Kite Strings

Jack Haberstroh - 1974/05/31

San Diego State University
Department of Journalism
San Diego, California 92115

Mr. Richard O. Simpson, Chairman
Consumer Product Safety Commission
7315 Wisconsin Ave., N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20016

Re: Hang Gliders

Dear Mr. Simpson:

This letter is being written to ask your commission to conduct a thorough investigation into the hazards associated with hang gliding (also called sky sailing).

Southern California has been described as the "center" of hang gliding activity in the nation and many concerned parents (and participants) are having second thoughts about just how safe these hang gliders are.

This letter, furthermore, might be considered a kind of "public atonement" as I am the former President of Free-Flight of San Diego, the largest sky sailing school in the world. We trained more than 100 students a week in sky sailing. One of the principal reasons I sold my interest in Free-Flight of San Diego, frankly, was my mounting alarm over the increasing incidence of fatal and near-fatal accidents in hang gliding.

Given the relatively small number who are CONTINUALLY active in hang gliding (i.e. not merely signed up in some club) the accident rate seems disproportionately high. Four persons have been killed THIS YEAR in the State of California. Here in San Diego, the death a week ago Sunday (5-20-74) of Bruce Slingersand, 27, a "very experienced pilot", has added a dismal exclamation mark to the sport's deplorable safety record.

A recent news account stated that "Scripps Memorial Hospital (here) has handled at least six serious hang glider accidents within the past year, involving broken legs, spines, and skulls." John Adcock, a 28-year-old San Diego State University student who rates himself "a very good hang glider pilot" spent 85 days in the hospital with a broken back and leg as the result of a hang glider accident. When I spoke with him this morning he described the sport as "dangerous as hell".

Dale Cooper, 30, suffered head injuries in a hang glider crash at Torrey Pines (a popular cliff-site location) this year. Robert Edgett suffered a broken leg when his hang glider was smashed against the Torrey Pines cliff. Just last month Gordon Cummings, a 32-year-old hang glider pilot from Encinitas, suffered a broken arm, shock, and head injuries, when he crashed into a 60-ft. pine tree. He had to be cut down from the tree and was later admitted to the hospital in serious condition. Even the Sea World air devil, Jim Rusin, admits to breaking his neck twice and all the ribs in his body at least once.

My own sky sailing school, conducted as safely as we possibly could conduct it, was not free of injuries. We limited individual classes to 30 students and, as I recall, had a broken wrist the first class. A broken ankle the second class. A broken wrist the third class. And so it went, class after class. All this, despite the fact that we required students to wear full-length clothing, as well as elbow pads, gloves, knee pads, and a helmet, all of which we provided. And the fact that the first flying lesson was conducted from an elevation on a gentle sloping hill of no more than thirty feet.

Furthermore, I suspect that hang glider manufacturers and clubs are simply paying lip service to safety. I shall never forget one instance of this which I personally observed. Quite possibly the largest hang gliding meet ever held, from the standpoint of number of manufacturers and participants, was the Francis M. Rogallo First Annual Meet held in Escape Country (in Orange County, California) in January of this year. For openers, can you imagine holding a hang gliding meet (of all things!) in a pea-soup, London fog ! I couldn't believe it ! We could HEAR the kites descending before we could see them ! Kites were landing in the spectator area, on top of parked kites in the manufacturers' area, and in the parking lot where cars were maneuvering for parking places. Incredible ! When I protested holding a meet under such conditions with letters to all parties and to all three hang glider publications with which I was familiar I was told it "looked more dangerous than it really was" and that no "official" flying was being done an that time. That MAY be TECHNICALLY true. But (1) flying was being conducted, with each flight announced over the public address system by the meet announcer; (2) pilots were attempting target landings with envelopes (cash enclosed ?) placed by meet officials at the center of the landing target; (3) much of the flying under such conditions was being performed by "factory pilots" (i.e. representatives of various hang glider manufacturers, most of whom were in attendance at this bizarre event).

To add confusion to the safety claims and counterclaims of hang glider enthusiasts for their craft -- and to silence us critics -- is the fact that many expert pilots become involved in the commercial aspects and promote it (as I used to) despite its so obviously tawdry safety record. Manufacturers have also become involved in many club activities, again self-servingly promoting a sport that may not be nearly as safe as it might look !

