Hi all,
I posted a 'soap-box' rant a few weeks ago regarding kooks and the flags.
Finally, the City of Stirling and Beach Rangers have had enough of the kooks riding through the flags.
A new sign was installed at the Trigg kite landing area by the City of Stirling.
Rangers will now issue fines and have powers to confiscate equipment and prohibit riders from doing the DW.
Remember - you must remain >200 metres offshore of the flagged area, REGARDLESS OF WHERTHER THERE ARE SWIMMERS IN THE FLAGS OR NOT.
Spread the word, educate the kooks and help and keep our awesome Floz-Trigg DW run open.

Exactly how will they execute this equipment confiscation , that's be fun to see

cauncy said..
Here's one
get signage up at start points
if you dwind regular then there's no excuses, but visiting kiters wouldnt know local rules regs spots

Start point is in the Town of Cambridge which complicates things

ReefWalker said..

cauncy said..
Here's one
get signage up at start points
if you dwind regular then there's no excuses, but visiting kiters wouldnt know local rules regs spots

Start point is in the Town of Cambridge which complicates things

Yeah, the City of Stirling rangers did explain that challenge re start-point being in City of Cambridge. The councils would need to start to work together. But, the point is, as soon as the infringements start flowing, hopefully people will start taking notice and spread the word.

Got me thinking, how many injuries/ accidents have actually taken place to have this on the agenda

Sauce said..
Down winder has turned into flog central these past couple years.. seen blokes squaring up to others, dodging swimmers, buzzing the shoreline through flags and generally being angry cnts.

You make your bed....

With all the facebook pages running around, surely anyone can read up before rushing out.

I haven't heard of any swimmer injuries but think of it this way; the mayor of Stirling is a member of scarboro slsc. The clubbies have regular access to him. You cant match that lobby.

nor should we try and match that lobby - we, the kiters, should be giving respect to the tiny area of beach that has flags on it, a total of about 2% of the whole DW run. it's not that bloody hard to give every other beach user the right to have a swim and not be buzzed by some kook kiter...

danno said..

Sauce said..
Down winder has turned into flog central these past couple years.. seen blokes squaring up to others, dodging swimmers, buzzing the shoreline through flags and generally being angry cnts.

You make your bed....

With all the facebook pages running around, surely anyone can read up before rushing out.

I haven't heard of any swimmer injuries but think of it this way; the mayor of Stirling is a member of scarboro slsc. The clubbies have regular access to him. You cant match that lobby.

nor should we try and match that lobby - we, the kiters, should be giving respect to the tiny area of beach that has flags on it, a total of about 2% of the whole DW run. it's not that bloody hard to give every other beach user the right to have a swim and not be buzzed by some kook kiter...

100% agree.

danno said..

cauncy said..
Got me thinking, how many injuries/ accidents have actually taken place to have this on the agenda

there's been more than enough near misses and kites dropped in the flagged area that I get why the clubbies are up in arms about this. If you were down here Cauncy you'd see just how many kooks cut through the flags every session. only takes one serious injury and it'll be all over....

Well if you've seen it, do a bit of disciplining, pull them up tell them there a bit of a cock in a nice way, that doesn't work tell them their a bit of a cock in a bad way

Just a thought, .....it strikes me that it can be difficult to judge what is a 100metres or 200m offshore (whatever distance is the rule). And people do tend to like to squeeze a wave to the nth, and often think "hey, the swimmers are nowhere near here...I'll go one more turn".
So, before ones' thinking goes to fines, infringements etc as the primary way of shaping/changing behaviour, I wonder if one cannot "design out" the confusion a little further with a clear exclusion line off the beach that downwinders see, to really set the stay out zone clearly.
Perhaps something like the lifesavers not only putting beach flags up, but also outer markers at the designated distance off the beach that the downwinders have to stay seaward of. A bit like two rounding marks. The markers could be selected carefully to minimise the risk of catching downed kites. In other words they create a clear area the downwinders have to sail/kite around.

obviously explanatory signage at both ends would be needed.

probably a crap idea, but sometimes lateral thinking about how to change habits or patterns works better than fines.

another crap idea might be a warning flag that the lifesavers put up if they see you as infringing or about to. They could have a different colour to communicate a clear infringement. ( At this stage you wouldn't know if they are thinking you're cutting it too fine. You'd only really know if you were met by an angry ranger at the bottom end).

i don't do the downwinder, but I'm pretty attached to that section of water.

So how does one send this to kiteboarding WA so that they can take it up and maybe put some signs up, isn't that what the organisation is for?

OzinColo said..
So how does one send this to kiteboarding WA so that they can take it up and maybe put some signs up, isn't that what the organisation is for?

KWA contact email address: [email protected] it's on the website kiteboardingwa.org.au

KWA AGM is on the 28th of May 2019 @ 6:30pm @ Fremantle Surf Lifesaving Club. If you care enough about kitesurfing @ your local to lend a hand or just want to see what it's about then please come along.