German Open Piedrahita

Blue skies and a very light southerly tempted the task committee to set 91 km cats-cradle around the valley with the 'traditional' corrals and back first leg was followed by the Villatorro antenna, Hoyoredondo, Bonilla church, the red-roof building on the Salamanca road and goal in Piedrahita itself. A classic task in the relatively stable conditions. The launch window was opened and delayed as the wind went from extremely light up the face to over the back. It seemed that it might just not happen as the thermals failed to rise up the face at all for the first 30ish minutes of the window. I was set up below the road completely on my own wondering if everyone else knew something I didn't.. until the arrival of Steve Ham who had also decided that if we were going to launch at all that this was the only place to be.
After a couple of abortive attempts from the top and a few 'arrivals' on the road heads started appearing over the edge and soon we were joined by Germany's finest! After one particularly committed launch attempt I had to be extracted from one of the spiky shrubs well below where i had started. There are times when i really should give up.. the glider flew and then I guess I just hit dead air and the ground in one swoop - the same was happening in more style higher up with U4's throwing themselves into the tarmac will alarming regularity.
Conditions in the air were scratchy at first on the way to first tp but within 2km of the corrals a local convergence had set up in front of the mountain so while many pilots were scratching around in 1m/s climbs myself and a few others were flying straight on course going up at 6m/s. After arriving at the tp at 2800m the way back to start looked like a no-brainer. Just at the start cylinder we heard the first call of a level 2 situation over the safety frequency. I was very surprised since for me it had been one of the smoothest and most pleasant flying experiences I have had in Piedrahita. Unfortunately as I neared the launch it was obvious that a pilot had crashed at the top of the big spine and the closest competitors were landing to assist.
The relay over the safety channel was prolonged and even though I don't speak German it was very obvious that it was a serious accident requiring helicopter rescue. The meet director took the necessary decision to cancel the task and instructed all pilots to go and land in the valley immediately. there was some discussion going on in German about continuing to fly but the decision was repeated continually, so we went to land.
It was a big surprise to see other pilots around us completely ignoring all the big-ears and spiraling that was going on. I can only guess that they either didn't have radios on in the first instance or had turned them off to avoid the constant distraction of radio traffic. Anyway quite a number were still trying to complete the task 3 hours later... where did they think the other 60% of the pilots had gone??
Today, the second day has been declared a no-fly day in memory of the pilot who lost his life. Its sunny and hot so a day of dog walking and checking the weeks weather forecasts to see if we can find one we actually like!