[Rick Masters]

2011 48 (to date)
2010 95
2009 113
2008 122
2007 88
2006 90
2005 66
2004 89
2003 69
2002 59

Just to be sure we're dealing with the facts, can anyone confirm or refute those statistics?

Those numbers are only the ones I was aware of by August of 2011 and are revised up or down when new information comes in.
For instance, the paragliding fatality total 2009 now stands at 109. Some other years are much higher.
I am still trying to find a hang glider accident due to a "sticky wing," a paraputzism.*
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*The noun "paraputzism" was entered into the lexicon of paragliding by Rick Masters on the US Hawks forum on April 24, 2018.

A paraputzism is an incomprehensible description of something regarding a real aircraft, offered as criticism or advice to real pilots by a paraputz.

[SamKellner]

I am still trying to find a hang glider accident due to a "sticky wing," a paraputzism.*
-------------.

"sticky wing" ?? fake news for sure

[Rick Masters]

Aug 4, 2011    Paragliding Forum

Bob Kuczewski, founder, US Hawks
    I hadn't realized there were that many deaths each year in paragliding.



James Bradley, USHPA paraputz
    A lot more people than that die in the bathtub every year. In the US alone, we lose about 40,000 people each year to car accidents. Are you going to quit bathing and driving?
Why not? Deaths-per-year numbers alone mean nothing. As far as paragliders vs hang gliders, the same air that will collapse you on launch in a paraglider will give you sticky wing in a hang glider. The range of outcomes is the same. RM is like Michael Moore. He selects emotionally charged anecdotes that appear to support his argument. He puts on airs of being instructive, again because it supports his case.

[Find sticky wings here: https://www.google.com/search?q=sticky+wing&num=50&client=ubuntu&hs=mQC&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi9kI7HqNTaAhUDxmMKHRliBBQQ_AUICygC&biw=1536&bih=868 ]

Rick Masters, body counter, adapted from Mythology of the Airframe (2009-2012)
    Soaring parachutists are often insistent in claiming that there have been about as many fatalities in both sports, which suggests both sports are equally dangerous. This is not true. Paragliders collapse and the majority of paragliding fatalities appear to follow a collapse. A collapse at altitude can result in a full recovery or an unrecoverable spiral dive. But most fatal collapse events initiate within the Paraglider Dead Man's Curve.
    Short of varying degrees of structural failure, the airfoil of a hang glider does not deform. The majority of hang gliding fatalities stem from pilot error.
    Nearly 500 hang gliding fatalities had occurred before the first paragliding fatality. For a direct comparison of hang gliding and paragliding risk the fatality count must obviously begin at that point. But soaring parachutists seem either incapable of understanding this or seek to deliberately manufacture a false safety argument by invariably including the total number of hang glider pilots killed prior to the beginning of paragliding.

[magentabluesky]

Man, you learn something new every day in aviation. I have to confess, I have never heard of a “sticky” wing before. I must be nubbie to aviation.

The only “sticky” wing I ever felt was when I dragged it on takeoff and it was sticking to the ground. Yes, I confess, I too am a namby pamby pilot at times and am capable of having bad habits. Thankfully there are people in the world like Rick who will help extricate my head when it is buried too deep. He is truly a friend and a buddy.

Now from the one and only Dennis Pagen: Ridid Wings-Part 1: Spins, Speeds and Safety

The best way to avoid spins is to recognize the situations in which they occur and how they feel. Spins occur when you are flying slowly in turbulent conditions or you are in a shallow-banked turn (30° or less) and slow down too much. Spin prevention consists of maintaining a bit of extra insurance speed when soaring low, and when thermaling in a turbulent thermal. In addition, you should know the glider's signals of an incipient spin very well. These signals may include a "sticky" wing feeling (the inside wing wants to retard), a harder push-back of the basetube or pull-forward of the stick, and buffeting of control surfaces. Some craft may give no overt signs.

USHPA-Link

I pull back on the base tube. I have to confess again, I have never heard “pull-forward of the stick” before either. I have always “pushed” the stick forward. I did have one time where a burly student was flaring hard (pulling the stick aft) at ten feet with absolutely no energy left in the plane and I was “pushing” as hard as I could forward with both hands where I really thought the yoke was going to break.

Perhaps “pulling forward of the stick” is when you sit with your back to the instrument panel facing the tail of the airplane practicing unusual attitudes. We know how that is going to turn out.

Aviation is so FUN!

[Bob Kuczewski]

"sticky wing" ?? fake news for sure

As far as paragliders vs hang gliders, the same air that will collapse you on launch in a paraglider will give you sticky wing in a hang glider. The range of outcomes is the same.

The "range of outcomes" (on launch) includes being hit by an asteroid (on launch) or winning the lottery (on launch). So the "range of outcomes" isn't nearly as important as the probability and severity of those outcomes - and they are not the same.

[Rick Masters]

The other launch hazard James Bradley forgot to mention.
    "The range of outcomes is the same."

[Bob Kuczewski]

Is that the source of "sticky wing"?

[Frank Colver]

I think a "sticky wing" is when you dope your fabric (ie: rigid wing for you flex wing guys) with the wrong material and after many hours in the sun it gets all gooey.

FC

[magentabluesky]

No Hands Hang Gliding

Among those commitments was one by Steve Pearson of Wills Wing, to create a beginner hang glider model that is much easier to launch and land.

I don’t know how much easier it can get?

No-handed launch – Condor You Tube Link

NO HANDS – Alpha 210 You Tube Link

Wills Wing Alpha - Willy Dydo showing the Alpha 180 in Santa Barbara You Tube Link

[Rick Masters]

I don’t know how much easier it can get?

Yeah. I'm with you. The range of performance across all models of hang gliders goes far beyond what is possible in the paragliding world.

Unlike paragliders, which approach a sudden risk of collapse the faster they fly, hang gliders offer an incredible range of genuine performance and inherent safety. Unlike paragliders, which most accident news reports describe as suddenly "going out of control," regardless of the experience level of the helpless falling human attached to the useless thing, hang glider pilots get themselves in trouble through pilot error on fully functioning wings. Pilot error can be addressed with practice and training. Despite the disingenous protestations of soaring parachutists, canopy collapse cannot be. Fatality and injury rates attest to this. If you're at a couple hundred feet, you're s**t outta luck on a collapsed paragider. Nothing in the hang gliding world is comparable.

While it has been demonstrated that some novice pilots can learn on advanced wings - "Where's that spare downtube?" - a better route is to progress from an easy-to-launch and land wing to an easy-to-fly intermediate wing, then ultimately to a fast, demanding wing requiring a high level of skill (if you want to go there).

My own progression went well. I began on a swing seat Seagul III to learn the basics. I then moved to a Seagull single surface 10-meter clone. Next was a double surface Aolus Bowsprit for my first cross countries, then a big Moyes Meteor "Comet Clone". Virtually everyone I knew progressed in a similar manner in those years before paragliding and big commercial schools. And nearly every glider was used, except for the new advanced ones, so the cost of entering the sport wasn't high until you began competing and needed the latest, fastest wing.

Parachutists, with their limited ability to effect pitch, have little to offer hang glider pilots except for misconceptions and bad advice. It's hard for me to imagine a worse idea than a combined hang gliding and parachuting group. It makes no sense unless one group is using the arrangement to drain the resources and lifeblood from the other.