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A kiteboarder was killed Saturday in Avon NC. The article says a major weather system changed the wind direction 90 degrees and significantly increased in speed.

saw many articles and forum discussion about it. apparently a Canadian from Ontario.

Good god, that's scary that it could hit that fast and hard. All the safeties, instincts and reflexes in the world probably couldn't save you if you were turned into a 40 mile an hour torpedo. My thoughts go out to his friends and family.

a mental check point for us all , thoughts to the family and friends

Another side of it is that the kiteboarding school cancelled classes hours earlier because they knew this stuff was coming. Sometimes you just have to know when its time to pack it up. I regret anyone dying by a kite though. It is bad for his family and the sport as well.

it is sad, and he was our local kiteboarder from Ontario

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Originally posted by BeamerBob Another side of it is that the kiteboarding school cancelled classes hours earlier because they knew this stuff was coming. Sometimes you just have to know when its time to pack it up. I regret anyone dying by a kite though. It is bad for his family and the sport as well.

schools will often times cancel lessons for very favorable conditions.

1. because beginners aren't ready for the "good" winds. its better to teach when underpowered and work up to powered.
2. instructors would rather be riding "off work" in those conditions
3. there's too much liability to teach in high winds

I've actually been refused lessons before when it was only blowing 25mph and the instructor was out on the beach getting ready to head out. simply because she didn't want the risk of teaching in high winds. secretly I think she just wanted the day off work. now that I've been riding for a year I view 25mph winds as the creme de la creme.

none the less though that's still very sad. it sounds like he was knocked unconscious from the 40ft jump. something similar was believed to have killed a guy on lake Washington here last year. I think people forget how hard you can hit the water if you don't keep your kite over head, and even then sometimes it can be pretty brutal if you're all of a sudden way overpowered.

my guess is that the shift probably wasn't very visible on the horizon. ususally you need clouds to really see something moving in quick like that. if it was clear it would have been pretty difficult to notice until it was too late.

I wonder if him being not from the area(thereby not knowing our mid atlantic conditions and quick changeability) might have played a role. My heart goes out to his loved ones , it can happen to any of us without warning. But we bear the burden of knowing when to say when, and know the local conditions, watch the locals, if they suddenly start packin it in. Maybe there is a reason why.
My prayers go out for his loved ones.


WG

Sad news ... RIP

I've been hearing mixed reports on other forums but the most delivered story is that this guy was an experienced kiter that put up an appropriately sized kite AFTER the wind shifted and increased in speed. Supposedly he was seen doing some pretty high jumps and then one of the jumps went wrong slamming him into the water.

I wonder if he was wearing a helmet ?
I wonder if it would have saved him ?

Very Sad. Hatteras is supposed to be about as safe a place as you can find.

From everything I read it sounded like he had a very bad landing. He was kiting on the sound side near Avon and it can get pretty shallow there which can add to the dangers of big jumps. I kited that day but about 100 miles south of where he was. This is Spring and all the locals here know that the only wind we get this time of year is as fronts pass and kiting can be sketchy at best.

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Very Sad. Hatteras is supposed to be about as safe a place as you can find.

I've lived here on the banks for about a year and a half and I'm not sure I can entirely agree with that (although I might have thought that when I first moved here). The beaches here are wider than a lot of places I've kited, but there are many other dangers here: from razor sharp oyster beds to dramatic and fast weather changes and others. I've developed a great deal of respect for the weather and waters here. It will kick you in the a** if you're not careful.