Storms and Squalls

[troubleshooter]

Originally Posted by RickI

A big, long jump in stormy conditions. The kind of European squalls that have killed and maimed more than a few riders. They've had some right here in Holland too. See that one windsurfer do an emergency jibe to stay out of the lines? He blew that jump with lines stretched out in front of a bunch of sailers. What's wrong with being a jump hero and responsible?


"We had a wonderfull day on the 3rd of september 2009 in Holland. Winds exceeding over more than 44 knots. Conditions: Sun, rain and thunder, and mostly Storm, storm, STORM!
It was a perfect day with me and Ruben Len10 doing a Stormsjees 3 tour along the coast, which started out of the blue. First spot was Wijk aan Zee for a real hard trashing on Ruben, then off to Scheveningen to do some more. Also there was Eddy Lansink doing his thing to, and very well indeed! "


Here's another clip showing one way to approximate jump height. Still no mention of risk to the other guys on the water posed by the jump.



64 ft., good height. I suspect there have been higher jumps but a big one all the same and with a happy ending but not for lack of trying.

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Reposted from: http://fksa.org/showthread.php?t=6089&page=34


Just a discussion point from my observation. What i see is a hell of alot of downwind space (at least several hundred yards if not more) before the windsurfers. The windsurfer doing the "emergency jibe" was coming back in at a high rate of speed and probably wasnt even seen as a threat when the jump was made.

The second jump appeard to be a "holy sh!t" jump to get out of the way of the group of windsurfers and what he did probably avoided a major mix up. That second jump was also intitiated well upwind of those windsurfers. Also, on his second jump the kite got behind him and it looked like it wasn going to recover from a stall with a hard jerk and he intentionaly went to the 5th to depower the kite. We are talking eye opener record setting distances and height here so were traditonal precautions observed?

Dedinitely risky conditions but I didnt hear you call out the windsurfers either. Everybody there that day was taking a major risk.

[ricki]

Windsurfers don't get lofted, kiters do. Windsurfers might get catapulted 20 or so feet across the water, not lofted hundreds of feet through the air at high speed. If you are good enough and not worried about lightening, go ahead and head out in storms on a windsurfer. It takes a great deal of skill, more than kiting to even get offshore on a windsurfer in such conditions. A rank newbie can launch a kite and be lofted in such conditions by contrast. Both new and experienced kiters have been killed in similar storms from the North Sea even more seriously injured.

If a skilled kiter wants to go out in such stuff and throw down massive long jumps, go far enough out to where there aren't any others to hit. He should also accept he stands a much greater chance of getting injured, disabled or even killed than a windsurfer in squalls passing over. If he gets killed it may well threaten our access too, this has happened in the past. The guy was boosting just beyond the breaker zone, afraid of being away from shore, the camera or ? We've hit windsurfers before and come close many more times doing far smaller and controlled jumps than this. If something were to connect between a kiter and windsurfer in a jump in conditions like this it could be real bad. The guy had a lousy buffer with the sailors considering the massive area covered but probably blows it off at least until one or more get clotheslined.

[troubleshooter]

Rick. Take a look at some of the Gorge windsurfing vids you posted earlier. What happened to that rig once he let go of it in 40+knots launching off one of those river swells? Did you see how fast that rig went down wind? Could you se that rig hitting a kiter? Another windsurfer? If you dont think a windsurfing rig can get launched a hundred yards downwind in those conditions then you should view a few more windusrfing videos. All those windsurfers were jumping right next to each other as well.

Anyway, point I wanted to make was that I though it a little unfair to call out this guy comparing him to some of the other issues we have had at our launches. Have you not watched (and enjoyed) a len10 video doing megaloops in 40+ knots? I think we all have. Its very hairy in those winds no matter how safe (or not) you are. I watched that takeoff over again sever times and was amazed at how long horizontally he traveled. That is very against the norm and there appeared to be a sufficient buffer. I did not see an intentional ignorance of safety other than all of them risking it out there together.

Edit. I found your post:

http://fksa.org/showthread.php?t=866...ht=windsurfing

Originally Posted by RickI

Windsurfers don't get lofted, kiters do. Windsurfers might get catapulted 20 or so feet across the water, not lofted hundreds of feet through the air at high speed. .

[ricki]

Decided to give this a thread of its own.

I saw one jump by a windsurfer of about four feet off the water over a short lateral distance in the Dutch video. Everyone else is staying close to the water. How often have you seen windsurfers jump over 15 ft. upward and fly over 30 yards downwind? How often have you seen kiters jump over 15 ft. high and 30 yards downwind? What is common for us, is rare or almost unheard of for windsurfers.

How many windsurfers vs. kiters have been picked up in gusts and blown into buildings, sand dunes, trees in storms?

Kiters die and get badly messed up in these conditions. We had 16 killed in loftings last year, 11 of those were in Europe with many in storm conditions. For each one of those there are likely many more seriously injured kiters who survive. Weather awareness and planning are still very poor in our sport. We had three kiters vacuumed up in a water spout and blown inland in Italy last year, taking one out when he hit a house. There were many kiters obliviously riding around this damn thing for quite a while first.

People watch these megajump clips in strong conditions and want to go riding in these conditions themselves, believe it. They may not appreciate what they are getting into for lack of fair warning and/or common sense. I think Lenton usually doesn't have clips showing him riding out into squalls unlike this one however. European storms can produce high wind for days, squalls can dish out high erratic gusts in seconds as you know from Florida. The smart kiters get off the water before the squalls move over as you don't know what violent conditions they will create. The guys that don't care and may well get taken out someday stay out in them.

Was looking for something else and found the following just now. This was a kiter out in a squall and was lofted into a house in Mexico. He lived but it does look painful, wonder what after effects might come with this? Looking at his tibias, both seem to have fractures as well. Wonder how long it will be until he can walk again unaided? A young man was killed at this same beach last year in another squall.


http://morphkite.blogspot.com/2010/0...temerario.html