Sad story,

A lesson to learn. Verify that your gear is in good conditions. Always check your set up. Never be overconfident!

From

http://www.kiteforum.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=2342814

FYI

"Yesterday, friday, we had a very sad day in Ibiza (Baleares Islands, Spain), one of our old friends, years ago in windsurf, and started kiting two years ago or bit more, Ram?n, 35 years old, married and a 4 year daughter, nice guy, always helpfull with everyone, and one of the most cautios guys I know had a bad day that ended in fatality, Im going to explain what happened, lived in first person, so that it will never happen again anyplace:

We got to the beach, and regged our smallest kites cause the windmeter indicated 30 kts, 39 in the gusts. We were all overpowered with our 7m, 8m, and 9m. Ramon rigged his 8m, but like others he wasnt decided to go kiting because of the strong winds. The moment he decided to go, he asked two friends to help him, one grabbed his harness, and the other one helped him with the kite. He depowered the kite the maximum, but the bad luck, because of the strong wind, made his right steering line tangled just very near the pigtail of the kite, and made a knot there, so the line was shortened aprox 30 cm (we saw it when they got the kite from the roof of a hotel), nobody noticed this knot, he didnt either, he gave the thumbs up to lift the kite, and the kite passed through the zenit, and continued making a kiteloop, that dragged him and the guy that was holding his harness (big and strong guy, aprox 80 kg), who couldnt grab him after the first 2 meters, the pull of the kite ripped his hand off the harness. He dragged two more meters with the bad luck of hitting his head on one of the few stones on the beach, he probably passed out there, but the kite did another kiteloop that launched him 20 more meters, then another one that launched him another 10m and made him hit a van that was in a parking lot behind the beach, and then inexplicably did another kiteloop that made him fly over that van, another two vans, one tree, a 2 meter fence, and some gardens, and violently impacted on the first floor of a hotel, and fell to the ground. then everything finished. Nobody could do anything for him, they tried holding him, bat could do nothing. A low depower kite added to the knot that was tied with the strong winds shaking the kite tips left rigged time with the lines extended a while, and over 30 kts, triggered this sad accident. PLEASE BE CAREFULL OUT THER AND I WISH NOBODY TO PASS THROUGH WHAT HIS FAMILY AND OUR SELVES ARE SUFFERING."

http://www.kiteforum.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=2342814

man you gotta feel bad for that guy, sympathies to his family. i think it brings a good piont of not only checking your gear but if things do go wrong practise your safety release till it becomes second nature so if you feel the slighest thing you can bail out and hopefully avoid things like this.

A reminder to us all, no matter what kite you fly - C, Bow or Hybrid - if you make a simple mistake on the beach and things go pear shaped the consequences can be fatal.


Commiserations to this guys family and friends.

i launched a kite for someone a week ago. the steerimg line was caught around the wing tip, it was a kite that had the line attached straight to the kite without bridle. both of us did not notice this luckily it was only blowing around 12knots and the kite was put down without incident.Sounds very similar to this guy who seemed to be very safety orientated. You can not be to careful even when helping someone out.

...made his right steering line tangled just very near the pigtail of the kite, and made a knot there, so the line was shortened aprox 30 cm (we saw it when they got the kite from the roof of a hotel), nobody noticed this knot, he didnt either, he gave the thumbs up to lift the kite...

strange he didn't notice that his bar was not level ... surely, with one line 30cms shorter, he would have had an 'uneven' bar wouldn't you think ? ... I suppose what happened was tha due the strong gusty conditions he missed it in the 'heat of the moment' and gave the fatal thumbs-up ... RIP ... the only 'good' part is that he went doing something he loved to do...

All condolences to this guy and his family and friends. This is a really sad occurence.

I recently made the decision not to kite in wind above 30 knots anymore for the exact reason noted in this post. In 30 knots and above the likelyhood of death resulting from an accident is greatly increased due to the huge amount of energy in this wind speed.

Kiting with any kite in wind gusting to 38 Knots is asking for trouble and is not fun anyway. I think some kite companies rec. that 30 Knots is the maximum wind speed rec. for safe kiting. It would be nice to see ALL kiting companies make some maximum rec. along with IKO and WAKSA etc.

