not sure,but when i got down there it looked like the kite had only one line attached to the bar and the guy was having no luck getting it down, wind and waves were to good to worry about what happend, WHAT A SESSION !!!!!

fresian said...

got back from downwinder....not much left of kite, all ripper and torn now!

yeah it was getting pretty trashed up there
no good

vert said...

Yeah silly bloke tried to walk past with his Air Rush kite straight up next to the lights and woops, gust of wind and it drifted onto it. Bugger......

We've even got cameras in mobile phones these days and no-one thinlks to take a shot?

What a totally missed photo opportunity !

GreenPat said...
<SNIP>
He went on to explain some of his rationale, which I won't relate here, and I felt despair for the sport of kiteboarding.

Great shot GP.

Now, where's Dave Spruce..... Oh well seeing as he's not around just now, allow me....

* What "camera" did you use for that ?
* There is too much sky - crop the image at the top and the RHS.
* There is no ground reference in shot so we dont get to know how high the kite really is.
* A multiple exposure of the kite flapping around would give us an idea of wind strength.

This is the sort of shot Sprucey would rip apart more surely than the hapless kite.

But I appreciate your quick thinking talent GP. I begged a guy to take a shot of coppers arresting Australians most wanted crim last year on his phone camera . (I left mine at home). He finally agreed but the moron didnt get the offender in the shot (he only took one). It would have been worth at least $1000 a time to about 20 newspapers around Australia.

is it still up there??

how would you get that down

sci said...

GreenPat said...



Its a $1000 FLAG!

Or wind sock.

i say leave it up there. its almost as good as a kooks head on a stake at the top of the dunes.

Greenpat said:

I went and spoke to the guy and the beach patrol not long after it happened. I asked if he was a member of WAKSA, and he asked me what WAKSA was. I explained, and told him about the public liability insurance that is part of it. I then asked if he had lessons, he had not. I assumed from this that he had not bought his gear from a shop, and asked if he had bought it second hand. I was correct. I told him that kiting between the groynes at City Beach is not allowed, and he went on to tell me that he wouldn't have been if there was any room north of the northern groyne, and that he had set up between them because there was no room on the sand to the north. I heard from other people who had seen him out kiting that he was in amongst the swimmers between the groynes as well, but did not see this myself.

I did see a few more people between the groynes as well, and they weren't foreign tourists.

As for exactly what happened to get it there, he told me that he was walking past the light with the kite at 12, and must have accidentally steered it into it. Having had no professional instruction at all and no contact with any part of the kiteboarding industry, I'm not that surprised. He went on to explain some of his rationale, which I won't relate here, and I felt despair for the sport of kiteboarding.

I sometimes launch between the groins. To my mind, much safer than North of Floreat groin, both for me, and for public.

On what basis do you say you are not allowed to kite between the groins?

(I am happy to be informed)

Unfortunately "common knowledge" went out some years ago along with "common sense"

When the beach patrol was there and the unfortunate chap who owned the kite asked about it he was told that getting a council crew to lower the tower would be considerably expensive, and they would not be very keen to do it either. The fact that he had bought the kite second hand and not got lessons would indicate to me that he is not in fact rich, rather he might be a bit lean on funds. He was only a young chap, early 20s perhaps.

So if he is not rich is he dumb? For a start, that's not a very nice thing to say about someone, especially if you have not met them. As I said before, he has had no contact with the kiteboarding industry. So he either figured out himself how to rig his kite or a mate, or the person who sold him the gear, showed him. Either way, the one point of contact we can be sure he's had is the person who sold him the gear, so did that person stress the importance of lessons? Indeed, does that person even believe lessons are important? If he did, and he does, then perhaps the kite owner is not so clever. But it's still not nice to call him dumb on a public forum especially when he can't defend himself. I daresay he doesn't know about these forums to do so.

If you're saying he's dumb because he hasn't thought to lower the light tower, I can assure you that isn't the case. Speaking to the beach patrol, it sounds like it's neither easy nor cheap to do that.

I think he's learned a harsh lesson, and perhaps we can all learn from it as well. As we all know already, it's an uphill battle to promote safe and responsible kiting, and from this we can see that there is still more to go. As a community of responsible kiters perhaps we should try and pull our finger out a bit more. Perhaps the Scarborough users group could get a bit more organised, perhaps people could put a bit of effort in to help WAKSA in its never-ending work, perhaps everyone could just take a bit more responsibility on the beach and go chat to people who are doing things that could get them in some sort of strife.

Sorry about wading into this from another state but the tower in the photo is specifically designed to be quickly and easily lowered to maintain the light fittings.

It has a hinge in the middle and pivots on this hinge like a seesaw. It will have a fixing bolt near the base and loop to tie on a rope. The method is generally as follows

Tie on a suitable rope, 50m of good stuff
Remove the fixing bolt
Have two blokes hold the rope while a third pushes the bottom hinged section away from the fixed vertical section.
These poles are designed so the top is slightly heavier than the bottom so the top with the lights on should come down to ground level under the control of the rope.
If the rope fails or the blokes let go then the top will probably crash to the ground.
Remove the kite and reverse the procedure.

Link to a similar pole to show the design
http://ingaleps.com/loweringsystem/genarrangedraw/Avenue%20Seesaw/HAL12FDO30/HAL12FDO30.pdf

I'm not advocating anyone other than the owners of the pole try to do this just pointing out that the "neither easy or cheap" excuse is not valid

If all else fails then tie a hook knife to the end of several lengths of PVC pipe and cut it down.

Buell said...


I'm not advocating anyone other than the owners of the pole try to do this just pointing out that the "neither easy or cheap" excuse is not valid

I'm sure it's easy and cheap for the owner of the pole to do it once they are there, but I think the beach patrol's point was that scheduling and mobilising a crew to come and do it was not so quite so easy and cheap.

Sell it on ebay as pickup only dont give location.

DaveSpruce said...
Seriously man. I'm not gay. Seing how you are completely obsessed with me it's pretty obvious you're a homo, in love with me. I have no interest in you so if you would please leave me alone...

Great shot of the kite in the lightpole btw.

Dave please dont be that way. You know the times we've had together were very special. Dont let it end this way. Please dont walk away. I want you back. I love you Dave. DONT LEAVE ME THIS WAY ... DDDDDDDDAAAAAAAAAAAAAAVVVVVVVVVVVVEEEEEEEEE..................



Great shot of the lightpole in the kite btw. BTBTW, My uncle's brother made those things. Made a fortune.

Similar incident in Caloundra recently.
Photo courtesy of Grumpy Sam.

Apparently the owner cut his lines and bailed. Leaving locals to watch as Energex cut it down.

Made the local paper. Great publicity!!!



DOH!