In a nutshell: Is the "aircraft" itself a safe flying vehicle ? Is its glide ratio too steep, meaning that light, freak breezes or downdrafts will send the craft crashing ? Is the control mechanism sophisticated enough ? After all it's simply weight-shifting which controls it from side to side -- the same general principle which steers a surfboard. The difference, of course, is a surfboard misstep means a dunking in four feet of water. The injuries listed above suggests what can happen when one makes the same mistakes with a hang glider. Should manufacturers sell kites in "kit" form ? Or worse, sell plans, and hope the buyer can scrounge around for all the parts. And shouldn't hang glider instructors be certified ? Manufacturers, as some materials become difficult to obtain, are themselves substituting parts and materials. What certification is there that even these factory constructed "aircraft" are suitable to fly ?

My own investigation into this entire matter suggests that the "Rogallo Wing" may be too unstable and is unsuitable for safe, personal flight from any elevation. One aerophysicist of my acquaintance, calls them "death traps".

The injuries and deaths resulting from their use would seem to reinforce that assessment.

Sincerely,
Dr. Jack Haberstroh
4458 Mataro Drive
San Diego, California 92115

Associate Professor of Advertising
San Diego State University
San Diego, California 92115

CC:
Jerry Magee, San Diego Union
Neil Morgan, The Evening Tribune
Gene Gleeson, KFMB-TV
Larry Boyer, KGTV
Richard Hart, KSDO Radio
Wade Douglas, KSDO Radio

Pete Wilson, Mayor of the City of San Diego

Robert V. Wills - 1978/02

1977/06/24 - Robert V. Wills - 26 - Wills Wing SST "Pulley Special" - Escape Country, California

Filming a commercial for Jeep. During final turn for landing helicopter crossed his landing path, leaving turbulence that tumbled the kite from 75 feet.

Robert V. Wills - 1980/04

1979 HANG GLIDING FATALITIES
An Update

I won't restate all of my goals and premises for Glider Rider readers, but I will identify one major catechism behind me efforts since 1974: the only way to redeem anything from the tragedy of fatal accidents is to prevent others through any lessons learned. And the only way to learn any lessons is to, first, hear about the accidents and, second, to think about them. I volunteered my efforts in this direction after our third son, Eric, was killed doing his first 360 on March 16, 1974 near San Bernardino. I decided to continue the efforts after our eldest son, Bob, was blown down and killed by a helicopter on June 24, 1977.

Robert V. Wills - 1981/01

Your readers should know that the hang glider pilot has again been turned away by a jury.

The wrongful death suit brought by Suzette Wills and her children for the death of Bob Wills on June 24, 1977, was in a Santa Ana courtroom for five weeks in October and November. The attorney for Suzette, a prominent trial attorney who rarely loses, proved that Bob was blown down by the filming helicopter's wake; in fact, this was even conceded by the defense during the trial. It was also proved that the helicopter pilot changed his flight path from the prior filming run and left rotorwash across the normal landing approach.

Yet the jury, which included two powered-aircraft pilots, found the helicopter pilot innocent, by a nine to three vote, after three days of deliberation, awarding nothing to the widow and kids.

The verdict was a shock to the family members who attended the entire trial, Suzette and Maralys, as well as to Suzette's attorney. About all it proves is that a hang glider pilot simply accepts the risk of crashing - even if someone else helps him do so. It's an unenlightened attitude but it's there. We know of no jury verdict for a hang glider pilot yet.

The trial was long and expensive. As is often the case, the jury saw the trees but missed the forest.

Tad Eareckson - 2011/05/27 14:30:15

To: Lili Panarella

Chicago Sun-Times - 2005/10/06

On Wednesday, Thompson's family filed a negligence lawsuit against the company, demanding unspecified damages but also hoping to find out how the crash happened.

"They're two hundred feet in the air, and while normally they would glide to the ground, this hang glider nose-dived to the ground," attorney Matthew Rundio said. "We need to find out why that happened."

The Missoulian - 2005/09/18

We treasure all of Jeremiah's friends and hope you will communicate with us, especially if you cannot be at the memorial service.

1. Hoping that neither of those items has hit an expiration date.

2. Apologies for undoubtedly opening some old wounds.

3. I never met your brother but he sounds like someone who could have been a friend and valuable asset in the war to change hang gliding from the incompetent corrupt killing machine it's been for most of its existence into something safe and sane.

