Modern hang glider designs are tested and certified safe. Like any activity (mountain biking, sailing, etc...), participants can put themselves into added risk when they do not respect their own skill level, equipment, or the weather conditions.
Yes! Curt has done it about 20 times (and counting).
You have 3 choices:
1) Short-pack it (~14.5 feet) and check it on as luggage (sometimes pole-vaults)! Ask Curt about which airlines is currently providing the most support. This is our favorite way to travel.
2) Ship it, Air-cargo, in a box from your dealer. This is more expensive and takes longer, BUT everything is insured, and you can load up the box if you want.
3) Take your harness, and rent a glider from a school or dealer.
Kitesurfing is another love, but we are not offering kitesurfing instruction in Wollongong at this stage. At the moment, Curt is focusing all energy and time into further development of hang gliding projects of Warren Windsports. Feel free to contact us for more info on Kitesurfing in the Illawarra area.
-Learned to fly in 1994, while water-skiing in the San Diego, Sea World ski-show. There was a hang glider in the show that was towed up (and released) behind the boat...
Every time I drive/ride in the car through Sydney
I’ve hang glided around the many places around the globe and chose Stanwell Tops as my nest.
Stanwell Tops one of the best places for tandem hang gliding. It has an easy take-off and landing area, AND the coastal mountain ranges produce SMOOTH lift for introductory tandem hang gliding flights. The Royal National Park and the Northern Illawarra coast-line attracts pilots from around the world.
My favorite “big-air” hang gliding competitions have been in Brazil, having traveled there five-times over this decade.
Really, there are wonderful flying sites and free-flight pilots, scattered across the world.
It’s like a 3-dimensional Sailing race. The pilots race a course in the sky, which may be a triangular course or an “out and back”, or maybe a straight “race to goal”. Pilots are scored on how fast they fly the course, or how far they went if they did not finish the course. Global Positioning Systems (GPS’s) are used to navigate and as track logs of each pilot. GPS’s also give each pilot a synchronized time.
Thousands of feet high! Curt has been 14,500 feet in Australia and 16,500 feet in the USA.
-If in a "thermal" (warm rising air), you can go as high as the clouds!
And when soaring the "ridge lift" on a mountain, it will depend on the shape/size of the mountain and the direction/strength of the wind.
Our tandem hang gliding flights at Stanwell Tops often take us to altitudes hundreds of feet higher than the launch site of Bald Hill.
At Hill 60, of Port Kembla, we often double the altitude of the lookout/launch site.
The world record is currently 701 kilometers.
Curt's personal best is 416 kilometers which took place in Texas, USA.
The world record is about 36 hours…. Solo-pilots at Stanwell quite often stay up for a few hours, flying up and down the coast. –Wollongong and back. Curt's longest duration is 9.5 hours!
23-33 kilograms. Beginner gliders are lighter than high performance wings
Minimal maintenance is needed. The sail is a high performance material called Dacron. The wires are stainless steel. And the tubing is aluminium. A casual pilot could have a glider for 20 years. A very active pilot could keep a glider for ten years. Air junkies, that fly ALL the time, just get a new sail for the frame every few years.