I agree that you would feel 30cm of differenec in back lines at the bar before launching but maybe not front lines ??

Lets keep that in mind and have a safe Summer.

Buzz said...

Also, IF he had've launched to seaward, and not the reverse, he might have missed getting looped towards the carpark, road etc... absolute tradgedy

From the way i read it and understood it, he did launch seaward. It says it went up through zenith and continued on a kiteloop. So he launch on the seaward side, and the kite flew over to the other side adn started looping?
Just my take on it all.
Terrible accident which shouldnt havee happened. It only takes 30s to do a pre-flight check.

Im not really sure how the tangle was made?
If the lines are all attached, and you have checked it is all the right way around, they cant be in a tanlge then i though.
I've never had it happen to me, so i have no idea about this, but please explain deeper, as i need to look out for it.
Do they get tangled when you walk up to you launch position?, but i figure they just untwist when the person launching you lifts the kite.
If thats when you spot em thats good, because i always take a good amount of time double checking everything is the right way around.

Yes, yes and yes. That's what I'm saying, and trust me it happens. Because of my weight and riding preferences I like to go out as often as possible in very strong wind, so I've probably seen more than most of these ~30kt days, and this is when it happens to me most. An example for clarity:

- I have been out kiting, come in for a break and had the kite caught for me.
- I put the bar down where I was standing when it was caught, so I know it should have been right to pick up again and go straight back out.
- Chat on the beach for five minutes.
- Go to relaunch and find a birdsnest in one or several of my lines near the wingtips where it's been fluttering.

Seriously, they tangle to the point that they will not untwist when the kite is lifted.

I find the best way to alleviate this is to keep the lines as taught as possible when it's lying on the ground, either when rigging in the first place or when it's down for the aforementioned break. The other thing, as I mentioned above, is that 90% of the time it's happened to me it's been with one particular type of line that seems to have a tendancy for it. I won't mention the brand though, they get antsy when I say things that might be bad for their profits. Plus what's the point, you should keep an eye out for it no matter what brand you fly.

Another thing is to keep your individual lines as twist free as possible. A kite line that is spiraled along its length tends to form loops on itself when not under tension, and this can lead to these sort of tangles pretty quickly. Running the length of your lines a few times before you rig up helps them untwist, as well as rolling them up neatly after a session to keep them twist free. If you've had a serious birdsnest for whatever reason ( -> ) then it also pays to run the length of the lines a few extra times for this reason before using them again.

Very sad to hear of this tragedy. Perhaps the world kiting community should keep some statistics with respect to fatal accidents or serious injuries (especially head and neck trauma). I suspect there would be a close connection between 30+ knot winds and serious injury. It seems the safety releases in these situations are virtually useless as the reaction time is too slow compared to the speed of the event. Maybe we need a safety release mechanism that can handle these situations....something on the bar that can be activated more easily than the current devices that usually require one hand to let go of the bar to activate the safety.

I have seen this happen too (auto birdnest) quite recently, and it can be a recipe for disaster. After my 3 years or so of kiting i am religous about setting up my lines upwind (instead of downwind like most) and pulling gently on each line to make sure they are rigged correctly/not tangled before each launch. I have found this to be a good safe practice, you can also do it for the downwind setup method but its a little harder to see knots, tangles etc.
No comfort to this bloke or his family though, this is a very unfortunate accident, i think its the problems that come out of 'left field' that we have to watch out for the most.

Kitingpaul said...

I recently made the decision not to kite in wind above 30 knots anymore for the exact reason noted in this post.

Good call Paul!

Also, related to this accident, watch out whom you ask for a launch...

I recently asked this bloke at Pinnaroo for a launch and while I was doing my safety check on the harness end, followed by sighting up the lines for tangles, about to give the thumb's up, I noticed to my horror that my 'friendly helper' had already let go of my kite and was shuffling away doing his 'I'm too cool for safety' strut. (Later saw him doing out-of-control little Raleys in the launch area)

Anyhow, the kite pulled me off balance, able to save it. Luckily there were no wing tip tangles. Could easily have been nasty, as per the Ibiza accident though.

Bo