Three Februaries ago I was asked by the Chairman of the USHPA Towing Committee to help him revise the (miserable, dangerous, meaningless, toothless) regulations covering aerotowing which made that 2005/09/03 inexcusable crash mostly compliant and blameless.

I spent a couple of months getting them in sync with Newtonian physics and sailplane procedures and regulations which had been around for most of the previous hundred years and asking for comments and input but fairly soon discovered that an establishment which couldn't be bothered to read - let alone comply with - any of the regulations it had had on its own books for the past quarter century certainly wasn't gonna bother to read my proposed revisions - let alone adopt them and subject itself to any of the standards and accountability they threatened.

Next move was to bring my concerns about the shoddy standards and practices which killed Jeremiah (and one of my old flying companions and his tandem clinic student in a very similar incident nine years earlier) to the FAA. No action from those useless bastards either - and the end of my twenty-eight year flying career (coast to coast blackballing - not much in the way of whistleblower protection in this game).

So if you or your family wants to know what happened (and don't at this point)...

1. The tug driver was incompetent. He climbed above the glider and stayed there - probably as he had been trained to do by Arlan.

2. The glider nosed up to try to get into proper position, which - in a sane world - would be behind and level with the tug.

3. There was an expectation that the tug would drop back down into something approaching proper position and help them out with the tension (thrust) they needed to regain and maintain safe flying speed.

4. The tug didn't get back down and apparently remained oblivious.

5. This induced the glider to nose up further and get dangerously close to stall speed.

6. The tug end weak link blew. The tug end weak link isn't supposed to blow until a hundred pounds after the glider end weak link. But that's just a suggestion - not a requirement. And, what the hell, unlike in REAL aviation there are no MINIMUM requirements for the attachments between tug and glider anyway.

7. As a consequence of the weak link blowing - COMPLETELY UNNECESSARILY - the already dangerously slow glider lost all of its thrust and most of its airspeed and whipstalled.

8. There's an array of stainless steel wires - the reflex bridle - running between the kingpost and trailing edge of the sail which prevents the trailing edge from deflecting down and thus allows the glider to pull out of a dive. A Dacron sail shrinks with age and stainless steel doesn't. Therefore this system must be periodically checked and adjusted. It wasn't and thus the glider had no chance of recovery. And from 200 to 250 feet it should've been able to recover but instead went down like a brick.

Of those contributing factors only the last was a clear violation of USHGA/FAA aerotowing regulations.

The towed vehicle (un-powered ultralight) must meet or exceed the Hang Glider Manufacturers Association's airworthiness standards.

It didn't. But even if it had been properly maintained it would still have been put in a very dangerous situation in which survival would be far from a certainty.

So WHY did this happen?

Arlan was running a dangerous operation (as are virtually all of these outfits - worldwide).

Fourteen months prior to the 2005/09/03 crash an advanced rated twenty year pilot was killed when Arlan towed him up into dangerous conditions on dangerous equipment which included an understrength weak link which blew unnecessarily and deprived him of any options for avoiding the stall.

About four and a half months before the fatal tandem crash a student of Arlan's was towed up with dangerous equipment at a dangerously slow speed and consequently experienced a stall that dropped him half of the seven hundred feet he had to burn.

Arlan was doing a lousy job of running an aviation operation but doing so with the full approval of the incompetent inbred corrupt organization that's supposed to be making this sport safe for people like Jeremiah but is instead only interested in protecting itself from liability and recruiting as much membership as possible.

And WHEN these needless tragedies occur at regularly scheduled intervals the response is NEVER to fix problems to ensure they don't kill somebody else. The response is ALWAYS to blame the victim and suppress and distort information and get everyone on the same page with the same story - because if the problem gets fixed there's a tacit admission that things were being done wrong and that opens up major liability issues with respect to the previous half dozen people killed for the same easily predictable and preventable reason.

Also... When someone is killed clearly as a consequence of violation of an existing standard it's always a lot more convenient to eliminate the standard than to hold people accountable. So you get a process of reverse evolution. There were accepted and complied with rules in place in the mid Seventies which almost certainly would've kept the 2005/09/03 crash from occurring. No trace of them exists today - nothing so much as a recommendation.

To put this in Winter Olympics terms...

