a great way to get kiting band from your local river mouth is to have a demo day.get about 40 kites in the sky.crash a few into the local caravan park.nearly clean up some 5 year old kid playing on the sand.and have half the caravan park complain about the idiots.a friend of mine sat and watched the carnage.another friend had his family staying at the caravan park and could not believe the near misses with children on the beach inside the river.kites crashed over sand bag wall,around sign poles.complete tools.the organisers should be taking responsiblity for this.and should apoligise to the local kite shop who will be the one who would suffer from the blowins that leave at the end of the day for the locals to take the blame.disgusting.

I don't normally involve myself with negative forums but I feel there is an important message and some clarification needed.

Having read the above comments about riders crashing near beaches etc, I can safely say that all riders who participated in the clinic acted responsibly and having the groups separated into three distinct areas, including having riders on the North Shore ensured a positive day.

Not everyone who was riding in the river mouth, in fact very few, were part of the actual clinic. There were only 5 riders out of the 15 or so in the river who were in the group that utilised the flat water section and these 5 were well upwind of the indicated crash zone. However, I do remember deploying our rescue jet ski on a number of occasions to assist kiters who were not part of the clinic!

Yes, it is easy to blame blow-ins and the like, but this clinic series has structure, purpose and is very focused on safety. Each and every rider in this clinic kited at a standard that was expected and stipulated prior to booking. It was not a demo day, it was a controlled education program which had a major focus on safe practice.

I believe there was a demo day organised by the local shop, but whether or not the offending riders were part of the demo is questionable also. Cotton Tree is renowned for blow-ins and has a reputation for riders who do not show respect for the public or other water users including other kiters. Maybe some house keeping is in order before going live on what is clearly a case of shooting off without any evidence to support it!

Being an instructor and someone who has spent many seasons in and out of cotten tree, i did sit back with a bit of astonishment as to the goings on on sunday. It does not matter if it was people from the clinic, demo day or blow in's, it is EVERY individual kiters responsibility to put the safty of the general public first. Lets not forget it only takes a very small incident to get kiting baned from another public area.

I am 49 and only a year old kiter, have been known to push the envelope always believing that I had safety in mind and when not sure always taking advise from the more experienced. I was part of this clinic attempting my first unhooked back roll, on my first 2 attempts which was alomost complete I felt uncomfortable with my ability with the amount of kiters and beach goers around. I consulted our instructor and we agreed that I understood the fundamentals of this move and should return on a weekday or in an area with less traffic. This clinic was done in small groups (5) under the safety of instructors and supervised assistance. I was witness to only one incident involving 2 members of the clinic which was a tangle up, people from the organisation ran to assist and all was good. The facts are that Maroochydore on a sunny windy day equals some chaos, on this particular day I do not believe it was any better or worse but those who do criticise do have a someone to point the finger, at even though they were totally separate to any of the incidents. I think the point was to bring a group of people
to gether with the same interests, the atmosphere enjoyed by people who were not even part of the clinic was noticable, those who were simply enjoying joined us for a chat and a sausage at the end of the day - excited by what they had seen. I think we need to focus on how we can keep locations like this safe and enjoyable for all as the numbers enjoying this sport are going to continue to grow. Maybe we need more organise events such as this so we can supervise the new who venture out with a lack of knowledge and education.
PS; Thanks for a great day!!!!!!!!

