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AusMoz said..
I can see its only a matter of time b4 we see a decent chop on a wing dinger or a fatal. Really hope it doesn't happen but from what I seen- it's gonna happen.
It's pretty surprising that (if) it has not happened yet, given that there are more wingers on the water than windsurfers at a lot of spots. I know about several deaths on the water while windsurfing in recent years. Those are just death by either windsurfers I knew, or friends knew, or that happened at spots I sailed at the same day, or frequently. Some of these deaths were due to natural causes (e.g. heart attacks while sailing), but not all of them. In addition, there were a few incidents where windsurfers ended up unconscious in the water at bad crashes, but were saved from drowning by others. I never had any serious injuries while windsurfing, but had several crashes with rather painful gear contact, where I was really glad to be wearing a helmet (and, in one case, wished I had worn a face guard).
In freestyle and wave competitions, most wingers don't use board leashes, which drops their risk of gear contact injuries to a level that's lower than in windsurfing. Of course, that can result in long swims in waves .. but many who have played in waves have also chased their windsurf gear in a long swim.