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Paragliding / Parapenting
Paragliding (known in some countries as parapenting or parapente) is a recreational and competitive flying sport. A paraglider is a free-flying, foot-launched aircraft, the way a hang glider is. It is quite different from the parachutes used in parasailing, which is a passive amusement ride where the participant is towed on a line behind a boat. Modern paragliders began as rectangular skydiving parachutes flown from hills. They have evolved dramatically in the last twenty years to be extremely high tech aircraft in both design and materials. Paragliders are optimized for glide performance, turning behavior, and safety. Since they are not opened from freefall at terminal velocity, but rather are launched from a hillside or by towing from flat ground, they do not have to be as strong as skydiving parachutes. They are lighter and larger, giving them much better performance gliding and climbing in thermals. These paragliders have reasonable gliding characteristics and are quite controllable by use of cords which are held in the pilot's hand as he or she sits in the harness. Shifting one's weight also steers the paraglider.
The paraglider wing is a self-inflating structure. It consists of a row of cells, most of them open at the front and all of them closed at the back, joined together side by side. Moving through the air keeps them inflated because air goes in the front but can't get out the back. The cells are cut into the same cross-sectional shape as an aeroplane wing and it is this "aerofoil" section that produces the lift. The pilot is supported underneath the wing from a web of lines, each with the strength to support the pilot. The lines are then attached to risers, straplike devices, that are attached to the pilot's harness. Launching is usually done in anabatic wind, which blows uphill, or zero wind. A launch in more than a very light tail-wind is not possible. In calm morning or evening air a pilot may enjoy a "sled ride", a smooth flight down to a landing area. During the day, when the sun heats the ground and the ground heats the air next to it, updrafts of warm air called thermals are present, stirring up the lower atmosphere. A paraglider pilot, like a hang glider or sailplane pilot, typically seeks out these thermals and uses them to gain altitude. Any unpowered aircraft is always descending through the air, but if the air is moving up faster than the aircraft is descending, the aircraft will be climbing relative to the ground.
When a pilot finds a thermal, he or she begins to fly in a circle, trying to center the circle on the strongest part of the thermal, the place where the air is going up the fastest. This circling isn't a one time thing; thermals are not always politely organized and may zig, weave and roil as they climb through the atmosphere. A good pilot is adjusting the position of this circle constantly to try to stay in the area of strongest lift. Most pilots carry an instrument called a variometer that communicates with beep sounds and a visual display the rate of climb. A variometer makes it easier to center one's circles and climb effectively in thermals.
On a blue sky day, when a pilot reaches the top of a thermal climbing slows or stops and the air often becomes turbulent. The pilot will normally leave in some direction ("go on glide") either trying to explore the place they are flying in or simply hoping to locate another thermal. On days with cumulus clouds, each cloud is usually at the top of a thermal. Large or fast growing cumulus clouds, and especially thunderstorms, may have very strong lift under them, and hang and paragliders must be cautious not to get sucked up into such a cloud. When there are strongly growing cumulus clouds about, it’s usually a good day to stay on the ground. Overcast days normally have little thermal activity. Sled rides are possible if it's not raining. It's important to be aware of the possibility of thunderstorms that are embedded in the overcast and therefore hard to see. Another kind of lift used by paragliders, hang gliders and sailplanes is "ridge lift", also known as "orographic lift". This simply refers to wind blowing up a hill, cliff or mountain, like a current of water. As with thermals, if the air is going up faster than the glider is sinking through the air, the glider can gain or maintain altitude indefinitely.
The origin of paragliding has roots in the sport of parachuting. In the early 1960’s, American parachutist Pierre Lemoigne was successful in cutting slots in the round parachute canopy to allow for air to flow through the canopy. This had a dramatic effect on the lift to drag ratio and allowed the pilot to steer the chute in a predictable manner. In 1962, Walter Newmark of England took note of Lemoigne’s design and modified it so that the chute could be towed aloft. During the 1960s, parascending became a popular sport among the English. Newmark was responsible for the creation of the British Association of Parascending in the early 1970’s. In 1964, Domina Jalbert of Florida invented a square canopy called the Ram Air Para Foil. The Ram Air worked by allowing air to pass through the double surface glider allowing for better maneuverability and increased lift. Walter Newmark soon adopted this canopy for his parascending activities. Using specially designed ram-air parachute canopies, instead of wings of aluminium and dacron, paraglider pilots launch, glide and soar in much the same way that hang-glider pilots do. Not until the 1970s did the sport take off. Gerard Bosson, André Bohn and Jean Claude Bétemps introduced paragliding at the 1979 World Hang Gliding Championships. The first pioneering foot-launched flights on gliding parachutes were made during the mid-1960s by David Barish in the U.S. The sport of recreational paragliding as we know it today was born in Mieussy, France, in 1978 and grew rapidly during the mid-1980s in the French and Swiss Alps as commercial manufacturers improved the glider designs to optimize them for soaring flight.
External Links
USHGA - U.S. Hang Gliding Association
The USHGA is a California Corporation, incorporated in March 1974. Fifteen years later, in 1989, the association was moved from Southern California to Colorado Springs, CO. USHGA is still a California corporation doing business in Colorado. The USHGA is a private, voluntary, membership, non-profit corporation. This is the way it and other private associations are viewed by the California court system. This means that the association is free to establish and change its membership requirements, dues structures and operating procedures. This is done through an elected body of representatives, the regional directors. The directors are charged with making the policy decisions of the association.
British Hanggliding and Paragliding Association
The British Hang Gliding & Paragliding Association oversees pilot and instructor training standards, provides technical support such as airworthiness standards, runs coaching courses for pilots... and a host of other services, providing the infrastructure within which UK hang gliding and paragliding thrive. The number of different flying disciplines offered by BHPA training schools is very varied, the Learn to Fly section will clarify the relative merits and possibilities of the types of flying involved and provide further details about training. We hope that when you've found a school appropriate to your needs, made contact and begun training, you'll discover for yourself the excitement and challenge that makes free flying such a great pastime. If you do you'll also find that the level of support and camaraderie amongst pilots is one of the many great strengths of the sport. You'll make friends, go places and achieve things that you may have only dreamed about in the past. It's a fantastic sport... join us and never look back.
ProFly - Professional Flying Team
To move freely in three dimensional space, to overcome gravity with ease and play with the wind like a bird – no aircraft other than paraglider takes us closer to this never ending dream of humans. We the Professional Flying Team live for this dream! We design well-engineered techniques and high-quality equipment to come into professional operation for ambitious paragliding pilots and skydivers. Our aircrafts and flying gear convey the pure feeling of flying: reduced, without gadgets , tailored to your needs. With our gear we want to feel the harmony between ourselves and the aircraft and elevate flying in harmony with the wind and the thermal to an art.