Just wondering what action do you take if you have a line break and its your flagging line? No point hitting the QR I would've thought? Has this happened to anyone?

... yep, had it happen a couple times, once waaaay out to sea. Nearly let the lot go until I saw what I was about to do so instead, I read what the kite was doing, waited until it and I was ready, then grabbed one of the steering lines and pull pull pull until all was safe. 1 hour 20 minutes of self rescue ensued but all is well that ends well.

Robbie

Depends how powered you are. I had my flag out line break. Ended in a death loop with no way of manually flagging the kite. I ended up letting the lot go and swimming in.

I think that the increased ease of use and reliability of safty releases has made people quite lazy in thinking about what they actually would like to achieve. Any behaviour in the kite is a direct result of the the amount of force which gets applied to each line in relation to each other. Modern Kites have got such good depower that most of the time when you need to release the safety you can actually make things a great deal worse as you move bar and therefore the individual lines further away from your body. Any intent to pull the safety should be immediatley followed by the intent to permanently release the kite which may be canceled if the safety release put you in an advantagous position where there is no need to release the kite completely. However, most people just think of it as a get out jail card to depower the kite which it is simply not.

Truth is that flagging a kite is just a way to put a disproportionate of tension on one line in comparison to the other lines. You can therefore flag on any line you want really. (I think Cabrinha used to flag on the left steering line actually back in the late 2000s)

you can manually flag the kite out on 2 front lines by pulling both centre lines hard toward you (i.e if you flag on a mini 5th which broke). If you flag on one front line you should still be able to flag on the other by pulling that line hard.

If your kite deathloops then this is a problem of there being more pull on one of the steering lines. As such you can either pull harder on the tensioned line which will flag the kite or you can pull hard on the other steering line which will make the kite very unstable and crash. The reason the latter is preferable is because it's easier to pull a line not under tension and you can still flag onto that line once the kite has crashed (that's essentially what Puetz did)

there is no way you want to relaunch the kite if one line snapped so what you want to do is wrap up the bar with the line you are flagging manually by keeping it hard tensioned and then roll up the bar as normal. You can then selfrescue by sailing the kite back to the shore or doggypaddeling.

Grab a steering line in pull release! If you ride slingshot the steering lines have a loop handle and makes it really easy

Did i just read a book?

Every scenario is different and the wind conditions and kite size would influence the most which decision to take in case one or both front line breaks.

I never had a single front line break, but about 3-4 times when the depower rope snapped, essentially releasing both front lines at the same time and leaving you with both back lines pulling hard. The most recent one was about 2 months ago in 30 knots. The fact that I had a 5m kite made this rescue possible as pulling one of your BACK lines in those conditions is very tricky. I essentially did the exact same thing mentioned by Puetz. It was very difficult to get to the kite a there was a huge amount of tension on the back line. I eventually self-rescued by sailing in.

Kites aren't meant to be flagged out on back lines, it can cause erratic behavior of the kite such as the kite spinning around the wing tip in a continuous loop, scary suff, I had this happen before on a old Cabrinha bar flagging to a single back line. Also, in strong winds, wrapping a back line around the bar would be extremely difficult due to the amount of pull....however, in light to moderate winds, it wouldn't be such a big deal.

If your kite starts to death loop which would be a possible outcome if a single front line breaks then releasing your kite completely would be a good option if you are in strong/very strong winds. Have a look at the video below, jump to time: 5:10.



In such off-shore conditions there is typically much lower winds at the surface of the water, hence why in this case he could flag the kite safely.

Again, every scenario is different what happens in the video when he cuts the lines could really vary in other conditions or with other kites/sizes.

Christian

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Plummet said..
Depends how powered you are. I had my flag out line break. Ended in a death loop with no way of manually flagging the kite. I ended up letting the lot go and swimming in.

I should add that my death looping flag out line snap was in cross off conditions in double head surf about 28 knots 10m edge.
Every second I spent fruitlessly trying to manually flag another line dragged me further out to sea. So let the kite go and swim in was the safest option.

My depower line snapped a month or so ago. Kinda flopped around without much control in the air for a bit until it landed in the water, i waited for 15 seconds or so until it sorted itself out, pulled one of the steering lines to spin the kite and then pulled it into me and self rescued. Without the tension on the bridle lines the kite cant hold its shape correctly to catch wind anyway. The only thing helping it keep its shape is the inflated leading edge. Without the bridle lines attached steering doesnt work properly anyway

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Puetz said..
... yep, had it happen a couple times, once waaaay out to sea. Nearly let the lot go until I saw what I was about to do so instead, I read what the kite was doing, waited until it and I was ready, then grabbed one of the steering lines and pull pull pull until all was safe. 1 hour 20 minutes of self rescue ensued but all is well that ends well.

