Rapid climb, snap freezing
 

A German paraglider pilot survived a rapid climb to around 30,000 feet after being sucked into a storm cell near Tamworth in northern New South Wales earlier this week.
... "She was covered in ice all over her body and her harness and equipment - it's minus 40 to minus 50 degrees at that altitude," he said.
...
Mr Weness says the paraglider was unconscious for around an hour.
"She had ice secretion all over her body, the wing was covered in ice, internally as well," he said.
"She's got severe frost bite over her face and coming out in blisters."
The woman was taken to hospital but discharged shortly after.

(ABC News)

read in the paper today that the pilot was a chinese male, and had died as a result of hypoxia

That was a different incident.

Bloody hell! How long was she up there for? I would have thought hypoxia might have got her, but obviously if she's been let out of hospital she must be OK.

Amazing she survived. I wonder if the cold slowed her metabolism sufficiently that the lack of oxygen had less of a damaging effect than it would if she'd been at normal temperature? A sort of hibernation state.

I think her residual MSG level probably saved her from going to sleep.......

A more pertinent question might be: what the L was she (they) doing wafting around a bl@@dy CB????

Even the greenest rookie know's they're dangerous.

I've never met a German who would willingly consume the stuff.

It didn't seem to save the Chinese man, unfortunately.

http://www.chrigelmaurer.ch/mambo/te...elles/ma10.jpg

not a good place to go flying...

Read that all paragliders were warned of the weather conditions and warned against flying, the German woman and Chinaman were the only two who decided to ignore the warnings....

Not the first time though. I think it was National Para Champs in QLD many years ago. Two got sucked in (up) and at east one cut-away and pulled reserve when spat out the bottom (with the inherent risk of being sucked in again). Both survived - Yeah baby what a ride.:uhoh:

Natural selection at its best, sometimes however even the truely stooopid German survives' :ok:

I'd say that's exactly what happened, there's no way you'd survive more than a few minutes at that altitude otherwise. Much like falling into icy water. Pretty amazing.

At Expo 88, display jumpers got sucked into CB, got bruised by large hail, some had to cut their main to descend, got spread out over a 10NM radius. Not too much fun was had on those jumps. :ouch::ouch::ouch:

So since she made it up to FL300 does that constitute a VCA?

Now appears the Chinese guy was killed by a lightning strike. (ABC)


{BTW: Re FL300 jokes ... mine was deleted, so I'll ignore the VCA remark :rolleyes:}

Darwin awards
 

I reckon they ought to be considered for the Darwin Awards.