[Rick Masters]

Universal Paragliding Design Flaw (UPDF)

Paragliders are parachutes modified to soar at the expense of stability and safety. The canopy of a paraglider can suddenly lose its aerodynamic shape in normal atmospheric turbulence, collapse and fall. A 360-degree turn can tighten into a locked-in or nose-down spiral dive where control cannot be regained. A collapse below about 400-feet may not allow enough time for emergency reserve deployment, often resulting in serious injury or death.

See the Paraglider Dead Man's Curve (PDMC)
U.S. Hawks: http://ushawks.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=1582&p=12383&hilit=PDMC&sid=6dfcf030f832fd3d4197c0d0cc93bbac&sid=6dfcf030f832fd3d4197c0d0cc93bbac#p12383
and
Paragliding Forum: http://www.paraglidingforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=25711

Because these incidents have been occurring for 30 years with over 1,700 deaths in both powered and unpowered paragliders worldwide and the accident numbers show no signs of decreasing, on August 22, 2016, Rick Masters coined the term "Universal Paragliding Design Flaw (UPDF)" and placed it into the lexicon of paragliding on the U.S. Hawks forum.


Note: On the day of my original PDMC post on Paragliding Forum, June 23, 2009, the Russian soaring parachutist Boris Lukanin encountered lee turbulence on a flight near Anapa. His canopy collapsed and he fell from 50 or 60 meters, making him the 800th paragliding fatality that I am presently am aware of.

[Rick Masters]

This is a photo of 96 people.
I have verified 96 paragliding fatalities worldwide in 2016.
Unfortunately, that number is incomplete will continue to rise as late reports come in.

If the hang gliding designers and instructors of the middle 1970s had ignored the problem of the full luff dive and told us that the fatalities were due to pilot error, we would have a situation today similar to what is going on in paragliding.

[Rick Masters]

Make that 97.

[JoeF]

Are the shown 96 faces of the subject incidents?

[Rick Masters]

The 96 people in the photograph died in a soccer stampede in Hillsborough, England in 1989.
I find such visual devices useful in realizing the true cost of paragliding.
For envisioning the total accumulation of paraglider pilots and passengers who have been killed thus far, I use the Boeing 747s from the Tenerife disaster.

Not the original two. Not three. Not four. It's a nightmare. We're loading the fifth one now and it's three-quarters full.
Soaring parachutists should try this. Maybe then they'd realize there is something terribly wrong with their bloody sport.

[choppergirl]

So would there be a way to make a paragliding wing more rigid, and snap back into shape.

I'm thinking of something like a fishing rod, or those fiberglass tent poles you assemble with a bungee cord inside.

If you could slip a couple of fiberglass like fishing rods inside a paraglider wing connected togeter (or not), in the right way, I would think it could eliminate or minimix something like this potentially...

I don't know anything about paragliding... so... that being said, just throwing it out there...

[Bill Cummings]

So would there be a way to make a paragliding wing more rigid, and snap back into shape.

I'm thinking of something like a fishing rod, or those fiberglass tent poles you assemble with a bungee cord inside.

If you could slip a couple of fiberglass like fishing rods inside a paraglider wing connected togeter (or not), in the right way, I would think it could eliminate or minimix something like this potentially...

I don't know anything about paragliding... so... that being said, just throwing it out there...

At this stage of the game any idea could be an improvement. Brain Storming could come up with at least some advantage.

[Rick Masters]

So would there be a way to make a paragliding wing more rigid, and snap back into shape.

Like putting battens in the fabric? Okay, that takes care of the longitudinal shape, but you'll still need a lateral axis structure to keep the fabric from folding itself together. And some other stuff to keep everything pointing in the right direction. After a while, you end up with a defined wing that won't collapse - a hang glider - and you will have discovered how to make paragliding safer.

The real issue, though, is that paragliding is parachuting, and the parachute has to quickly pack into a bag to be backpacked or, more commonly, tossed into the trunk of a car. The safety and performance offered by hang gliders comes with a necessity to haul the thing around on a roof rack. I never gave this a second thought when I flew hang gliders, but it is too much of a hassle for today's soaring parachutists, who appear very happy to embrace greater risk for convenience.

A secondary issue is that when you try to change the design of a paraglider, which is essentially a fancy and less stable cut from a conical canopy, you start running into other problems. If you add weight to the fabric, the tendency of the paraglider to rotate around the pilot's mass increases. To minimize "surge," soaring parachutists prefer the sail to collapse and reinflate. Living ones consider this a safety asset.

[msoaring]

choppergirl has a good point. A lateral batten pocket the full length of the leading edge with a shock corded (graphite) batten that breaks down into a 2' or 3' length (for easy backpacking), would keep the leading edge (with the right tension), springy and stiff. This would prevent the collapse (momentarily), and possibly allow the glider to fly through the (temporary) turbulent airmass. It seems like paraglider designers would have already explored this concept, considering their product has a significant design flaw.
Thanks choppergirl!

[eagle]

Good thinking Chopper Girl
The best I've seen comes from Kite surfing inflatable foils to keep a float
~ A collapse deterrent ~

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