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OT--Think Treetop Flyer was Dangerous?

Cool! This is an extreme (and statistically dangerous) hybrid of paragliding (my 'other' airplane) and the BASE jumping crowd. There is a fair amount of cross over of these speed flyers with the paraglider crowd - we share some of the same sites.

Speed flying is more dangerous for two reasons: you fly about twice as fast and use a wing of almost half size (9 to 12 m^2 vs. 26 m^2 for a regular PG wing). Such a small wing is only really good for fast swooping flights, and many times (as you can see in that great video) the pilot _has_ to land. Much of the 'flying' is from pulling down on the brake toggles - kinda like abruptly pulling back on the stick gives an airplane a sometimes unsustainable rate of climb.

Alas - 'Speed flying' is too new for me to find a good webpage, but if you are curious the wikipedia page for Paragliding might be a good start. Paraglidingforum.com is kinda like the VAF site for paragliders.

A one day intro class for Paragliding costs about $220 - including equipment rental - a P2 rating (kinda like FAA 'solo') takes about ten days of training. It is a very different form of flight - I was surprised to find I enjoy it as much as the RV. There are some great thermal sites anywhere you find mountains - I've had multihour flights that reached very high altitudes just from thermals and launching off a low ridge near my house.

Sorry for the long email but I dig this stuff . In fact, we just put down a deposit for a trip to Chile over thanksgiving: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8233943155438496775

:D
 
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