An Indian Sunset

HOT NEWS is coming in that Sunni paragliders are not relocating from wet old South Korea to sunny India in no attempt whatsoever to solve specific corporate issues they've been having.

Hung Li KaMule, chairman and chief executive of Sunspot PG's, was quoted as saying, "It did not become too much for us, to be honest. We can get DHL to understand it, and we expect everyone else to get it right". He went on, "After many years we've not given up, quite frankly, and have not relocated ourselves to India in an attempt to get things flowing smoothly. It is good for us, the future is blight."

The original story posted online has not been taken down to avoid further confusion.

We like confusion.

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident

Painium Inum Arsicus

LATIN IS a fantastic, historic language and it's great to see it being kept alive in some circles. It's still in full use in certain groups around the globe, medical doctors use it to give clear and precise instructions to patients, catholic priests occasionaly raise their cassocks to give a choir boy a lesson or two and recently we've noticed it being used in some conversations on paragliding forums. Amazing!

Of course, it's only amazing if you actually understand it. Which is why we were left a little confused when we recieved an email recently in this amazing, but dead, language. So.... if there are any formally educated types out there who learned Latin while studying, or maybe a doctor or a priest, we would appreciate your assistance with the following. We simply don't know where to begin and have no idea what it's about, so would like to open it up to the community for assistance.

Quote:

"Id Windtecum Zephyrium est absoluta maximus.

Is est optimus wingum umquam flownum inum mi spiritus vita. Il designmator est a genitor. Commodo tellum como super il isum.

Il glideum lapsus est optimus in mercatum procul 10.2 l/d mas maximus da illas Novatums. Il colori cultum es perspicuus especialus in redum mas da los Blozonums. La linea es cleanium e crispium como est no tenen wingleticuses como los feisimus Advancicums. Autem no ni necessitas RigiFoilicus como ilis Ginisantimums.

Il wingum riseum facile quod adveho overum vestri headum capitis sinum nullus problemums. Landum facilinious a humus est smoothicus e softicus. Comum il slightimum flareum.

Commodo dico todo pilotums como fantasticus is illa wingum.

Luvum e etc,

Veni, Vidi, Vici"

Anyone chipping in with a traslation or offering suggestions will receive one of our coveted "Pie in the Sky" coffee mugs by way of a thank you. By email.

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident

G'n'T'n'Safety

G'YN GLIDERS released a safety notice a few days ago relating to a couple of wings in their product range. Clearly they are concerned for their loyal customer base and are taking steps to ensure the safety of the pilots. Once again it's good to see a manufacturer being pro-active in helping pilots to "stay safe".

Please find below the full safety notice just in case you missed it. To assist the reader we've added a few notes [Editorial Notes - Ed] especially aimed at those for whom English is not their ferst langwage.

Quote:

"We strongly advise you not to fly in the rain on the BoomBoom GTi and the BoomBoom Seven [No shit - Ed] These high performance gliders are very susceptible to deep stall in the rain." [No shit - Ed]

"The development path of modern high performance paragliders (etc, etc) bears no allowance for these kind of gliders to fly when wet." [No shit - Ed]

"If you see a shower coming during a flight, even a light one, we strongly advise you to go to land immediately." [No shit - Ed]

"If you do fly in the rain, and if you enter a stall, which generally happens when you enter lift, do as follows. Do not perform any actions with your brakes, do not steer the wing, push on the "A" risers. [No shit - Ed] If this is not sufficient to recover the flight, push the speed bar and maintain the action". [No shit - Ed]

So there you have it reader, some good solid advice: "Don't fly in the pissing rain".

No shit!

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident

An Indian Sun

HOT NEWS is coming in that Sunni paragliders are relocating from wet old South Korea to sunny India in an attempt to solve specific corporate issues they've been having.

Hung Li KaMule, chairman and chief executive of Sunspot PG's, was quoted as saying, "It just became too much for us, to be honest. If we can't get DHL to understand it, how can we expect anyone else to get it right?". He went on, "After many years we've just given up, quite frankly, and have relocated ourselves to India in an attempt to get things flowing smoothly. It's going to be good for us, the future is blight."

After many years of missing wings, failed DHL deliveries and a FedEx van delivering 25 rolls of SkyTex-39 to Pyong-Yang by mistake the Sunshine Team appear to have simply given up and relocated. It seems that (Gwandgju City, Gyeonggi-Do) is too difficult for the worlds delivery services to understand.

So here's hoping their problems are behind them and, here at Pie, we wish them all the best in their new location. For pilots wishing to contact Sunshade PG's please contact them at their new address: Warehouse 24, Utkarsh, Mahaveernagar, Vakharbhag, Sangli.416416, Maharashtra.

Paragliders have also asked us to quote their full postal address to ensure nothing goes astray from now on:

Good luck Mr KaMule.

