Paraglider survives after soaring to 32,000 feet

Batman · Post by **Batman** » Fri Feb 16, 2007 11:06 am

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17185299/from/ET/

C

Post by **hang_pilot** » Fri Feb 16, 2007 11:08 am

Amazingly the wing kept flying through 20 m/s up and 33 m/s down.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/dea ... 21626.html

~Daniel

Post by **XCanytime** » Sat Feb 17, 2007 10:24 am

Soaring? That's not soaring, that's stupidity. Seems that everyone except her and the deceased Chinese pilot gave the cu-nim wide berth. She just used up all her nine lives. Bacil

jimrooney · Post by **jimrooney** » Sun Feb 18, 2007 5:08 am

I'm still confused as to why a glider "still flying" in 20mps up is "amazing". I've heard this a LOT in relation to this article (every PG pilot on the planet seems to be talking about this)
Relative wind?
Gliders don't know up and down... they know relative wind. Wind coming over wing = wing flies.

Perhaps everyone's talking about a glider flying in violent conditions? But then the assumption is that it was "flying" because when she came to it was inflated. If you take your hands off the brakes and give it enough time... why wouldn't it be?

Jim

jimrooney · Post by **jimrooney** » Sun Feb 18, 2007 5:10 am

btw... not trying to be a shithead here... I'm honestly curious.

Post by **mcelrah** » Sun Feb 18, 2007 10:05 am

If I'm doing the math right, she was going up at 33 meters/sec = 6600 feet/minute? And down at 20 meters/second = 4000 fps? So presumable the wing was at least partially open during the ups. I suppose if the wing survived the transition from normal to rocket, it wouldn't "know" anything different. I haven't seen anything on the condition of her equipment after all this. Lines stretched? Rips? Did she get whiplash? - Hugh

jimrooney · Post by **jimrooney** » Sun Feb 18, 2007 12:53 pm

she didn't even start to spiral untill she was in 20mps up. (yup, your math is on)
why would the wing only be partially open? it doesn't know the difference between 1mps and 100mps.
now the transition are a different story, but we don't know about them. the only info we have is "there i was, going up at 20". and when she was out, it could have been a bag of laundry for all we know... there was a skydiver that went up and down like this after cutting away. my guess is that it was fine, but my point is we have no idea.

Post by **silverwings** » Mon Feb 19, 2007 12:47 pm

While in the airport on Saturday, I saw the report on a TV and I believe I heard the pilot say she was flying between two cells that joined and sucked her up. It's amazing she survived. I wonder if at the first signs of starting to get sucked up, what she could have done to get out of it? Any comments?

jimrooney · Post by **jimrooney** » Mon Feb 19, 2007 1:30 pm

Yeah, that's my beef with this whole thing... she waited till 20mps to start spiralling... that's kissing the dragon in my book. Kari Castle had enough sense to land. The others were just being hypercompetative. It's not like these are inexperienced pilots blundering into bad weather.... they're all world class. They knew what they were playing with.

ra ra ra....
Anyway.
Good to see ya over here John :)
You should post up about your travels. I think all these guys get to hear about NZ is my rosy colored "wow it's great" stuff. Be nice to hear a down to earth version esp considering how much more time you've spent here.
Jim

Spark · Post by **Spark** » Tue Feb 20, 2007 11:06 am

It is difficult to imagine why anyone would want to be in the air during this weather.

http://s7.photobucket.com/albums/y259/i ... G_0964.jpg

Post by **silverwings** » Tue Feb 20, 2007 1:08 pm

Wow, looking at those pictures from irrs, the first four look OK but by 5 you can see it building (img _0989) and by six, I sure would be trying to get down (and maybe that would be difficult). Seeing all the gliders in the air on the later pictures looks real scary to me. I wonder if some of them had trouble seeing that it was building? What maneuvers would you use trying to get down?

Flying Lobster · Post by **Flying Lobster** » Tue Feb 20, 2007 8:18 pm

Other than a cut-away freefall, there is no paragliding descent technique that could exceed the maximum lift recorded on Ewa's vario.

marc

jimrooney · Post by **jimrooney** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 2:10 am

which mght be why you don't wait till 20mps up to -start- to spial.
20mps or so being around the best decent rate you can hope for.
a hard spiral being hands down the fastest decent tecnique.

Post by **markc** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 11:31 pm

What would happen in the event of a cutaway?

Are PG reserves designed to handle the inflation forces after
a deploy from free-fall?

Also, what about the forces on the pilot? I can imagine a fast/quick
inflation that transmits forces that could cause physical injury....

Anyone know/heard-of cutaway deploys that were successful?

MarkC

chgpa.org

Paraglider survives after soaring to 32,000 feet

Paraglider survives after soaring to 32,000 feet

Some photos of the cloud-suck day in Manilla