REMOVE THE SEED NOW

Spacemonkey! said...

Come on mods do we really need to see kitecrazzy with his gear off twice in one thread. This is worst than meatspin. Ok now back on track... Would hate to ruin a good thread.

Egads, how did I miss this one? You have a point there Spacemonkey. Green thumbs on this post and the pics stay, red thumbs and I remove them.

I reckon you've got about four hours to vote


I hope Laurie doesn't mind me doing this.

you got some red1s now remove

poor relative said...

This



Scares the **** out of me every time i see it

good work with the plaster. really covers that ** up

Got my credit card bill today!
That scared the s@#t out of me damb kitesurfing!

Was kiting on a beach on the WA coast somewhere....... was walking my kite up the beach and up over a rock groyne to get to the other side of the beach. As i was on top of the sharp rocks, a freaky gust caught me and pushed me towards the beach and the park over the dunes. As i have whimpy feet, i let the kite pull me a bit. The kite was low to the ground and i was more concerned about walking down the rocks that i didnt realise what my kite was about hit. As i was walking i felt my kit hit something and stop. I looked over at it and my blood froze.......... I had just put my lines into a power pole.
I swear i let a bit of wee out.
I back tracked with the hope that i could get my lines off the pole as it hadn't touched the powerlines yet. So i walked backwards and it worked, lines were of the pole. But as i started to lift the kite, a second gust blew in and the kite flew forward in the window and the kite shot up and wrapped around the light on the pole. I t was a matter of secs before it hit the powerlines. All i could think of was of that poor guy in Rockingham. Faster than you could say eeeep! i pulled both releases of the kite. I then watched as the kite hit the lines and went into a death loop and, get this, pulled the pole out of the ground. both pole and kite hit the ground and it was all over.
Police arrived and western power who said that the pole was probably about to fall over as it was in sandy eroding ground.
Talk about a shocking incident! Haha, get it..... shocking...... hahaha... did you see what i did there. Ahhhhh.
What ever.

Flying a 14 metre at the local golf course with guys who i met on the day who couldn't fly worth a damn...I realise landing on water and sand is a LOT softer than grass and cement. It was the day that freak storm came through in the middle of summer early this year too. it was about 40Knots... just cuts and bruises and sprained ankles.

I was worried about putting a negative spin on the sport (or makeing the public think of us as idiots) but all the guys were so pumped they went and got lessons.

We call them city feet.
People who live in cities(metrosexual sydney guys ect) that live in concrete jungles and always have to wear shoes as they never walk on grass .The only time they go bear foot is at home on their designer carpets.
Others wise known as a pussie footer lol

a couple of years ago I was kiting near the applecross spit in a northerly wind about 75 metres from the beach. ( beach due south ) I had a 15 meter kite in what was 12 - 15kts of wind ( with a warning for 45kt gusts in thunderstorms however there were none around). I was in the middle of tacking, hardly moving in the water but just holding my weight with the kite as it moved from 11 to 1 oclock when suddenly i got yanked with the bar fully out up higher than anyone could intentionally jump. I could see into the houses' back gardens ontop of the hill, and felt like I was stuck in an elevator just watching the scener turn from planform into skyview.

I moved the kite to about 2'oclock and was probably 20meters up doing about 20-30kts and gauged that I would not make it around the spit and would end up getting crunched into the rocks under the walkway that is on the rivers edge. I then moved the kite from 2, all the way over to about 10, by this stage I was coming down but going rediculously fast downwind and was hoping to make it
a- back to the ground before I got to the beach ...
and b- far enough to the left that i would enter the park rather than hit the 20' limestone retaining wall.

Alas, I "skimmed" the water with my knees ( wearing a home built wakeboard ) when I touched down about 10 meters before the sand started and 15 meters before the wall, head first, and was still getting yanked nearly horizontaly by my kite at about 20-30 kts.... the touchdown did not slow me at all and I basically bounced up to about 15 feet high again ( much much lower than the initial gust as the kite was very low at this stage), and I traveled into the retaining wall managing to manoeuvre my feet first to land horizontally on the wall thanks to the skimm on the water.

the board that was probably 1 - 2" thick snapped in half and the binding plates pushed through the top layer of glass/carbon into the foam. I ended up shoulder ramming the wall too as I was still getting towed up slighlty. Luckily I had a bouyancy vest on and because of how thick it was it was impossible for my head to hit the wall with the angle I smacked it.

Then I started getting towed up to the top of this wall, an saw 2 or 3 of the metal spikes on the top of metal fence that lined the top of the retang wall get ripped off by my lines and thank god finaly 2 lines snapped and then I fell back ono the foot path below.

A mate who was about 5-10 metres further out landed in about 2 feet of water about 7 meters behind me. No major injuries but would have been fatal if I didn't land on my feet on the wall no doubt.

Lesson no 1, no matter how light you think it's going to be, don't kite upwind of stuff you don't want to land on!

First the hail turned the sea into a freaky looking bubbling thing, my helmet was rattling, I was board in front arse planting to try to slow down when I finally got back under control.

Then the scary bit. Anchoring board and body against the pull I watched the right rear line snap on my 12m C kite.

It was about 5 years ago. The airport reported that the cold front turned my session from 20-25kn to a 15min period of 38-47kn. I was dragged backwards and upside down through the back of waves, through the air and underwater for about 800m before a super human effort got to the release, hung onto it and ejected the kite.

I ended up 10m from a 2km section of rock.