On Feb 6, 4:53*pm, Jody wrote:
This doesn't look good for our sport. *It seems that the Cirrus hit
the towline and the towplane and Cirrus went down despite the
ballistic chute on the Cirrus. *The glider released and landed
safely. *But guess where the blame will lay....http://www.associatedcontent.com/art...dead_when_glid...

This may be the last straw for gliders having mandatory
transponders....

A tweet from another tow pilot who saw the accident said the SR-22 hit
the Pawnee, not the tow rope. One would expect the tug's weak link to
fail protecting the tug if the SR-22 had just hit the rope.

It appears the collision was in the standard north mountain departure
corridor for aero tows. Boulder has a lot of noise sensitive areas
where tugs can't go so tow routes are very standardized. Local pilots
should be aware of these corridors.

There is a lot of transient VFR traffic along the foothills of the
Rockies. Pilots want to see the mountains without acutally flying
over them - or flying high enough to need oxygen. There's also a
class C airport (BJC) that tends to push north-south VFR traffic into
a narrow corridor that passes over Boulder.

About 15 years ago a member of a transiting RV-4 formation flight hit
a Grob 103 on final approach. The G103 landed safely with 10 feet of
wing missing. The RV-4 pilot died.