Six Whoppers

[RickI]

Six notable kiteboarding accidents from the past were summarized in the latest Kiteboarder Magazine.











Checkout the whole mag. at:
http://thekiteboarder.com/

More about some of these accidents at:


#1 http://fksa.org/showthread.php?t=135

#5 phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=3425

#6 http://fksa.org/showthread.php?t=3466

[RickI]

Have folks had incidents or accidents similar to any of these? A lot of ground and variation in conditions are covered in them.

[hleeb9]

Early last spring, I was learning to change directions by hopping to toeside and carving through the turn. The water was very shallow, maybe 6 inches deep, the wind was onshore around 15 mph with gusts up to 25 mph.

I hopped to toeside, steered the kite up, got hit by a gust, and went flying to land head first. The impact was not very violent, but enough to cut my hands and put a nasty dent in my helmet.

Stupidity hurts, of course.

[mv]

Just this week I watched a buddy get lofted into some trees with his kite ending up in the road on the other side. No injury or damage but the potential was definately there.

The wind had been blowing about 20 knots on shore. Depending upon the tide the launch can be very tight or wide open as a large sandbar gets exposed at low tide. and at high tide there is only a sliver of beach. My buddy arrived as I was getting ready to take a break and rigged a 8m kite but came back complaining about being underpowered. The wind has died down to about 15-16 knots and I was thinking about going back out on a 13m where I had been on a 10m before. My buddy rigged a 15m and went back out but was having some line issue so came back to sort out the problem. I decided to go back out so I grabbed by 13m and headed for the sandbar 200 meters from the beach which was now exposed as the tide was going out. My buddy stayed on the beach working on his lines. When I got the sandbar I noticed that the wind had picked back up and was now over 20 knots so I turned around to head back to the beach to get my 10m when I noticed another kiter running at full speed down the beach toward my friend. I looked over and saw his kite in the air very close to the trees but I could not see him. Then all of a sudden he popped up and landed in the trees. He pulled his QR and the kite went over the trees and into the road on the other side. I ran back to the beach to assist and found my friend unhurt but very shaken up. During his launch a gust hit while his kite was a zeinth and he shot up in the air and headed for the trees. He landed the first time in front of the trees and got lofted again and landed in the trees.

This was another accident that did not have to happend, especially when the sandbar was exposed and he could have launched his kite 200 meters away from anything hard. He was not wearing a helmet or impact vest and is very lukcy he did not get hurt. He was also launching a kite that was way to big for the conditions at the time. In his zeal to get on the water he basically threw all caution to the wind, sorry for the pun, and paid the price.

[RickI]

Early last spring, I was learning to change directions by hopping to toeside and carving through the turn. The water was very shallow, maybe 6 inches deep, the wind was onshore around 15 mph with gusts up to 25 mph.

I hopped to toeside, steered the kite up, got hit by a gust, and went flying to land head first. The impact was not very violent, but enough to cut my hands and put a nasty dent in my helmet.

Stupidity hurts, of course.

Glad you came through OK and prepared for the unknown by wearing a lid. What sort of a dent do you think it might have left in your head absent the helmet.?

This is a common scenario that can lead to some really nasty injuries. There was a case in Cabarete years back in which a guy struck bottom nearshore in onshore winds. He feel over, down looped the kite and dragged himself up the beach to impact a wall head first. He suffered a severe head injury but was air evac'd off island to other facilities. I never learned how the rider fared, hope he recovered fully.

More about this in Incident #74 of the 2003 Volume of the KSI HERE

There was another case of a rider striking bottom in sticky clay and badly fracturing his ankles as a result. Distance is your friend, so is adequate depth!

[RickI]

Just this week I watched a buddy get lofted into some trees with his kite ending up in the road on the other side. No injury or damage but the potential was definately there.

Wow, that had to have been a shocker for your friend. Was it a C kite? Those sort of loftings can stick with you, if you're lucky as a deterrent to future repetition of some of the more likely causes.

I just heard about an accident in which a kite hit some trees, snagged some bridle lines and relaunched powered up and looping. Moral, if a bridled kite (really ANY kite) lands in trees, debris, etc. expect that it may relaunch with the depower potentially disabled. A percentage of the time, it may well happen.

An accident that happened years ago involving a C kite and some trees More about this in Incident #38 of the 2002 Volume of the KSI HERE

FKA, Inc.

transcribed by:
Rick Iossi

[Arcsrule]

my lesson learned was 'stay clear of helicopters'...
i was kiting alone on the shore of a navy base a couple months ago. kite was a peter lynn venom 16, and south east seabreze. the wind had just picked up into tthe high teens. three navy helicopters came out for training and started flying circles around me, with about a half mile arc. one helo appeared to be closer than the other three and after a few passes it seemed like he was doing it intentionally. spending most of my time well out past 1000 feet from the breaks i thought it prudent to come in before i crashed the helo so i was literally 20 ft or so from being on shore ,with my kite low and to the right of the window in a safe position "i thought". so that particular helo this time got right over me (obviously out of the pattern) and banked hard, sending his prop wash straight into my kite (that was low and on the edge of the window). i was launched about head high and probably 50' or more inland before coming down hard on ass and elbow with another good slide across the sand--all this in about 3 seconds! fortunately there were only a few people on the beach but all were directly in the path of my kite. luckly no one was injured (except for my road rash). the eyewitnesses confirmed to me what i expected and advised me to call in the tail numbers. not a good idea considering access issues from a few years back. so the moral of the story is --stay away from helicopters.

[RickI]

Hey Arcsrule,

Good advice, glad the chopper pilot didn't wreck both your days. I was going to say, one to a customer, i.e. the clay accident but the helicopter encounter is worth thinking about. Hope your leg injuries are well in the past.

It is amazing how a normally flying kite can feel like it gets flushed when intercepting the prop wash. I had this during last years 60 mile race to Ft. Lauderdale from the media chopper.