1. You build an obviously dangerous luge course.

2. Everybody and his dog knows it's dangerous.

3. In practice before the games even begin you kill someone who had just hours before expressed those concerns in no uncertain terms.

4. You lay the blame on the Olympic athlete and paint him as incompetent.

5. Then you keep building scores more courses just like it - or more shoddy and dangerous - 'cause you've already paid for the plans and materials and you're really good at blaming the athlete and painting him as incompetent.

6. Especially when you can get an incompetent, apathetic, and/or corrupt coroner's jury to support your position.

Mike Van Kuiken - 2005/10/10

I saw that Jeremiah was doing the take off right from the start and I watched him get pretty low on the tow as the tug crossed the road at the end of the runway.

Catch that? It's a bit subtle but...

1. JEREMIAH got pretty low on the tow. Not what was ACTUALLY going on - which was that the tug driver (whose name, curiously, never seems to have been made public) got dangerously high on the glider - exactly as in the 2005/04 incident and the 1996/07/25 tandem crash near Cleveland which killed two leaders of the sport (Master and Advanced rated with over 47 years of experience between them) from that chunk of the country.

2. Also... If Arlan didn't like what Jeremiah was doing he was perfectly capable of overriding his control at any moment he chose. But we're not hearing how Arlan or Arlan and Jeremiah got pretty low on the tow - just Jeremiah.

And when you try to get the luge course outlawed and replaced with something that WON'T routinely throw world class competitors into unpadded steel poles at ninety miles per hour...

Tad,

Does it bother you that you can't engineer away all sources of danger? It does? Then I suggest you sell your equipment and take up a safe activity like checkers.

Hi Tad.

I'm Tracy Tillman, on the USHPA BOD, on the Tow Committe, and I am an Aviation Safety Counselor on the FAA Safety Team (FAAST) for the Detroit FSDO area. As a rep of both the USHPA and FAA, I would like to help you, USHPA, and the FAA improve safety in flying, towing, and hang gliding.

The FAA gets a lot of letters of complaint from a lot of yahoos...

There should have been dozens of heads on pikes as a consequence of that Hang Glide Chicago crash. Arlan's should have been one of them - had he been otherwise occupied at the time. But it's the Dr. Tracy S. Tillmans that are in most need of elimination from the gene pool 'cause they're the ones most heavily invested in the luge courses, unpadded steel poles, and blame-the-incompetent-victim administrative strategy and concealing their own stupidity and incompetence. And seeing as how he's FAA, USHGA, AND a flight park operator you get a lot more bang for your chopping block buck.

And, if you're interested... I've got EXCELLENT paper trails documenting how the people controlling this sport enabled this crash and got everybody on the same page with a story everybody could stick to - blatantly contradicting previous statements and positions.

So, other than making sure that you were informed of what happened and why, what's my point...

1. I, as did Jeremiah in the course of his short dangerous exposure to the sport, loved hang gliding.

2. But EVERY SINGLE TIME time I towed up behind an ultralight I was taking a completely unnecessary risk of being crashed for most of the same reasons that took him down.

3. More importantly, so was - AND IS - everyone else.

4. Minor crashes for these reasons are so commonplace that they rarely get mentioned but the potential for a kill is always present.

5. Sometimes there are severe crashes in hang gliding which are simply the Darwin Effect kicking in but the vast majority of them occur because of dangerous, incompetent policy and instruction and shoddy unregulated equipment - such as was the case in Jeremiah's crash. These greatly sadden and anger me.

From the national magazine by an individual who has been a USHGA Director since 2001/02...

Felipe Amunategui - 1996/12

A Tribute To Mike Del Signore

It took a while before I could get under a wing again, and some of our fellow pilots may never do so after this. We all react to tragedy in our own way. I knew Mike well, and I am certain that he would have never wanted to discourage others from flying safely, yet I know he would have respected each one's decision and ways of dealing with the pain. Also, I am certain that Mike would want want us to learn how to avoid a similar tragedy. We owe it to Mike and Bill to further refine aerotowing in general and tandem towing in particular.

It was virtually the SAME crash as Jeremiah's. Tug driver who didn't know what he was doing, got and stayed high in front of the glider, stalled it, and blew his front end weak link. Two deaths. If Felipe and his ilk actually HAD bothered to learn how to avoid a "similar tragedy" the similar tragedy which killed your brother wouldn't have happened. And STILL he and his ilk will do NOTHING to revise and implement the standards needed to avert the next similar murder (you can only call them tragedies the first two or three times - and there was another one like this in Florida on 1998/10/25 (also two deaths - instructor and student)).

