Horror Stories

Although these instances are not really anything to be proud of, they are part of the lore of every hang-glider pilot.  I mention my own personal incidents here. 

Flying in McConnoldburg PA around 2001, I launched without my harness buckled (though it was zipped up).  This caused me to have very poor control of the glider and I had a hard time staying in life .. in fact I was unable to penetrate any thermals and was descending rapdily.. I decided to head for the "bail out" landing field - a small field near launch used for exactly those times you get in trouble finding life. 

On route to the landing field I managed to clear the last tree by about 5 feet so I was thankful for that, but then I found myslef heading straight for a telephone wire,  and I was not going to clear it, quickly I dove hard and flew under the wire landing in the drive way of the house next to the landing field.  I was perfectly ok and received the Capital Hang Gliding club's annual restricted landing field award..  This award is actually a booby prize  - it is small tombstone with a plaque attached.

 The following event was in 2008 and spooked me to the point I have not flown in 2 years.  I was flying at Woodstock on a light day with a number of paragliders and a few hang gliders.  I was flying along the ridge with a paraglider about 100 yards above me and 300 yards to my left - I was aware of it but not giving it much thought and it went out of veiw because it was above me.  I hit a thermal and turned right in attempt to penetrate the thermal, and it started to lift me.. after I had turned 270 degrees the paraglider pilot suddenly appeared out of nowhere and flew over me while lifting his feet to avoid my king post.  I talked to the paraglider pilot later to find out what he saw.   

Much to my dismay, I found that the same thing had happenned to him.. he started to turn left in a thermal, then suddenly I appeared out of nowhere just missing him.  Had we collided it almost certaintly would have been curtains as the tangling that would have occurred probably would have  made a parachute deployment impractical.. or totally  ineffective.