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Learning to Fly a Paramotor by Eddie Jones
Posted on Thursday, 03 June 2024 @ 16:07:24 EDT by admin |
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Anonymous writes "
I first saw a paramotor on the web, never a second thought about getting one. Before long I'm working on getting the extra money to buy one, not ever having flown anything before in my life. I ended up selling my old hobby, a 1970 Olds Cuttlass Supreme.
With cash in hand, I asked around about where I could see one fly. I was told at the beach and I found the guy with no problem. After watching him fly a few times and making it look so easy, I knew I had to have one. My mind was made up.
He sold me a new wing, an Apco Prima, and a rebuilt Adventure, which still runs well at a price I could afford. I happily signed stating I would get training with a local paraglider trainer.
After a week of ground handling, I was ready to solo. The weather was right, my equipment was right, but I had a cold and was on a heavy dose of cold medication. Oh well, I wanted to fly very, very badly and told them I was ready. I wasn't. I got the paraglider up in a reverse launch, turned and ran without looking up first, yep, it went sideways and so did I for about 40 yards. The rev of the motor full blast kept me from hearing the words from the head phones, ABORT ABORT ABORT! Worse, a crowd of about 50 people were on hand who had stopped to watch this red faced dummy try to fly before he was healthy and ready. My heart was pounding out of my chest that first try. I fell and the prop dug sand and the paraglider fell over me.
That’s only the first stupid thing I did, there's more. I was on vacation and had this contraption in my garage. Eager to fly, I kept calling my instructor. He couldn't make it for 4 straight days, other commitments. Hey, its an easy sport to learn, give gas, go up, let off, come down, pull right or left to turn. You guessed it, I was going to solo all by my solo self.
I told my son, which was 14 at the time, to get the video camera and lets go. We went to a large field next to two busy 4 lane roads with power lines on the other end, and a Wal-Mart on the last side. Motor running and doing a reverse launch, the wind took me about 20 ft down field. That would have been a good indication in hindsight. I finally get it up overhead, turn and go, looking up this time to make sure things are right. It was, and I was up in 2 steps. I went forward and up fast. Climb rate was max. I got to the end of the field where the power lines were, giving myself plenty of room, which was a half a city block at that time. While thinking that I'm not that stupid, I turned right over the busy road then down wind, by this time I had climbed to about 300 ft. I flew really fast down wind and by the time I got turned around, I was past the field and down wind over the Wal-Mart parking lot. I strongly remember looking down watching people getting in and out of their cars and seeing my white van and my son in the middle of the field looking pretty small. I knew my son was thinking that his dad was nuts. Okay, I found out the hard way at that very moment that I had no clue to what I was really doing. I hovered over the parking lot not going anywhere into the wind, That was at ¼ throttle. So, I throttled up to ¾ and felt my self tilt back. When I let off, I found myself in the same place over the lot, but a whole lot higher, and the van a whole lot smaller and further. I tried different speeds then finally I let off to a idle and started drifting forward back onto the field with a very soft landing. I was soooo glad to be back on the ground that I forgot to turn around. Yep, got pulled over backwards and laying on my cage. Luckily I did remember to turn off the motor close to the ground and no damage was done to the equipment, but instead to my ego.
I packed it up in disgust and came straight home and got on the phone. I called the guy that sold me the thing. First words out of my mouth were, "Hey man, I think you sold me a defective paraglider and motor, I flew today and couldn't get it to fly forward, what's wrong with it?". He says, "You’re kidding right? You didn't fly today in 22 mph winds did you?". "Yep, and what's more", I said proudly, "I flew all by myself". The instructor couldn't make it. The rest is history. The instructor dropped me for being stupid.
I am usually not that dumb. I flew because I had the need to do so. I watched and it looked easy, which it is with the right training. I also assumed a whole lot. Like the wind they flew in seemed to be the same wind as that day, NOT! So I didn't get the real training I needed to do this with some sort of confidence and comfort. Every once in a while I would get on the web and get information, like how strong are the little lines that suspends me. I looked up the accident report. Mostly pilot error, and I didn't need to wonder why. At first, if I could kite my paraglider with ease, I would fly, that meant trying out the wind and being drug on my belly 20 or 30 feet before I decided it wasn't right. I flew only in mild winds after that and by myself also, but from bigger fields of course. It's been over a year now, and there was a time I didn't fly for a few months. Just recently have I really began having fun doing it.
Let me tell you beginners one thing. Get training! It means trust in what you’re doing! No trust, No fun.
Not having training delayed my comfort zone by probably 8 or 9 months. A couple of times I wanted to quit completely, but my hard headedness won out. Now I am glad I got into this sport and survived to tell my story. I think it is very safe if you know what you are doing and the equipment is good.
P.S. I am not a great writer. Read between the lines. Many other things happened that could have been avoided with training and many questions that were unanswered, got answered the hard way.
"
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