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident

Eclipsed

IMAGINE OUR delight at being invited to witness the total eclipse of the sun last month on the Easter Islands. It's not often we get invited to witness celestial events by paragliding clubs, but we got one 5 weeks ago and included with the invite were two first class air tickets. Can't say no we thought. So we didn't. We looked it all up on Google Maps, checked out the news stories to see if it was a big wind-up and started packing. Imagining a week or so soaking up the South Pacific sun on a tropical island while mixing in a bit of local culture, some sight-seeing, plenty of coastal soaring and then maybe witnessing one of nature's great events. Wow. What a nice bunch of pilots they must be down at the old Easter Island HPGA. Or so we thought.

Collecting his luggage and his secretary the Chief Editor headed off for the South Pacific Island Experience. With a look of "This ought to be fun" on this face.

That was before the 3 days of hell we went through to get there, of course. A trip during which we lost one glider, had one piece of luggage misplaced and another stolen and took a wrong connecting flight to somewhere god-forsaken place inhabited by three crazy biologists and a quarter of a million puffins. Eventually, of course, we arrived. 36 hours later than planned and somewhat bleary eyed we rolled into MataTodo International landing strip, which seemed to be the only place in the entire island that had worked out what to do with tarmac. Flopping down on our beds we slept for 24 hours straight to re-charge our batteries and get ready to meet the local pilots.

Tepano Makemake introduced himself as the chairman and founding member of the RNHPGA and fourth cousin, third removed from the ancient King of Easter Island MakaMakaBigFun InumAgua. He wasted no time with the frills and we soon found ourselves hiking up to takoff with a Pina Colada in each hand and a garland of flowers round our necks. Everything looked good so far. Even Miss Sudds, our secretary, was begining to relax and let her hair down. Which was a shame, as it rather covered things.

Arriving at the summit, a healthy 500m ASL, we prepared ourselves for takeoff and once again, thanks to the airline baggage handlers, it was me and Miss Sudds in the tandem again. Shame.

"Where's the rest of the club?", we enquired. "Conditions look great, surely they would all be out today?"

"The rest? Excluding you two temporary members?", replied Tepano.

"Uh-huh", we shot back.

"You're looking at him", he answered while tying some form of rope around his waist in what looked like a poor immitation of the worlds first rock-climbing harness.

"Ah. Ok. Right then", said Miss Sudds looking at the Chief Editor in the way one chicken might look at another when feeling a wall behind and backing away from the fox.

"Just in time for the eclipse too", said Tepe.

"But what about the sea breeze and the thermic activity", we said, "Surely it'll all shut down?"

"Nah, mate", he shot back, "The breeze here will keep you up, no problem."

Then he took off. And so did we.

We had some great fun. Soaring and thermalling out, flying way out to sea, gliding back and then thermalling our way back up again. Just what we came for. In fact we were so busy taking photos and enjoying ourselves that we totally forgot about the impending solar eclipse and we were cruising at well over 2500m ASL when we realised Tepe had landed and seemed to be chilling out on takeoff. This seemed strange given that conditions were stable and unchanging, no clouds in the distance or other clues to an impending change of fortunes. Within two minutes, however, we remembered.

Because in two minutes we were flying in the dark. Yes, the dark. The black stuff. Not a twinkle. The vario was informing us that the lift hadn't shut down, just as Tepe had said, so at least we were maintaining our altitude. Unfortunately, the GPS was warning us that it must have gone katabatic, synthetic, adiabatic or even diabetic or something down there and although we were flying towards the island we were in actual fact travelling backwards at 50kph and quite rapidly being blown out to sea. In fact the moving-map page was showing us well offshore already. So wingovers or a spiral it is then. Let's face it, it's better to pitch up in the water a few hundred metres out to sea rather than find yourslef 10k offshore. Damn! We were flying the tandem and I'd temporarily fogotten about Miss Sudds reasons for being there, which ruled out wingovers, unless of course I wanted another couple of black eyes from her not-so-fixed-in-place upper-body appendages. Nice, but not right now I thought. As I thought more about it, spirals were not on either, hitting the water at 18 m/s wouldn't do either of us any good, regardless of how large Miss Sudds airbags might be. The more I thought about it the more I was convinced that altitude was our friend as long as we were unable to see the land or water. Holding back the panic, I made a decision! These volcanic islands are in chains I thought, so I guess we'll just have to hope for another one. We turned and went with it. Of course, this turned out to be a big mistake. As they generally are.

They found us 3 weeks later on Sala & Gómez Island, an uninhabited rock with nothing more than grass, ferns and plenty of puffins, some 400km ENE from where we'd taken off. Miss Sudds was looking rather the worse for wear, more so than yours truly it has to be said, mainly due to the fact that certain parts of her had acquired more sun than is generally good for you. At least we'd survived though, all be it on a diet of small fish, crabs, eels and other assorted seafood. In point of fact, we'd eaten just about anything daft enough to swim into a 38D cup.

