British man dies in paragliding accident in Portugal

It comes a day after former Scottish rugby international Greig Oliver died in a tragic paragliding accident in South Africa
Stock picture of a paraglider
PA Wire
Natalia Penza5 July 2023

A British man has died in a paragliding accident in Portugal.

Emergency responders including firefighters launched a search after a 999 call from a local saying a paraglider had crashed to the ground near a beauty spot north of Lisbon.

The accident victim is said to have already gone into cardiac arrest when he was discovered in an area “of difficult access.”

He was assisted by medical experts but died at the scene.

The unnamed man suffered his accident in an area known as Vale Bom in the municipality of Cadaval.

It is near to the Montejunto Mountains an hour north of Lisbon, a nature lover’s paradise speckled with windmills and sleepy villages which is also a well-known wine region.

The alarm was raised just before 9pm on Tuesday.

It was not immediately clear on Wednesday if the British man lived in Portugal or was on holiday.

One unconfirmed report said he had been practiced powered paragliding, also known as paramotoring, where the pilot wears a back-pack motor which provides enough thrust to take off using a paraglider.

An investigation is under way into the cause of the accident.

Paragliding is one of the activities listed among the “things to do” on local travel websites, along with hiking, mountain climbing and horseback riding.

Former Scottish rugby international Greig Oliver died in a tragic paragliding accident in South Africa earlier this week.

The 58-year-old, an elite performance officer at Irish rugby club Munster, is believed to have drowned on Monday after hitting rocks following a freak mid-air collision.

Oliver, in South Africa to support his son Jack and the Ireland squad during the World Rugby U20 Championships, was a passenger on a tandem flight overlooking the coast of Cape Town.

Two tandem pilots collided mid-air above Sea Point Promenade, a popular tourist area.

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