BoM reading 18-22knots onshore yesterday, and apparently a beginner on a 14m was pulled into the powerlines at Pallarenda, starting a grass fire and cutting power to 400 houses for 3 hours or so. Ergon energy were not too happy. There is a small article on page 2 of the Townsville Bully this morning.

Anyone that was there got any more information? Evidently the rider didn't get electrocuted, but was he injured?

Guys,
Pauly & Matt are planning a meeting of kiters at Pallarenda on Sunday (3:00pm) to work out ways to reduce the chance of these sort of incidents happening. Meetings will also be held with the council to put some controls in place (possibly some signs and a no kite zone near the creek mouth?).
If you are a Townsville kiter, please try to come to the meeting on Sunday.
Cheers
Skid

being an idiot and trying to ban kiting.

I wasnt there, but most of us Townsville crew are pretty vigelant about who is going out on what, and most of us will give advice to new guys on wether or not to go out, but i guess saying that, noones perfect. Looking at the BOM it looked like a pretty knarly day, and for a new guy, it would have been oh so tempting.

ok. this is wat ive heard so far off a guy who was there..

in his words
'i warned him about flying his kite in front of the power lines'
'he was overpowered on a 14m monkey'

i live out at pallarenda.. so no power for me that nite.. real handy lol..
maybe if ergon wasn't so poo they would have underground powerlines cause out power goes out all the time due to even stupider things then kites.. but its a bit dangerous infront of the creek close to the mouth on the beach.. there but.. what can you do if you've warned someone? you can't force them not to lauch.. maybe smack em one in the face

quote:

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Originally posted by max_ob
one concern is the inexperienced kiters who rig larger kites than they should in wind that is really beyond their ability to deal with....


i have no doubt that this is a concern at other spots also....so what's a possible solution?

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A newbie flying a 14m blimp in 22knots near powerlines.
Solution.....You can't fix stupidity.
lol
It's the stoke that kills ya.
Spread the anti-hype.

Dang, i work at the airport and we lost power there at 5pm. I thought it was a kiter?. So i had to listen to peoples sling abuse to kiters for cutting the power all the next day.

Hi All,

Claiming "Stupidity" is probably an easy reaction from expert kiters to explain this beginner's mistake.

As a beginner, he was obviously not aware of the possible effects of his actions... Obviously, his kite was too big, the wind conditions not suitable for a beginner (gusty), and even very dangerous (onshore + powerlines). Let's remind the CLEAR from AKSA (see http://waksa.org.au.86.aspwebhosting.com.au/info.aspx ). Obviously he learnt at the cost of a kite, fortunately not his life, hopefully not a ban at this spot. I am sure that he is not going to do it again as now he is a bit more experienced.

There are two ways of learning the limits in kitesurf:
1- by yourself by doing mistakes, or
2- by benefiting from others' experience.

Learning from others' experiece is the right way in kitesurfing, or skidiving, or base jumping, etc... as mistakes can be fatal. You should learn by yourself by always staying on the safe side. And even with this approach, there will be some situations when you will be in trouble...

Not listening to experienced kiters is definitely not the wisest thing a beginner should do. And this incident is a excellent example that all beginners should meditate: please pay particular attention to what experienced kiters recommend.

Think that you are playing with your life, other people's life, and less importantly other people's right to kitesurf (if your actions results in kiting bans).

Stay CLEAR and have fun!

Wise words from Fred.

thanks digit.

Well we can have all sorts of useful and useless speculation about how to avoid such accidents in the future, but now that the accident has actually happened I think it is a case of doing some thinking about an appropriate response from the kiteboarding community.

If we get the message across that most of us are indeed very concerned about safety and this is a somewhat isolated incident by a raw beginner that we want to ensure doesn't happen again, then we have a chance of convincing councils etc that we can self-regulate.

A dialogue with council & ergon, some big fat signs at the beach, some letters to the paper, compulsory AKSA membership and harness tag in order to ride, a group response from the townsville kiteboarding association - all this sort of thing could help calm the ruffled waters.

The advantage of the palla site is that nearly all the townsville riders launch at the same spot, so you have a chance of getting to the less experienced riders before they launch themselves into an accident, both by signs and especially word of mouth. No doubt the locals will be a bit more hardline on the latter now, which is good.

The disadvantage is of course that if kiting gets banned at that one spot, then it is a great pain in the a*** for everyone, the 100+ townsville riders, the local kite businesses, the instructors, the comp promoters. Hopefuly this can be avoided by some common thought and action.

im relativley new to kitesurfing, as of the end of last season, havnt had too much on water experience as of yet but getting there. i dont think there is much to be done apart from new kiters to take responsibility for themselves and know their limits. i also agree with much that has been said here that the more experienced kiters need to help out the newbies. without newbies the sport will die off. i have also seen experienced kiters putting kites into powerlines, being dragged along beaches, all sorts of stuff. all this being said, accidents do happen, although preventable with the correct information.
Cheers
Luke

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The answer! Compulsory ASKA membership with some form of licensing criteria ...Or as has been suggested, talk the newbies through it.

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Compulsory AKSA membership, but criteria to get membership is that they are certified to at least Level 1 IKO standard. That way before they are let loose on the beach they have some sort of instruction/coaching on safely handling the kite.

Yeah, I recon it should be compulsory to have adequate training and get a certificate to be allowed to kite in dangerous spots e.g. near rocks, building, powerlines, people, tree's etc.

quote:

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Originally posted by Hammerhead
Compulsory AKSA membership, but criteria to get membership is that they are certified to at least Level 1 IKO standard.

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Thats no help. How does it get policed? What about those of us who have been kiting for a long time and don't have IKO certifications?

Hi All,

Like it or not, there will be heaps of learners coming down to the beaches this year. Last year was the first year that the sport started to become mainstream in the eyes of the public and this year will be even bigger.

From the numbers of enquiries we are getting already it will be busy. The good news is that most people these days decide to take lessons before they even buy a kite which is a far cry from a few years ago when people would buy a kite first and try and figure it out for themselves later.

The new SLE (Supported Leading Edge) or bridled "C" style kites will prevent an enourmous amount of stress for beginners as long as they are instructed correctly on their use and their cans and cant's. The new "hybrid" style kites do not invert or death spiral and are almost totally depowered simply by letting go of the bar. The SLE kites will also get riders up and riding more quickly so they will join in the procession rather than going thru the pack and walking up the beaches with barely controlled kites at 12. Every out of control newbie is a hazard to our access to the beaches, so the less time they stay a hazard the better for us all and if the SLE kites accomplish this, then I'm all for it.

The big picture is that we will all benefit from the newer style kites like the Airush DNA and Flow and other SLE style kites of this type. Less accidents, faster learning, safer to use, easier to fly. The learning curve is still steep, just less slippery. Used withing their wind range there is no issue.

An elderly woman was made Quadraplegic last year as a result of being hit by a flying learner in a lofting accident. The kiter was flying a "C" kite and couldn't dump the power in a freak gust. In the future hopefully this type of lofting accident will be a thing of the past.

I think that schools should be able to sell AKSA or IKO membership on the spot to ensure everyone rides with insurance. This would be up to AKSA to implement their side of things.

Be kind to the newbies, we were all there once too and the more help we offer them, the faster they will become experienced.

Good winds,

quote:

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Originally posted by jan
Thats no help. How does it get policed? What about those of us who have been kiting for a long time and don't have IKO certifications?

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Go see your local instructor, I'm sure for a small fee or a couple of beers he will certify you. He gets an extra student for his instructor rating, you get certified and you might learn something while your there, like self rescuing or right of way rules.