I am sitting here at a kite center in Egypt, wind gusting now up to 38 knots, sideshore.

99% have their board in their hand at launching and landing.
90% don't unhook imediately when the kite was grabbed.

All it takes is one stronger gust, one mistake, the beach boy falling and the ruder will shoot straight forward into the sun huts...

There was just a close call...the beachboy jumped into the kite and prevented something bad.

Think about it...we will never be 100% in control, but leaving your board in the water next to you, with one hand on the release when launching and landing, and immediately unhook when someone catches your kite will make your life longer!

If you do it 100 times and nothing bad happens, why would something happen on the 101st time? People playing the odds for the sake of convenience ...

You should have seen the guy with the powered-paraglider trying to take-off at the little park at the beach ... between the coconut trees, over our kites, narrowly missing the wire fence to the left and the power lines to the right the landing was something to see too.

True. Like those people who never released before.
And they never will until their (early) end of their life.

And yes, always a good show...but I teally don't want to see anyone dying in front of me.

Toby,

Send some pics of Egypt kiting.

These people are probably PEEP SQUEAKS ( and ME MONSTERS "look at me i'm cool")

Meaning they are teens or in their 20's or early 30's and/or rookies

They trow caution the the wind .....they don't think too much of consequences and are invincible

They have "squeaked by" without getting hurt since they started kiting

Sooner or later the law of average will get you and......KERPLUNK .......OOOOOCH & YOU CAN DIE!

........................ ....................................................................................

no, average about 40 years...

Clearly those are dangerous conditions and I agree.

The same could be said for riding large kites in overpowered conditons. Sure you may be an expert and have managed that 18 meter in 25 knots a hundred times.......but is that the rated condition for the kite?

"Day 6:

Wind: 19-25 knots
Location: Ilha do Guajiru, Praia da Barra
Kite: Dyno 18
Lines: 25m
Board: Flyradical 128x38

Stronger wind, me fighting the 18 with all my weight!
But landed really hard tricks where I need lots of hangtime, e.g. Kick Flip with triple board pass."


Look at some of your quotes from this post:

"all it takes is one stronger gust"
"one mistake"
"we will never be 100% in control"

How does this relate to flying an 18 meter kite in 25 knots?

yep i'd say thats a fair comment. I've flown my 15m speed 3 gusting to 25 and my 6m reo gusting to past 40. Both conditions were interesting. but the 15 m in 25 was worse than the 6 in 40.

OK we are all aware that you do a Dyno18M in winds up 25 knots safely in a hot climate....

But that day of 38knots gusts were you sitting it out and observing......or did you ride?

If you did or would have ridden that day what size/type kite do you prefer?

Because I ride big kites with stronger winds, I pay a lot of attention for safety.

But a bigger kite is also slower and therefore more controlable.
Small kites create more uncontrolable power when looping due to their speed.

I will always prefer an 18 in warm air gusts to 25 then a 6 in 40 knots.

And in a day like today with gusts up to 37 knots I don't go out.
Having a 14 as smallest kite I limit myself to strong winds and the danger coming with it and the small kites.

I only got hurt once with a 12, never with a bigger kite...