sometimes lower) and some power pilots take half of Essex to do a circuit with a final turn somewhere near Stapleford for 02 (or so it seems at times). I have known a pilot call finals from miles out when two gliders were in circuit, and then complain about being cut up - but we had to land before he reached the airfield boundary, let alone the threshhold. All, including glider pilots, have to call joining downwind and again turning finals, so it is a known environment, except for some people doing unusual things when the rest may have no idea what is going on.
Glider pilots at NW have no wish to stop people doing R&B's if that is their thing, provided they are done safely and, if necessary, aborted before causing an accident when somebody else is legitimately in the way - or even not legitimately for that matter.
This tolerance is notwithstanding any implications for a R&B conducted when our gliders and ourselves are stationed close to, not on, the runway in use - the words five, rule, feet and hundred come to mind in some order or other, but that is a matter for others, not us.
And after all, it was another power plane that was the victim of the R&B merchant in that NW fatal collision, not a glider. My reading of the accident report is that the innocent victims had no idea that the R&B pilot would end up in conflict with them. I think there might have been no conflict had it been a simple, well conducted R&B as described by some on this thread who claim to be proficient in that art - AIUI the end of the run turned into an excursion perhaps to look at something, not an immediate join into a conventional downwind leg, and that's what caused that particular collision.
Chris N.
Oops, the R&B pilot in the NW accident seems to have done his excursion before starting the run in, not after as I had wrongly remembered, although it was after he had called "Initial . . ." whatever that might mean to the uninitiated.