tow rope brake practice crash, what can we learn...

I always teach a multitude of tow failures to pre-solo students
ranging from turn backs at low-ish altitude to abbreviate patterns at
mid altitude to full patterns once high enough. I always sort of grin
when people call it a "simulated rope break". There is nothing
simulated about it! Frankly i find it the most stressful sort of
training that i've ever given because it requires an incredibly high
level of oversight and everything has to be done just right, there
isn't a lot of room for error. I've had a few exciting
ones...probably earned a few early gray hairs as a result.

The more downwind turnarounds i've done the more I realize that in
reality at the airports I usually fly from a landing straight ahead
into the wind off airport is probably at least as safe if not safer
than turning back. I always make sure that my students are not
married to the idea of having to make it back to the runway too. IMO
there is a pretty narrow window of wind/temperature/takeoff
performance and however many other factors that make turning back the
truly best all around option. Remember this is me flying out of
midwest runways with miles of landable fields off the departure ends.

I usually enforce a basic three step process after the rope "breaks".
1: nose down 2: turn (if you need to) 3: land. Lots of pilots forget
#1.

I've also learned over the years that sometimes the most difficult tow
failures are the mid altitudes where you have multiple options
(especially if there is more than one runway at your airport). could
make a short pattern and land into the wind, could pick another runway
for a crosswind landing, could land downwind. sometimes options are a
bad thing and people wait too long to make a decision and then they
are out of options and ideas.