KBH in Kite Lines!

[4liner]

Using a cut-away knife should be your last resort. Try to avoid the situation in the first place. Twice this has happened to me: I crash, my kite goes down straight down wind, the lines are in the water and the board is beyond my reach but drifting right into the lines. Let go of the bar and SWIM RAPIDLY to get your board and push it off to the side. You will not lose the bar because the chicken loop is locked into your spreader bar. By swimming towards the board this will slack the lines and your kite should not lift off. There may be other variables to this situation and the wind strength may be a factor. Both times this happened to me it wasn't terribly windy and I was able to keep the foil from getting tangled in the lines. I was lucky.

[OzBungy]

It's really part of foiling. Just learn to deal with it and not panic. It's easy enough to pull the board out again if you take the time to work it out. If things are really yuck then crash your kite onto the water and sort it out there.

It really reinforces the cardinal rule of kiteboarding to make sure you always have clear water downwind of you. It is only a drama if your kite is out of control and you don't have room to deal with it.

It's much less of a drama with a lightweight board and foil. Another reason to progress to a carbon foil.

[maximlg253]

I had HF thru lines on my very first learning day. Couldn't untangle, kite eventually started death loop and I had to release it. Luckily, my wife was nearby with the boat and we caught the kite half mile downwind. It was quite scary when kite started looping pulling me into board with sharp foil. Next time, I will proactively let safety go before the death loop.

[Horst Sergio]

It's really part of foiling. Just learn to deal with it and not panic. It's easy enough to pull the board out again if you take the time to work it out. If things are really yuck then crash your kite onto the water and sort it out there.
It really reinforces the cardinal rule of kiteboarding to make sure you always have clear water downwind of you. It is only a drama if your kite is out of control and you don't have room to deal with it.
It's much less of a drama with a lightweight board and foil. Another reason to progress to a carbon foil.

Distance is your friend that's right, but distance and a carbon foil won't help you, if the foil is tangled in the lines and the kite starts to loop and to pull you towards the sharp parts of the foil (which are even sharper on most carbon foils).

For me there is no 100% solution to avoid having the foil in the lines and I had it a few times. For me the only and most important precaution (and the maybe only reason why foils are a NOGO for kite beginners):

The solution is knowing your kite very well and knowing how to stall and drop it fast in such a situation. If you wait and allow your kite to loop it can already be to late. With some kites especially high AR foil kites its easier to stall. Every foil kiter should be able to always instantly kill the kite force without using the maybe already trapped safety system, just be pulling in the steering lines.

There has been a video about what to do when your safety system is blocked, it shows the same solution: pull in one or both steering lines. Maybe somebody find the link.