hang gliding accident parachute deployment.mov 

I'm a hang glider pilot, & years ago I was doing a hang-check, by lying cliped-in, prone on the ground. I didn't notice, until I was ready to launch, that my reserve chute handle got trapped under the base bar, & when I stood- up, the chute container dropped onto the ground! I definitely have learned from my mistakes!

So glad it worked out ok, out of all that wide open area missing that concrete abutment by a foot added a new level of scary.

Thanks for your willingness, this video tells a good story. This is the big European drogue chute on a long lanyard, the standard setup. It wanders a lot, and is perhaps too effective in reducing speed on the ground, such that the pilot must be skilled and ready to dive it in and flare it fast. The American style chute is a foot smaller in diameter and on a short lanyard, more stable and easier to use, though less of a tugger. I used it for years on every landing and was happy with it.

Bloody lucky with the wall!:)

I think you could have landed ok.

Q: You know what paragliders call this? A: A flight.

It's a simple drouge chute. Its meant to degrade glide performance to land in tighter lz locations. The pilot could still fly with the drouge out. Performance would have suffered. The pilot could also retract the drouge in flight. This is very different than the emergency parachute. I would suggest the pilot shorten the lead on the drouge to avoid getting tangled with the keel. Keep a cool head if this happens. First, fly the glider to get away from the terrain and other aircraft. Then assess the situation and start making a list of your options. The pilot could have easily pulled on the lead until they had the nylon in hand to restow it or use a hook knife to cut it loose. The only issue would be letting the drouge get wrapped around a downtube or the control bar. If you can't fix the problem, fly the problem! The pilot had plenty or altitude to set up a proper landing approach. The ground speed at impact was much too high. Land into the wind as normal and understand that the drouge only changes the l/d (glider performance) of the gluder, not the stall speed, flare speed etc. I'm really happy the pilot appears to be fine but that impact speed could have been life altering or life ending. Please get some quality instruction and deploy at altitude to see how to disable it and to see how the glider is affected with the drouge out. No more close calls like this one please! Cheers

You were about 6 inches from spinal compaction and a life in paralysis.

@logmeindangit...more or less crosswind landing......didn`t have the chance to land directly against the wind...the last turn was horrible...didn`t get the glider into the right direction...but close to the ground the wind became less...(-:

Frank thanks for sharing ..just be thankful it wasnt the bigger chute

The rational behind having a drogue chute is to shorten your approach..., equivalent to lowering flaps on a rigid wing.. Requires more pull in to keep up a safe approach speed . There was absolutely no reason to belly into the ground !. Lucky you did not break your neck or back. BUT Thanks for having the courage to post this video.. May you fly high and safely .

If landing on your face is a good result I think I’ll stick to other hobbies

man those last seconds were fast - more upright and a flare rather than push out might have totally saved it but glad you are ok i've seen people get badly hurt for less impact...thanks for sharing Frank!

Man, glad the only thing you broke was your DT, fly safe bro:)

Landings like that make me wonder what would happen if you had big bicycle wheels on the base tube. They’re strong, light, aerodynamic, big enough to not get caught in ruts, and would keep your neck away from the ground. When the frame nose inevitably digs in, you’d still be a wheel radius above the ground. What are the downsides for an extra 3kg of weight?

Glad to see the pilot walk away.

Good to see you are ok and you showed poise under stress!

Drogue chute lowers the glider performance significantly, I tried mine last week and I couldn't believe. I cried here go uprights at 2:02 😱

wow dude you almost hit the concrete wall.

I can't believe that a sport that is almost 50 years old still doesn't have a way to detach a parachute. I'm astounded that there are any accidents/mishaps at all. With all the technology and information available it is still humans that fly these machines.

These small parachutes are commonly used to reduce landing speed. I think it was possible to land on my feet, but of course I don't know the details that prevented it.

Thank God you didnt hit that stone wall when you were coming in so low. Dude you're lucky to be alive! Anyway I'm glad ya are :) I would get rid of that flight-bag and buy about 15 rolls of bubble-wrap if I were you! :)

never mind the chute - what the hell were you doing trying to land so close to that concrete wall!!!

Turned all the way to the ground, no 'final', no rotation - no surprise.

...I still fly with the 12" wheels; they have prevented a number of very abrupt stops...!

