A Successful Failure.

As many of you are well aware the U.S. has been having a bit of a heat wave the last couple of weeks. It was in the Midwest roasting everyone from the Gulf Coast to the top of Minnesota (pronounced MinneSohhhta I think) and now the "Heat Dome" as the media likes to call it is apparently hanging out over my house here in New England. It was 101F in the shade (inspite of the fact that the local weather moron said it was 95f) I'm okay with it, there's nothing I can do about it and I have access to lakes and rivers to cool off in, I drive a topless Jeep Wrangler and there's a 7-11 down the street to refill my 84oz mega-gulp for around a buck. What else do I need?

Seriously, bitchin' and whining about the heat every 5 minutes only makes you and everyone around you more miserable.

So the interesting thing about this heat is I've never flown a kite in anything like it. There are some things that I didn't take into consideration, which in hindsight should have probably been fairly obvious. One thing is that an Arc really maintains air internal pressure well when its 110F in the open sun. And its pretty common knowledge that heat effects wind and weather. I know this, and my friend Mike knows this. He came down with me to see my mad ground boarding lack of skills. But neither of us gave any consideration to how the heat would be affecting the winds in a big open field.

More on that in a minute first let me tell you how my latest session went.

Well in a nutshell it went awful. Okay maybe not awful but it wasn't great. The wind was fickle as hell and this time out I decided to try my luck with the Phantom 2 15m. The kite was great but the wind just wasn't helping me out at all. It was blowing SE,SW,W,NW,N,NE and never for any serious length of time. I'd get moving and the wind would die or shift 180 degrees. It was really awesome chasing the wind constantly while standing out in that heat, NOT.



Not staged, actually moving. =)


So after about 45 minutes of repeated false starts and short runs the wind suddenly seemed to really die off for a moment. So Mike and I just sat out in the midday sun and sizzled like bacon waiting for the wind to pick up. Then we noticed something kinda funny happening in the NW corner of the field. The wind was picking up but it was seemingly blowing in every direction. Trees on the left were getting blown from the south. Trees in the center of our view were blowing away from us while trees to our right were getting wind from the north.

We were both remarking this when I felt the wind finally pick up behind me out of the north east. I launched the Phantom 2 and felt it power up slightly and I started for my board. Suddenly it powered up A LOT and the next thing I know I'm accelerating across the field. I managed two, maybe three running steps before I had to give up and slide for it. At that point Mike and I figured I was being pulled downrange between 20 and almost 30 mph.

Something very strange was happening. I worked the kite overhead to get it out of the power zone but to my surprise it didn't slow my speed hardly at all and now I was being lifted. I wasn't in any position to deal with being lofted, I pulled the safety on the chicken loop and cut the kite loose and it flagged out perfectly.

But then things got a little stranger. I've stopped the kite from pulling me into orbit and the kite is flagged out on the single line, but the kite is still flying. Not only is it flying but its maxed out the flag line and is now proceeding to fly in a big circle directly ABOVE me. The line was tensioned but just lightly pulling as the kite climbed as far as the line would let it until it was circling over head. I looked at the grass in the field and it was being blown in several directions at once. Oh, and in a rotating pattern.

Mike had stopped watching after I cut the chicken loop loose assuming that the show was over. I yelled over to him and pointed up to the hovering wing above us. Then the kite just fell out of the sky.

Mike and I were flabbergasted. Neither of us had seen or experienced anything like it in the last 10 years of kiting and couldn't believe how fast I took off and how the kite reacted after using my safety. After seeing the wind's effect on the ground things started to make a lot more sense. we got hit by some sort of vortex. Likely thermal induced or enhanced by the high amount of heat coming off the soccer field. Think "Dust Devil" without the dust.

At ground level, the activity in the trees should have been a clear sign of what was going on. The trees we were looking at weren't right next to each other some were closer than others and from above it would have been clear what was going on.

Bird's eye of wind direction before I launched.

I imagine that what hit us was akin to one of those types of dust devils you see out in big cornfields or out in the desert. The kind of devils that are about 40m wide and 300' tall. We get snow devils in the winter but they are much smaller and when you hit them there's nothing inside. The kite will die and immediately power up again after you've passed through.

This was completely different. I had visions of kite surfer Erick Eck who was caught in a thermal just after landing and walking up a beach. He got lofted several hundred feet into the air and landed on a hillside. He got lucky and got out of it pretty relatively unscathed. Here's the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMZcwo9PMhg

I don’t have nearly the jumping knowledge to be able to come out of that sort of situation in one piece. Maybe I’d figure it out but I don’t want to find out. Mike asked me how high I thought the updraft would take me.

Higher than I’d want to be I figure.

So as a ground boarding session the day was a failure. I was all set to install my bindings and give that a shot but we never got to that point. On the positive side we witnessed something that we’ve never seen before and I came out of it without injury and with all my fingers and toes. I’ll admit it got my adrenaline flowing a bit and I probably said “That was F&#*ing amazing!!!” about 100 times in about five minutes. I don’t get adrenaline rush much these days so for me this really was exciting.

I’m glad I lived it but I don’t want to try it again. I’ll wait for the cooler air to try getting back out on the board again. For the heat I think I'll paddle a bit.

Fun Hawg rig.

Until next time…