Bulgarian pilot killed in Himachal paraglider crash, British national rescued

A 47-year-old Bulgarian paraglider, on a solo expedition, was killed while a 63-year-old British pilot suffered injuries and was rescued after their paragliders crashed near Rising Star Peak in Dharamshala, police on Monday said. As an immediate measure, the Kangra district administration imposed a three day ban on solo and cross-country paragliding expedition.

The incident took place Sunday afternoon when the two foreign nationals, who had taken off separately from Bir-Billing paragliding site, encountered strong winds, officials said.

Police identified the deceased pilot as Maksim Valentinovich Gavrilichenko, a Bulgarian national who arrived in India on a tourist visa on October 7. The rescued paraglider was identified as Stephen Antony Purdie.

Superintendent of Police, Kangra, Kulbhushan Verma said both pilots took off for solo paragliding flight from Bir Billing. “Due to air pressure and (strong) wind conditions, the Bulgarian pilot’s paraglider went out of control, leading to the accident. His companion, the British national, too had to force land,” the SP said, adding Purdie informed the officials at the paragliding site and also sent the location coordinates.

He said a rescue operation was launched in the evening with teams comprising personnel from the local police, the State Disaster Response Force (SDRF), and the Him Sanchar Rescue Team. The rescuers worked through the night in difficult terrain and adverse weather before reaching the accident site in the morning.

While Purdie was safely evacuated, the Bulgarian national’s body was shifted to the mortuary at Zonal Hospital, Dharamshala, the officer said, adding that the exact cause of death will be ascertained following a post-mortem examination.

Meanwhile, the district administration on Monday announced a three-day ban on solo paragliding and cross-country paragliding expeditions. “The tandem flights have been allowed to continue,” Baijnath Sub-Divisional Magistrate Sanklap Gautam said.

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Gautam told reporters that six to seven crash and force landing incidents have been reported over the last few days.

The temporary ban, however, triggered protests with a delegation of foreign paragliders and locals calling on Rajya Sabha MP Anurag Sharma demanding that the restrictions be withdrawn. The delegation warned that foreign pilots, who arrive at Bir-Billing and stay for extended periods, might shift to Manali or other destinations if the ban continued, dealing a blow to the local economy.

They also expressed concern that the suspension of flights from authorised paragliding sites could prompt some pilots to attempt take-offs from unauthorised locations.

Sharma spoke to officials concerned and asked them to formulate a standard operating procedure (SOP) to address safety concerns and facilitate the resumption of paragliding activities. He assured the delegation that efforts would be made to allow pilots to resume solo expeditions soon.

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Earlier, two other paragliders, one from Austria and another from Poland, were rescued on Sunday after having remained stranded in the higher reaches of the Dhauladhar mountains in Kangra. While the Austrian pilot, identified as Sebastain, had remained stranded for four nights, Polish national Adam Bisztyga was stranded for two nights. Prior to that, another paraglider, Gautam Kumar Bharti, a resident of Darbhanga in Bihar, was rescued on Saturday.