Well, I figured it had to be possible but I didn't know how to do it and still can't recreate it but a few days ago I had a my first "Oh sh!t" moment.

In kiting we had this thing called the deathloop where your kite powers up and spirals out of control generating tons of power and potentially causing a bad scenario. When this happens we'd call it a "kitemare."

A few days ago I was riding in crap, gusty, swirling winds and something funky happened. I was riding toeside starboard and went for a heineken gybe. When the 3m Pocket Rocket repowered it went straight into a deathloop, an endless spiral that wouldn't stop. If I had to take a guess I'd assume that the luff from the heineken allowed a hitch in the lines to get fouled which initiated the loop. Now, this isn't the end of the world. It doesn't generate power like a kite and you can't really hurt yourself in the same way. Since I couldn't get it to stop I figured I could just drop it and then I would fix it in the water (no leash). Mistake. What I failed to foresee was that with the lines that badly twisted from the death loop the parawing, now on the water, was able to hold its shape and of course it landed with the leading edge straight up. This meant that the parawing was now holding it's C-canopy shape and moving downwind fast. The ability to hold it's shape may have also been exasperated by the current vs wind opposition. Perhaps this wouldn't be an issue in the ocean? Along with that opposition giving just enough tension to the canopy that same opposition exposed that my ability to prone paddle against the river current chasing the rocket downwind was insufficient. Fortunately, a winger swooped in and collapsed the canopy for me and then I was able to catch it. Without, it would have been gone.

Later in the day the same thing happened riding heelside to port and doing another heineken gybe. This time, I did not drop the parawing, I just held on and went straight downwind on some swell. This was enough to depower the loop, release whatever was snagged, and then it reverse looped itself back to normal and I rode out of it. Before this day and since this day my heinekens have all behaved like normal and I've never had these loops occur. It makes me think that the gusty/punchy winds were somehow able to make the smallest hiccup turn into a potential issue.

do you think your lines are snagging on the pigtail / line leader connection when you downloop the pwing? Assume you are fully rotating the bar on the downloop, right, so its not like the lines are twisting like they would with a kite. Pretty weird that it repeated twice.

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Velocicraptor said..
do you think your lines are snagging on the pigtail / line leader connection when you downloop the pwing? Odd that it repeated and I wonder what else it could be catching on.

Your guess is as good as mine. The thing that doesn't make sense to me is how the parawing could start looping based on how the bar controls work. I'm having a hard time imagining how to recreate that. It's easy with a kite, but with a parawing? It's a funky issue.

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BWalnut said..

Velocicraptor said..
do you think your lines are snagging on the pigtail / line leader connection when you downloop the pwing? Odd that it repeated and I wonder what else it could be catching on.

Your guess is as good as mine. The thing that doesn't make sense to me is how the parawing could start looping based on how the bar controls work. I'm having a hard time imagining how to recreate that. It's easy with a kite, but with a parawing? It's a funky issue.

Maybe one of the outer A lines got caught on the B or C pigtail? Or maybe it somehow wrapped the bar? Just a guess. Yea, its totally different than a kite, and I'm just extrapolating from that experience where the deathloop is basically due to some shortening of an outer line due to a tangle or snag.

I have had a c line around the bar when flying under the canopy on a light wind gybe. Because the wind was so light I just crashed and was then able to finally see the single line around the bar while trying to fly it.

its hard to imagine the Heineken gybe doesn't cause this every now and then in anything but light wind.

i haven't been game to try a Heineken but have been wondering what a more light wind function gybe should be rather than the need to pull on a c line to get the canopy round in light wind.

I like the one where they place the wing on the water and pass the bar around their back.