Robbie

Hope this didn't happen in Darwin. I'd be fair ****ting myself after that long a swim in.

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Beersy said..

Puetz said..
... yep, had it happen a couple times, once waaaay out to sea. Nearly let the lot go until I saw what I was about to do so instead, I read what the kite was doing, waited until it and I was ready, then grabbed one of the steering lines and pull pull pull until all was safe. 1 hour 20 minutes of self rescue ensued but all is well that ends well.

Robbie

Hope this didn't happen in Darwin. I'd be fair ****ting myself after that long a swim in.

... certainly did,,, on one of my adventures, past Old Man Rock where the tiger sharks and dugongs hang out,,, roughly 3.8 km upwind so an easy enough self rescue back ,,,, true story but I actually nearly fell asleep while drifting back,,,,, mind you, a-hole mates thought it would be funny to fill me in with spray or jump over me laughing their arses off, even the missus got in on the act and sprayed me,,, but but only after I told her I was fine.

Robbie

Thanks for all your comments guys. Well worth thinking about before it happens i recon. The video was great. Happy Days??

Had a centerline break in the surf, was death spiraling a bit, but sitting in the water a fair amount. I thought about releasing the rig, letting it all go, because it was slightly onshore and typically the kite will get to the beach and the sand/water will hold it down. Unfortunately, I waited too long and the broken center line was wrapping around my legs/harness and I couldn't tell if it was hung up and I didn't have a knife. I didn't want to release to just safety line because with 3 lines, it may spiral again and fly and I'd have no control. So I made the decision to drag to the beach and try to sort it out. The kite reached the beach first but was still pulling because it was dragging me an attempting to fly, but it stabilized leading edge down wind in a hot lauch profile. The broken line is now good and tangled around me and I'm standing in thigh high in the water directly up wind. Luckily, a kiter nearby saw my predicament and asked if I needed help. I told him to grab the kite and it all turned out ok.

A couple of things were going through my mind during the event,

1. I was afraid to go to the leash because I'd lose all control and death spiral.
2. I was unable to ditch the rig because I allowed the broken line to tangle in my harness and legs. I wasn't carrying a hook knife (something I've been telling myself to obtain since I bought this f'ing harness) and had no way to address a tangled situation.
3. The kite was behaving erratically and I felt that any strong action to flag it would worsen the situation.

After reading some of the responses here, I think I'll be better prepared.

1. Carry a hook knife, (that was a putner move on my part)
2. When the break occurred, I should have immediately ditched the rig and done a quick and easy swim. Faster decision making or situation awareness would defuse the situation quickly.
3. Alternatively, I could have pulled the outside line and swam up wind to flag it out then to beach.

There's nothing like a episode where things get a bit hairy to focus your thinking for the next time.

Eric.

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1. Carry a hook knife, (that was a putner move on my part)
2. When the break occurred, I should have immediately ditched the rig and done a quick and easy swim.

Thanks for sharing your kitemare.

I completely agree. Everyone should have a hook knife!

Also agree with ditching the kite. Most kiters are extremely hesitant do to so and in heavier surf it's often the BEST course of action.

Christian

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DaveDobbin said..
Just wondering what action do you take if you have a line break and its your flagging line? No point hitting the QR I would've thought? Has this happened to anyone?

My bridal broke in the middle of a jump. I did't know what hapened at the time - crashed in the water and the kite started looping. Hit the release not understanding what is going on, thinking it was the safest option.
The bar went all the way up and stopped on a pulley of the release line with the kite death looping and powered up on the remaining 3 lines. Had hell of a time wrapping my releease line with the kite fully powered and death looping. Got to the bar eventually and had to pull myself up the rope made of the other 3 lines until I reached one line to flag my kite.

Wind was cross on shore, no obstacles downwind - did not feel that I need to release the lot.

in retrospect, if I did not quick released I could have used the other centre line to flag the kite manually.

My conclusion is that unless I am in danger I should assess what hapened and come up with a solution rather than use quick release straight away.

Agree of course that releasing the lot is the best in biggish surf (I was on flat/choppy water).

