Getting dragged to death by paragliders August 13, 2018
I was flying north along the western side of the Inyo Range, returning on an out and return hang gliding flight from Mazourka, above my home in Independence, to notorious Cerro Gordo.
The flight had been great, but I suddenly began losing altitude and decended below the elevation of 11,105 ft Kenot Peak.
The air quickly became rougher, indicating an easterly carrying eddies and rotors into my path toward Mazourka.
I eased out into Owens Valley, holding tightly to my control bar.
My flying buddy Howard Gerrish had warned me about this.
In the afternoon, the expansion of the air over the Great Basin ranges would sometimes swell over the Inyo crest, overpowering the prevailing southwesterly winds and creating great turbulence near these dry, painted mountains.
Howard had described the roughest air he had ever encountered in an afternoon flight along the Inyos.
He told me the turbulence had almost broken his Comet.
I wanted none of that!
My flights along the Inyos, up to that time, had been pleasant.
Memorable for their beauty, smooth lift, ease of flight and easy altitude.
I had left my little Honda Trail 70 nestled in the creosote bushes at the base of Mazourka Canyon Road.
As I approached my landing zone a few miles ahead, I would attempt to work lift only to lose everything I had gained in the second half of the turn.
"I am in eddies," I realized with trepidation, feeling them getting stronger with each mile and knowing my impending landing might not be easy.
I crossed above the road, pulling in my bar at 300 feet for a fast landing approach to a bare - and hopefully soft - spot between creosote bushes.
The wind was strong and variable, coming straight in from the steeply rising mountains only mile before me.
Up, then down. Up, then down. Eddies. Finally, my feet touched the ground.
I threw my weight forward and...
I was looking up at the sky.
I was laying on the undersurface of the Pacific Wings Racing Express, looking up at the sky.
I had no idea as to how I'd come to be there.
It was quite comfortable, actually.
The noseplate was down on the ground, facing the Inyos.
The wings were rocking gently, supported by the kingpost, the light wind pressing them down.
I pulled myslef up to the apex of the downtubes and unhooked.
I threw the nose up into the wind and the hang glider flipped upright.
I caught the rear of the keel, slipped underneath, and brought her into the wind.
I was completely fine.
The glider was unscathed.
I felt like I had stepped through a dimension to an alternate universe.
So why do I tell you this?
I want to tell you about being dragged to death by paragliders and it seemed like a suitable introduction.
Paragliders are different than hang gliders.
They want to kill you.
This is obvious to hang glider pilots.
Soaring parachutists don't allow themselves to see it.
On Saturday, in England, a guy and a gal were getting ready for a joyride on a tandem paraglider.
But before they left the ground, the canopy was seized by "a freak gust of wind" - as the press put it - and pulled them both over.
I think the "freak gust of wind' gambit us used to divert the blame away from the paraglider.
You wouldn't want people thinking they're dangerous. Oh, no... Anyway.
It then began draging them both along the hillside.
They were skating and tumbling on the grass, gaining speed, when they came to a stone wall.
The girl must have hit first, the commander slamming into her, then the paraglider pulled them both through the wall, smashing it.
Can you imagine?
The poor girl broke her neck. And her back.
I heard the guy was okay.
But I wouldn't want to have his memory of that!
So that's what paragliders can do.
Hang gliders don't do that.
Hang gliders usually just blow over and stop. Or break and stop.
Paragliders keep going. I guess you can't stop them and you can't jump off. You're screwed.
I've talked in the past about the horrible injuries people falling on paragliders receive.
They fall just fast enough to break lots of bones but not to kill themselves outright.
Sure, hang glider pilots have had their share of ugly injuries, but nothing like what modern day paragliding has wrought.
Broken backs across the world, every weekend.
Open fractures with the bones sticking out of the flesh.
Broken hips. Broken pelvises. Unbelievable internal injuries. Popped organs.
I've compared the results of paragliding accidents to the most severe of medieval tortures.
But nobody did this for fun in the Middle Ages.
Now paragliding presents a new horror. Dragging to death.
This was a popular form of torture, not just in medieval times but in modern wars and the American Jim Crow south.
Ugly as hell. No mercy.
Tied by the wrists, they would drag you until the skin ripped off your body.
Then the fat and the muscles and your privates - until you bled to death.
Who would do that for fun?
It makes me sick to think about this. To write about this.
But if you really think you know what paragliders are, you need to know this.
On Sunday, a German was preparing to take off when a gust took his canopy and pulled him into the air.
It then slammed him down and lifted him again.
"The man was thrown several hundred yards and hit the ground again and again," wrote the press.
"He was so badly injured that he died.
When trying to help the man, a woman and two other men had been injured."
This is a sport?
This isn't a sport.
It's something else disguised as a sport.
God help those idiots.
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