@watto958 Hey, watto old chap, my first comment, "was that a downwind or crosswind landing?", was in reference to the way he pounded in with no flare. He was going pretty fast, as if he had chosen the wrong landing direction. If the winds were as strong as he said, then he'd have been able to land into the wind easily, at a very slow ground speed. About the drag chute, I was merely making an observation that it seemed to be on the far side of the keel more than just side-slipping would do.

Never has the saying “a wing and a prayer” been more prevalent.

When you stoped you can see the colapsed drogue being blown to the right.This idicates that your landing approach was down wind.I think you got yourself in a bit of a pickle when you realised that the drogue had deployed.I am sure you have learnt from this and are a sfer pilot ads a result.Happy flights.

dam u were in a rush to get down to earth, nearly ended up in australia lol,glad ur ok ;)

hi raymond...of course...the drogue chute caused problems...the wind was very strong...aprox 30-40 km/h...i launched for soaring...the vid doesn`t show the problem i had to bring the glider out of the circle...it was horrible...only by pulling the cross bar the glider turns...so no drogue chute by strong wind and in curves...(-;...for landing i was scared at first by the strong wind...i tryed it nevertheless getting myself vertical but too late...as you can watch on the vid...

No weapon fashioned against him shall prosper. An evil person jinxed him.

nope...landings are done via a "flare," setting down on feet, like a large bird. Curious that the pilot stayed prone throughout final approach and landing.

What a drag!

@Mande1brot i very well know what a hook knife is. but the problem is your drag chute is atached on the back of the harness and there is no way you can reach its cord and cut it in flight...

I use wheels on my basebar and have a quick release on my drogue chute. With an LZ that big I dont think a drag chute is needed. You waited way to late to get upright to land. Glad you didn't get hurt

Parachute: I just wanted to have some fun. I never get out. Hang Glider: Keels over with embarassment.

Such brutal landing I hope your ok

Ouch man that was soooooo painful fit don’t crash only air glider when you are not busy and the wind is good and sadies

Looks like the wind was pulling your drogue chute to the left as you were trying to turn right and line up on final. I have had landings like that where I chose not to foot land and risk a run out and twisted knee as I have had two ACL injuries but hey, I have wheels so I have that option. Swallow your pride and put some wheels on the base tube. It's not worth a neck fracture and paraplegia or even quad just to look cool wheel less.

hey Fränk!! das war aber ein ordentlicher Schuss vor den Bug - zum Glück is nix passiert. see you in HOF -ali-

and that's how man vs wild started

Should be entitled ACCIDENTAL parachute deployment.

This was a drogue chute, not a parachute. A parachute is to save your life in an emergency. A much smaller drogue chute is used as drag for a tight landing field.

Misleading title! Am converting my trainings from paraglider to hang glider, so tying to study emergency procedures to arm myself with as much information as possible...

Glad you are all right Thx. for sharing the video.

*After Crash* Your Parachute Is Now Ready For Deployment

I'm thinking that the fact that the drouge was out the whole flight freaked you out - because it still should have been a normal landing - that stone wall is probably why you stayed prone right to the ground, but an approach without an obstruction would have solved that - and wheels have saved many a life - anyway you live to fly another day

Glad you are okay....

war nur der bremsschirm -falls die reserve rausfällt liegst du am berg irgendwo

Dude,, You don't realize how lucky you are!!!!! Do you have any idea how close you came to losing your keel sock????? Seriously,, Glad you and the glider are OK. At least it wasn't your reserve that deployed.

@haugen206 from canada...thx for posting...this is what i felt when i uploaded the vid years ago..."learning from my mishap"...for everybody...and as we know...shit happens...i`m checking my chute every time before launching!...and since the accident i have a system to drop off the chute...take care man...(-;

Hand Gliding most extreme and dangerous thing to do

@viagro1980 A hook knife is a fairly standard piece of hg equipment, and I think this incident is a classic example where one could have been used to cut the chute away and fly/land more safely.

Well it doesn't seem like too big of a deal that gives you a little bit of ballast going the other direction but it got me to watch your vid.

I had one of those, no big deal makes it easier to land. lol

wow. Had you tried landing with the drouge previously to get used to it?

Schicki Micki fliegt ohne Räder!😢

...and also in place of problem-causing drogue chutes, going upright also produces some extra drag in case that pilot has concerns of overshooting the landing site.

