KEY POINTS:
The team-mate of a glider pilot killed in a crash near Wanaka spent a night on the phone comforting the pilot's grieving family in Germany.
Herbert Weiss, 59, died on Friday when his sailplane smashed into a hillside in a remote area above the Wilkins River, about 55km north of the resort town.
The two-time German gliding champion and father of two had been taking part in the World GP Gliding Championships at Omarama.
Organiser Victoria Murray-Orr said Walter Sinn, Weiss' crewmate and a longtime friend, broke the news of his death to the family in Friedrichsruhe, southwest Germany, only hours after the accident.
"He was on the phone to them for much of the night. They were just devastated."
GP race gliding has been likened to Formula One in the sky, with pilots racing head-to-head at speeds of up to 300km/h, often just metres above the ground.
Weiss' ASG29 glider was being tracked by a global positioning system when it went down shortly after 4pm, but rescue crews were not called until the race ended, more than two hours later.
Murray-Orr said the technology wasn't 100 per cent fail-safe. There had been a fault with another glider's system the previous day.
Race director Gavin Wills was first to arrive at the crash scene.
"We had it plotted onscreen, so once we realised he was missing, I flew immediately to the spot and waited on the valley floor for the rescue helicopter."
The impact was so severe, Weiss was lying several metres from the wreck.
"It's very rugged country up there. The glider was destroyed. It was an unsurvivable crash."
Weiss is survived by his wife Barbara and children Felix, 19, and Lisa, 18.
He had been in New Zealand for a fortnight preparing for the elite competition and had studied maps of the area for several months beforehand.
The economics teacher and keen mountain biker had spent more than 8600 hours in the air during a 38-year flying career.
It was the second fatal gliding accident at Omarama in the past 13 months and the fifth since 1972.
Last November, a British father and son team, Owen and James Truelove, died after a severe downdraught smacked their glider into a steep slope near Mt Prospect.
The area is considered one of the world's best gliding spots.
The Grand Prix began on Wednesday with 18 pilots from 11 countries competing over six days.
Competition was postponed yesterday and is due to resume today.