6. Nothing will be done to decrease the frequency of those until enough of the people in control are more afraid of financial and legal consequences than they are of killing the next customer. Negligence suits such as the one filed by your family are the ONLY thing that will work to crack this cult. I'm so sorry that I didn't understand then what I do now 'cause I could've helped destroy the criminals responsible for that situation.

Zack C - 2010/12/13 04:58:15 UTC

I had a very different mindset too back then and trusted the people that made my equipment. Since then I've realized (largely due to this discussion) that while I can certainly consider the advice of others, I can't trust anyone in this sport but myself (and maybe the people at Wills Wing).

That's my current protege who started flying about a year before Jeremiah. I want to change that lay of the land.

Your brother was a victim of this culture and his death, as it is, was a tragic waste. The best we can do is use it as a lesson to prevent more crashes with the same underlying causes. If you would lend your voice to such an effort - at any level, from a letter of support (perhaps to the FAA and/or a congressman) on up - I would greatly appreciate it.

If it's still possible and you wish to pursue legal action, little would make me happier than to help with that. I know what I'm talking about, I don't lose debates (just get locked down and banned frequently), and I know where a lot of skeletons are buried.

If this issue is too painful for you to want to deal with I can understand, appreciate, and respect that. But if that's the case, maybe you could recommend an old ski buddy or other friend who might be interested.

Thanks very much for your attention.

Best wishes,
Tad Eareckson

Sam Panarella - 2011/05/28 02:25:22

Tad, Lili forwarded your email to me. I'm Lili's husband, Jeremiah's brother-in-law. As you can imagine, this is still a very tough subject for Lili and the rest of the family. I will discuss it with them and let you know if there's anything they would like to do. Thanks for reaching out.

Sam

I'm not so confident as you...

No text, no rule, no death penalty never stopped deviant behaviors.

Courts, and more if it is money, do not always make the best decisions.

I much prefer your teaching approach...

...which takes longer, but anchor it better..

Steve Kinsley - 2005/09/21 15:15:54 UTC

I am bothered by the current aerotow release options even though I have never really had a bad experience. If you were seriously crooked right off the cart are you confident you could really get to the release? I am an old guy and am no longer very confident in my abilities. That is why I have messed around trying to devise something where you hold a string in your mouth. Open your mouth and you are off. After much experimentation and many exasperated tug pilots seems to work fine. But with the exception of Tad, nobody else I know is bothered by this aspect of towing.

Steve Kinsley - 2006/02/10 02:22:10 UTC

Every year people are injured or killed by incidents like this (John Dullahan, low level lockout, broken wrist). Glider comes off the cart crooked (or gets crooked shortly after) and proceeds to a lockout situation very quickly before the pilot has time to release. These are generally advanced pilots towing from the shoulders in rowdy conditions.

While nothing like this has ever happened to me, reading about these incidents (particularly one in Australia where someone (Robin Strid) was killed) made me uncomfortable with my barrel release system. Accordingly, I devised a release where you hold a string that activates the release in your mouth. Open your mouth and you are off. Instantly. It works. What's more, as the pressure from an incipient lockout builds, you have to actively decide to stay on by biting down harder. "Duh" mode results in a release.

Once you are up a hundred feet or so and out of danger, you slide a keeper over the string and it becomes a barrel release. I think it is great. Tad Eareckson has made it even smaller. While I really do not like to proselytize on behalf of this system, it seems a no brainer to me. I think if everybody used this or something like it, there would be fewer incidents. So you should. And tow parks should make them and sell them.

I have made a few. Tad has some. If you want to try one let me know and I will send you one.

Hey Antoine,

I saw my release on the Oz Report! Oh man people are emailing me now asking about it! I only have two left! Oh My God I must get busy now to make some more. It is a lot of work!! Thank you for your confidence in my release and making such kind words on the world's online hang gliding magazine. I guess my other hang gliding projects must wait now as I get to work making releases, but that is a good thing. Thank you! I wish you many good flights.

Joe

Maybe the reason that there was virtually no discussion on The Davis Show is because the smarter people in this sport understand that there's no point in discussing anything on The Davis Show.