I went Sunday a week ago (1/8/2010) to Parham and after a few minutes of kiting in sunny weather with blue sky and 12kts of wind a cloud came and with it a 32kts squall. It was too late to land so I stayed about 300m away from the beach. After about 10 minutes into the squall (just as I thought it won't get any worse) I stopped to do a careful turn and in that instant a massive gust came and ... IT RIPPED THE KITE OFF ME!!! - leash and all!!!

There was another kiter in the area about 250m from my position, but he wasn't affected by this big gust. He also managed to chase my kite down (after it landed back in the water about 200m downwind from me). I don't want to speculate how strong this gust may have been, but just to illustrate what can happen in squally weather this is a record I found from the same day from a wheather station on Lake Alexandrina near Milang - this one is scary:

I had the misfortune of working that day (flying planes) and we had several go-arounds due to windshear at ADL airport. It is very dangerous to go on water in those sort of conditions, especially with a kite! The following gives you some idea of what you are up against.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microburst

DaGodfather, I did a bit more research and found a couple of good links. That guy in Florida in 2008 was hit by a micro-burst from a approaching hurricane. It made the news worldwide, because a news crew was on the beach filming the wild weather!

www.fksa.org/showthread.php?t=69

www.metacafe.com/watch/1646719/kite_surfer_gets_thrown_around_by_hurricane/

This is taken from a forum discussing kiting in dodgy weather. I would have hoped that a airline pilot would have known better!

Thanks for your detailed input, good stuff! There was a particularly notable microburst involving a kiteboarder in Utah a few years back. I recall it was his sixth or seventh microburst while he was riding. Dry microburst may be even more common in the western states than the wet variety in our area. They have some fairly sophisticated warning measures in place out that way. In this case, the rider thought he could handle this extreme weather events and would ride with them going off around him. Not sure if he realized they could boost up to around 170 mph or not if a good sized one struck nearby. Out there the dust columns show them up from a fair distance away. He landed his first jump from perhaps 70 ft. high after burst hit but failed to carry the remaining ones off. More about this at: fksa.org/showthread.php?t=631

There was another severe lofting in Portugal in 2005, one I have learned little about unfortunately. One newspaper account puts the height of the lofting at over 325 ft. and distance downwind of over 1750 ft.. I have no details about the weather that contributed to this tragic event. I have to wonder if it might not have been some form of burst. It happened to a well experienced commercial airline pilot out kiteboarding.

These are rare but nasty gusts, I've had a day where it was 10-12 knots so I didnt go in the water and was instructing a friend on how to steer and jump on the beach. That was until a 45kt gust threw me a up and away a couple of hundred meters, lucky to be alive.

I've tried telling others about it when I see them jumping on the beach, but most are like huh whatever... so maybe this may help one person out.