From: http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/

Two kiteboarders had just landed on the beach and had their kites low waiting for guys to grab and secure their kites before a severe squall hit. The winds had been around 16 kts. with one of the two kiters underpowered on his 9 m kite at the time. They had come in to avoid the squall but arrived too late to escape its impact. While they were standing there squall winds exploded to 40 to 50 kts in seconds. Torrential rain also started.

Continued at:

CLICK FOR FULL SIZED IMAGES

CLICK FOR THUMBNAIL IMAGES


FKA, Inc.

transcribed by:
Rick Iossi

We have to fix the attitude of kiters towards unstable, dangerous weather for the sake of the health of our sport (and some riders). We can't afford global coverage like this. At the same time, we have to get the word out to enough kiters to where we can turn a corner on this problem.

I will post a Powerpoint tutorial on Kiteboarding Weather Planning & Monitoring very soon. It contains information that I believe all kitesurfers should be aware of. It already exists, just need to put it up.

btw, another guy broke his neck as a result of another squall about 25 miles to the south within the half hour of this accident. He survived without paralysis, another lucky outcome. We need to take this stuff far more seriously, stop ignoring obvious hazards and trusting to dumb luck to see us through. We can't afford more screw ups like this.

THESE ACCIDENTS ARE FAIRLY EASILY AVOIDED IF WE TRY.

FKA, Inc.

transcribed by:
Rick Iossi

Be aware of your environment. I think most kiters could look at this graph with the combined
knowledge that a Hurricane is on its way through and realize its not the best time to be out.
-Toast

I soooo hope he makes a 110% recovery. Saturday it was around 14knots one rider was on a 17m, a woman was on a 16 and 2 teens was on 13s the rest of us was on the beach bitching about how shitty the wind was , Everything was fine there was a rain cloud a few miles away and we was to talking bout if it was coming and if it did was it going to bring wind or take it 2 seconds later it hit, from 14 to 38k instantly the guy that was on the 17 was coming when the wind picked up me and another rider and to run and grab him out the air we managed to bring the kite down without releasing it, the woman that was on the 16m got lofted onto some very sharp rocks and she suffered deep cuts to the face, shoulder,thighs, hands and knees the only thing that save her was the kite hit a tree, the other teen i had to run to one and scream to him to pull his safety it ended up around a tree the other was lucky because the wind started to die down. The moral of the story, PULL YOUR FUCKING RELEASE!!!!!!!!! ask yourself is my life worth 1200 bucks, SHIT!! all these lofting accident has a very simple fix

I think that satellite image and wind graph pretty much say it all.

You should not be out in the middle of that.

I disagree, the solution is not to hit your quick release to deal with hazardous weather. There are lots of scenarios in which it won't necessarily work. Many guys have learned that the hard way.

The solution is to try real hard to AVOID the hazardous weather. It isn't hard to do, been doing it for almost 8 years after my big screwup.

If despite all efforts, you volunteer for a crisis, then I totally agree Emergency Depower EARLY! Dont' wait.

Regarding the obvious squall signs in the wind graph, too true. The thing is we've been getting bashed with squall winds from 20 to 50 mph for almost two days on the half hour it seems throughout. There was no secret about any of this. They guys just blew off the hazard. That is the attitude we need to fix.

FKA, Inc.

transcribed by:
Rick Iossi

What went wrong ....
THESE SQUALLS CAN BE SEEN FROM MILES AWAY. THE WIND MIGHT PICK UP INSTANTLY BUT YOU WILL HAVE BEEN ABLE TO SEE THE STORM SYSTEM FROM MILES AWAY. WHEN YOU SEE THAT SHIT COMING ITS TIME TO GO. PUSHING THESE LIMITS CHANCES ARE YOU ARE GUNNA GET FUCKED UP. ITS BEEN VERY OBVIOUS THIS WEEK!!!!!!!!!

wow I'm all the way up here in NJ and was aware
that a Tropical storm
was approaching Florida

just tune in the wheather band radio
you really just have GOT to ride when a named sh!tstorm
is on its way?
have somebody on shore put up a big black flag
when the final radio alert sounds off.
really though that's probably too late

Trying to tell kiters to avoid hazardous weather is like trying to tell a Teenage not to have sex, the only thing you can do is tell them to practice safe sex. To top it off not many people know cloud formations, i'm lucky i was taught this at my IKO instructor training. When I'm out riding I'm always preaching safety especially to the beginners
that's the only thing we really can do is keep preach safety. At the end of the day riders are going to do what they going to do at least send them out there with the knowledge to practice safe riding.

I was just talking to an instructor about all of this. He hasn't seen any of the thread about the graphic images out of Brazil. He related a story of a friend that signed up for helicopter pilot school. They made him first sit through two incredibly gory, impacting videos of helicopter crashes. He said guys dropped out from instruction just from seeing that. Maybe the judicious use of graphic images for students and others might have a place in helping folks to better look out for themselves.