Hi Swavek,

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The bar went all the way up and stopped on a pulley of the release line with the kite death looping and powered up on the remaining 3 lines.

I don't understand how this is even possible. If you have a safety system on a single front line that works as it should, when you release the chicken loop you should only be attached by ONE line, therefore all other 3 lines are slack and therefore there is no way the kite can ''power up on the remaining 3 lines'' if they are slack ? this doesn't make any sense ?

Also, your bar should be equipped with a stopper ball so the bar doesn't go all the way to the kite when you activate the CL QR.

Also, no point wrapping your safety line if the kite is death looping, that is a waste of time, effort and potentially dangerous. You should just release the kite if it's out of control and the primary safety system has failed.

It just seems like your safety system is just not functional at all, but if I'm wrong thanks for clarifying.

Christian

... just playing devils advocate here cbulota but I think I get what happened to Swavek.

How I understand it is, the kite Swavek was using has a dual line safety system, maybe something like the old Bandits used to have. One part of the bridle snapping means bridle is still connected but is completely different length relative to the other side.

With a dual front line safety on these dual front line safety bars, it relies upon even pressure from both front lines on the kite via the bridles to work and if a bridle on one side breaks then you don't have even pressure any more. The LE is, in a way, twisted because of the now un-even tension so now wants to loop. Punching out will only put the bar out of reach now.

I had a similar thing happen to me on an old North Rhino bridle snapping, only I had the luxury of the 5th line to flag out on.

Robbie

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Puetz said..

Thanks Robbie, that makes total sense if it's a dual front line flagging system and would demonstrate, yet again, the potential dangers of this type of setup.

I am still confused as he mentioned '' The bar went all the way up and stopped on a pulley of the release line'' . It's my understanding that the bar slid out all the way to the kite on a single line.

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cbulota said..

Puetz said..

Thanks Robbie, that makes total sense if it's a dual front line flagging system and would demonstrate, yet again, the potential dangers of this type of setup.

I am still confused as he mentioned '' The bar went all the way up and stopped on a pulley of the release line'' . It's my understanding that the bar slid out all the way to the kite on a single line.

... yeah, it doesn't sound right does it. I wonder if he saying the bar went up to the Y point or where the front lines split which has a ring that looks like a pulley. From memory its about 1/3 of way up on Fone or even older Core bars,,,, just guessing!!!

Either way, if its dual front line safety its dangerous!

cheers,

Robbie

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cbulota said..
Hi Swavek,

The bar went all the way up and stopped on a pulley of the release line with the kite death looping and powered up on the remaining 3 lines.

I don't understand how this is even possible. If you have a safety system on a single front line that works as it should, when you release the chicken loop you should only be attached by ONE line, therefore all other 3 lines are slack and therefore there is no way the kite can ''power up on the remaining 3 lines'' if they are slack ? this doesn't make any sense ?

Also, your bar should be equipped with a stopper ball so the bar doesn't go all the way to the kite when you activate the CL QR.

Also, no point wrapping your safety line if the kite is death looping, that is a waste of time, effort and potentially dangerous. You should just release the kite if it's out of control and the primary safety system has failed.

It just seems like your safety system is just not functional at all, but if I'm wrong thanks for clarifying.

Christian

Hey Christian,

Belated response, but worth clarifying. I have been using the Wainman bar and kite at the time (it depowers to a single line and the centre lines have pulleys riding on the kite bridles).

1. The bridle of my kite that has safety line attached broke
2. As a result of the above once I released safety I ended up attached with a single line to the bar instead of the kite (the safety line was not attached to the kite any more and the pulley of the safety line stopped on the bar)
3. The kite remained powered up and death looping with the remaining 3 lines in tension (bar being 22m away from me - full length of centre safety line)

I would have released the kite if I or anyone else was in danger but I had an empty sandy beach downwind so there was no reason to let it go.

What I am saying is that if I did not panic and released the safety straight away, I could have grabbed the other centre line by hand and 'depower the kite manually'.

My message is again, check what is going on if there is no emergency - in my case releasing safety put me in more trouble then I would have been if I assessed what was going on and acted with more reason.

Cheers,
Swavek

Only half related: I have had my flagging line snap twice after punching out. Both times I knew there was a fray in the flagging line, but figured I'll fix it "next time", for many sessions in a row. Well, if next time doesn't come, and the wind is blowing side off faster than you can paddle a surfboard.....then you will regret not taking the minimal time to get your gear in order! First time may be excusable ... 2nd time is