If anyone knows of a good secretary currently looking for work, we may have an opening.

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident

No Va

WE RECENTLY received an email urgently asking us to publish a missing person request. Obviously we're happy to do so and it's enclosed below in the hope that the more places it can be seen, the more chance there is of the person showing up fit, well, and in fine form.

Quote:

"Dear Za Editor,

Vee hope you can help us find our friend, he haz gone missing and vee are now getting qvite vorried about him.

He used to hang about zee forums and zee shows vith new ideas and release fantastisch new ving designs every few months or so. He vos also a highly active member of our local branch of zee Innsbruck Marketing & Media Rotational Dinner Club but he now seemz to haff dissappeared off of zee face of zee earth. Vee are getting qvite concerned. Ze Polizei have told us to go home and vait for him as he is a grown man and a free spirit and can look after himself, so don't vorry. But vee can't relax, vee are vorried for him.

Vee sink zat he may have gotten himself invoved viz some extreme acro or speedving freeks and vee sink zat maybe why he has not been in touch vis the mainstream paraglidschirm community for such a vile.

If anyvone sees Hands Pampas, chief designer, big manager and all round good friend from NovaBling International.m.b.H please call us immediately as vee are missing him. Tell him to bring a new dezign viz him.

Hands vee miss you. Please come home.

best regards,
Bendi Toner,
(test pilot)"

Here's hoping he gets in touch. Good luck Mr Toner.

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident

Wise words

Pie journalist Ivor Longoria, brother of the famous sister and self-taught parawaiting specialist was recently asked a question by a fellow pilot on the hill. His answer was such a well composed, wise and thoughtful response we felt it worthy of printing. The full conversation is published below in the interests of helping to educate the flying community.

"Ivor, do you prefer airbags or foam padding?"

"Airbags mate. You really can't beat 'em. There's nuffin' like the feel of a good pair of airbags in the morning when you've got a harness full and you're looking for somewhere to put it down. You see I'm not as young as I once was. For your younger pilot, there's goin' to be times when he comes in hard and fast and so he's going to need something pretty firm right. This is where your foam comes in. But with age comes experience and we older pilots tend to come in slowly with a more gentle touch. It's then when you really appreciate a good handful of them there airbags. To tell you the truth, if you put your head in a pair of airbags on takeoff you could miss a full cycle. It's been known for pilots to lose an entire days flyin' by takin' a pair of airbags with 'em."

Wise words indeed.

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident

PMA Newsflash

THE LATEST PMA press release has just been received at the Pie offices and it's hot off the press. For those who may not know the PMA, it's the Paraglider Manufacturers' Autocracy, an association dedicated to protecting the manufacturers from all the other manufacturers of none-rigid, free-flight aircraft looking to get in on their action, such as [insert something here please - Ed], and promoting the fantastisch work being done by the members.

Unfortunately, we would warn readers who obtain a copy of the original document that we don't consider it's content suitable for general distribution, due to the rather bad smell it gives off. At first we thought it might be the printing process, but then we read it. Consequently, we find ourselves unable to publish the document in its entirety, but prefer to enclose some excerpts for your consumption.

For your information and reference, the current FAI definition of a paraglider is:

"Class 3: Hang gliders having no rigid primary structure (paragliders), and which are able to demonstrate consistent ability to safely take-off and land in nil-wind conditions."

Excerpts follow:

"The decision by the PMA to regard 70cm long, 1.5 mm diameter carbon rods, which are tensioned like a bow and sewn to the profiles of a paraglider as 'rigid primary structure' rather than as 'flexible and secondary' was not taken easily. It was preceded by very intensive discussions, which took several weeks. Honest."

"On one side there is yellow, on the other side red, in between we have orange. See, there's the problem right there, no blue. No blue anywhere. None whatsoever. This is just not on."

"The PMA sees the Blozone BPHBP as the first 'tentative step over this line'. Soon it will be followed by machines which will be maxing out the principle of the rigid primary structure. These wings will differ much more from the principle of the traditional, flexible soft-paraglider than the Blozone proto is doing it today. Well, maybe, but please let us instill the panic now."

"The proposal for a revised definition of FAI-Class-3 was voted upon by all PMA members. The polling was heavy, 78% of our members voted. The vast majority, 76% of the voters, chose the definition. Which stands for something right? Lets face it, we're the manufacturers so please don't ignore us. Ok, so 'heavy' might not be the best word, but English isn't our ferst langwage. Besides, 76*78 doesn't give less than 60%, does it?"

"Flexibility is defined by the ability of a component to be bent around a radius of 1cm by 180° without being damaged. This test of flexibility will be executed in at least two perpendicular planes and will be performed when the component is integrated into the glider. Because we say so, god-damn it. They've jumped the gun here for christs sake. We mailed in our new definition to the Oxford English Dictionary and eagerly await their reply."