Did you know that the parachute was out when you where in the air?

you're lucky ... that looked like it would have hurt a lot

@munirocknroll2...hey man...no time for taking my hands from the frontbar...wind was too strong...but now i have a system to pitch the chute...

Yeah I should imagine the drogue kills airspeed which might lead to a stall unless diving steeply, and the drogue is wobbling about which can't be good. If I was a flyer I wouldn't use one, I'd get out of the bag and dangle in the airstream like a human speed brake instead..:)

With all the room in the world, the pilot chooses to come in low over an obstacle and then flies into the ground. I don't see any drogue chute involvement here. It may be that the drogue shortened the ground skim so the pilot did not have time to rotate his body up and thus failed to shift his hands to the down tubes in order to execute an effective flare. Getting to the ground and then trying to rotate is a mistake, with or without a drogue chute. The pilot should be rotated upright with his hands on the downtubes throughout the final approach so he is ready to flare no matter what.

it doesnt look like it hurts O_O

Is that little parachute supposed to bring you including the glider to the ground safely?? Seems crazy small to do anything...

WOW that wall!!! Man you had a TONS of luck!!!! huh....

good job you didn't hit that wall.

Ouch! Good thing you wear a helmet!

Why this ended up as a crash is confusing. You literally had the entire flight to sort out your approach.

why on earth did he land prone with no flare?

whats a helmet gonna do when you fall a couple thousands feet?

Every landing from where you can walk away upright, is a good landing ;-)

...to slow down and steepen glide into a smaller field or in case of overshooting the site...but they can readily create more problems than they solve, e.g., taking away some of pilot's control of speed, feel of glider (must pull in harder to achieve same AS), and steepening glide angle if not desired nor safe. No one I know flies with a drogue chute.

Once you were in the air the glider only knows the speed you are flying at, it has no ideal of the wind speed. Knowing the drouge was out why did you not get strieghter for your landing sooner. Glad you were not hurt, Cheers pete

once again emergency chute cause emergency

Ich als Anfänger versteh gard nicht, warum du nicht normal landen konntest? Klar so ein Bremschrim bring dich wohl aus dem Konzept nach dem Start...aber warum ging die Landung schief?!

I understand that you were a little surprised by the opening of the drag chute so early. What I don't understand is why did you not use it for your landing... Don't you use the drag chute normally for your landings? You could act as if you have deployed the chute just before your landing set up your approach somewhere on a better field and flare! just before you land.

Terribly misleading title. Drogue deployment is correct.

Any landing you can walk away from is a good landing.

That landing hurts a little. Premature parachute deployment sucks.

Wow that was a hard landing

You were still on the base tube. Why did you not go upright and get your hands up the down tubes so that you could flare?

You know.......you can land those on your feet.

what the point to let the glass helmet opened when you need it closed at landing? To smell fresh grass...?

I think these things need a better landing apparatus. Or something. That looks painful.

@Mande1brot please explain how would you use a hook knife in this situation????

Question: "How do you know when to flare?" Answer: "Wait until you see the Captain tense!"

aoush... loss your breath for a sec there..

I assume the way the landing turned out here can be related to, given the obvious shock [Although I can not imagine even having the *guts* to land like this - rational consideration of whether it would be more dangerous to land head-first, or stay in the air for a few more seconds would be more dangerous, aside]. What I do not understand is why the decision to descend in the first place was taken that late - or were circumstances not allowing an earlier dive?

lucky that there was no problems..

...of course...you can feel it...you can hear it...the ticker is working stronger...(-;

no mechanism to release the chutes in an emergency? not thinking it through

But why did you crash??? i still can not understand?

ouch, i am fairly sure that wheels would be a great improvement on the design criteria

was that a downwind or crosswind landing? It was surprising to see the drag chute off so far to the side like that on final.

The answer to this accident is WHEELS . The second answer is " dont get panik " you counld actually have landed better than this if you hadnt got panic.

Bravo très bonne expérience et vol parfait

Way to land

Its a drouge chute with a very long line!

Am I missing something here?? It seemed as tho the drogue chute caused no real problem - it only went wrong cos the pilot shoulda moved his hands to the uprights. Why did he hold onto the cross bar rather than getting himself vertical and flaring in to a foot landing? I don't get it at all ?