The guy with a blue longsleeved wet shirt and cabrinha kite crashed amid all the familys and tried unsuccessfly to relaunch his kite almost causing more damage.When another person tried to help, he was told to go away.Needless to say the kite just bounced around in between all the children.
3 minutes later another kamakazi kite came crashing down at full speed narrowly missing people(by a couple or feet) and rolling through familys whilst tangling complete tourist in there lines.Who ever is reponsible, is the person hooked into these kites and they should really use their heads, so they do not blow it for the responsible river users.
After this dismal display me and my mates did a great beach run and did not see another kiter.
Go figure!

getting away from the demo day slightly.......I had friends up from Sydney staying at the cotton tree camp over the weekend and caught up with them after a kite out the front on friday arvo.
My mate told me that he had been standing in the water just next to the first lot of sandbags at the river end with his 4 and 9 year olds about 5 meters from shore and a kiter came in between
them and sprayed my mate who was in clothes and holding a $1500.00 SLR camera which got drenched. While we where standing there a couple of hours later later some arsehole on a switchblade dropped his kite on the same kids plus another 4 or 5 covering them all in the lines
and the guy didnt even say sorry. My mates little girl wouldnt go in the water for the rest of the weekend and he told me if I wasnt a local rider he would have been on to council.
Im a cotton tree local but only kite out the front generally because of all the f..kwitts around who dont look before turning or jumping. The place is pretty much a circus on weekends

Airpig said...

hux said...

a great way to get kiting band from your local river mouth is to have a demo day.get about 40 kites in the sky.crash a few into the local caravan park.nearly clean up some 5 year old kid playing on the sand.and have half the caravan park complain about the idiots.a friend of mine sat and watched the carnage.another friend had his family staying at the caravan park and could not believe the near misses with children on the beach inside the river.kites crashed over sand bag wall,around sign poles.complete tools.the organisers should be taking responsiblity for this.and should apoligise to the local kite shop who will be the one who would suffer from the blowins that leave at the end of the day for the locals to take the blame.disgusting.

Get your facts rite. The “Demo day” was by the local kite shop. Why on the same day as the clinic? Who Knows? “40 Kites” There was only 21 students in the clinic and probably only 15 in the water at any one time. This was further controlled by 5 instructors and backed up by a jet ski. Who knows how many kooks tried out the “Demo Kites” and what supervision they had. “Crashed over sand bags” The clinic was far from any sand bags.

Your post is relevant only for the fact that there are many idiots at Cotton Tree. As for blaming it on the clinic, get a life mate! Perhaps you should join the clinic next time?

Thanks to the organisers for an awesome day!

gee sorry i miss counted the kites and sorry for not having a gps directions of the incident and sorry if i cant tell the difference of who was in the clinic and who was doing a demo. sorry was it sand bags or concrete bags?sorry for my gramma.sorry i should get a life instead of giving a f**K what happens at my local.and sorry for caring about my children and my friends children.its all my fault.

Hi all, thanks Hux for initiating this particular forum. I do not wish to be a whistle blower but yes unfortunately we the local shop have copped a bit of flack from Sunday & this particular event. Most of the complaints have been from the general locals & some kiters. The concerns were the disregard of safety and or concern that perhaps things were not organized properly in relation to council permits and certain legalities that needed to be looked at considering the current climate and councils legislation for commercial use of public land. As kitesurfing is now classified as a high use and high impact sport on the Sunshine Coast.
Unfortunately we have had discussions with the council on Monday & Tuesday, due to some complaints to the council. The event was not registered & no permit had been given & the sea vessel that was used was not commercially registered or in line with the USL code of Queensland Maritime Safety.

Events like this are fantastic for kiting & spectators if organized correctly and legally with a high level if responsibility. I do hope that we are not one step closer to seeing kitesurfing banned from our local beach.

Please, when at Maroochydore always wear a kite safety leash, try to keep a fair and reasonable distance from swimmers, especially children, legally 30m but thats not going to happen in the river, keep 100m from the flags. Help self regulate, if something doesn't look right, say something at the time with a smile.

Personally I feel disappointed that the local shop is not supported by some of the big AUST brands & willing to help grow the sport fairly helping us to service the locals for parts so they can get straight back out on the local beach as well as may be helping to organize & get approved events on our local beach, rather than have shops crawling over each other trying to take market share causing over congestion on particular beaches. I think long term gevity is more important than trying to sell more kites. For me it could be so good rather than this continuing conflict. Cluster F*ck