I'm sure every area is different. My point is that it doesn't take a cliff to "get a guy" - a minicooper will do just fine in terms of causing an injury when something goes wrong on a launch or screwing around onshore. I was noting what Woody saw, the guy wasn't in the water.
Not trying to be a jerk, just trying to relay the idea that we all have launch spots with wind and with objects that hurt us when stuff goes wrong. I haven't seen a bad kitemare around here in about 2 years, but I have personally witnessed about 6 ambulance rides and heard of about 4 others from just our area. Luckily, no one has died. Not trying to over do it, but at the same time, accidents happen here too.

The last two years have been so quiet locally in terms of injury (good) that one of my concerns is that people may be lulled into a false sense of security when on shore with a kite tied to them. Sometimes you just have to see it to believe it or have it sink in.
When have storms coming...blah blah.

I do think kiting is safer now than in the past, but stuff can happen. When it does, I have seen (as I am sure you have H) sh.it happen real fast. If it happened slow, probably no one would ever get hurt or get killed when kiting. Anyway, I still have a little paranoia in me when on land with a kite, I hope I always do.