As you can imagine, here at Pie we took these definitions seriously and decided to take them to the hills and ask regular pilots what they thought. It turned out to be not such a good idea as, quite frankly, most of the questionnaires that were handed back were unprintable, but suffice it to say we can offer a single line summary of pilot reaction:

"Go fuck yourselves, who do you think you are?", seems to just about sum it up.

What? 5-1-2010, you say. But that 1 looks just like a 7.

So it rather looks like we may be 6 months behind with this story. Well... WTF.

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident

The Carbon Issue

WE'RE ALL fully aware of the footprint we leave on this planet and that we might be leaving behind a mess for our children and our children's children. And our children's children's children. And our children's children's children's children. And their kids. So it was with some considerable pleasure that we watched over the past year as the paragliding manufacturers groped around with this issue and came to terms with how they can protect their future.

It was one of the manufacturers in France that first decided to tackle the Carbon issue. Of course, we're not particularly surprised in this day and age of media hype and jingoism that it was a bunch of ex-anglo, cheese-eating surrender monkeys that came up with the idea. What did come as a surprise though, was their company name. Amazingly it's as environmentally friendly as you can get, so it's no wonder that Blozone were the first to dive in, so to speak.

Clearly we'd need to get out there and talk to them. These boys are setting new ground here, and us boys at Pie want to get on it and get some facts. Oh, and obviously we take our environment seriously too. Oh yes indeedy.

"So, Rusty. Tell us. What made you guys start thinking about the carbon issue?", we prodded gently at the only test-pilot not quite fast enough to run away when we approached.

"It was a performance issue initially", he started. "You see, we felt that the introduction of carbon would give us that extra rigidity that we'd been desperately looking for. For ages now we've all been stealing the big Gib's idea, but we've all been quite desperately trying different ideas too. No more trips down the Centre de Jardin looking for bright red cable ties for us now! Finally we had an idea of our own! Carbon. We love it!"

"You love carbon? How can this be environmentally friendly? You'll have to explain that again Russo", we asked. We were lost really, we just didn't get it.

"Look guys, we're winning everything. I mean everything. What's even better is that we're winning without the carbon too. We just don't need it yet. It's great! Lucky-Luke left his gps-vario in the hotel by accident during the last comp and he still spanked the Adwance boys. His old 76S tracklog showed a whole point glide over Chrigel Mullets proto".

"Even you tossers at Pie could probably walk away with a trophy if you showed up with one of our two-liners", he said laughingly.

We could live with the fact we might not have fully understood the Carbon story, but suggesting that we would stoop so low as to enter comps just to win was too much. Before we left the factory Rusty Ogler took us round the back and showed us the new two-line technologies and how they had developed. It became pretty clear we'd misunderstood what they were up to. We were disappointed. We'd hoped to find a company keen to reduce its carbon footprint, but had found the opposite. In fact the only plus we could see was the saving of the third set of lines and a few hundred cable ties.

On the flight home the mood was quite sombre to say the least. We took out our HB pencils and sharpened them slowly in deep contemplation of what this meant. No-one gave a damn about the environment, the Carbon issue was really about selling more wings to more pilots and nothing more sophisticated than that. Shit!

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident

Speed Bars

FOR MANY years we have known about this issue and many pilots have tried and failed to find, or develop, a solution. Let's face it, your average pilot has issues with his speedbar. Not the sort of issues that involve a psychiatrists couch or a short-term prison sentence, the sort of issues that involve fumbling about with your left hand while holding both brake handles in your right. That's right, getting your speedbar out. How do we do it? Can it be made easier? And how can you not put yourself in mortal danger by faffing about at what is one of the most critical moments of any flight. Great, we thought, let's get out there and find out what people are doing and see if we can't help find a better solution... a Pie solution.

Our first port of call was Iceland. Yes, Iceland. Pilots flying in high wind use their speedbar more, they'll probably have a good idea what to do we thought. After checking Google maps to find out where it was, we booked our tickets and eventually landed at Kevlaffik International Money Laundering Terminal and headed East looking for some action. After contacting local guru Björn Björkitup we found ourselves on Hafrafell, the only place on the island with two L's. After two days we came down and jetted off to the Alps where, hopefully, we would find some pilots whose idea of using a speedbar actually involved getting it out the rucksack and not simply sitting around huddled together for warmth for a day or two in howling gales and driving rain.

Sitting on Montmin, we found ourselves watching pilots from every corner of the globe simply doing their own version of the same routine. Wriggling around like 14 year old virgins on a first date 12.5 seconds after takeoff, desperately trying to hook the speedbar with a foot, a hand, a bit of string and in one elderly pilots case, his walking stick.

Then we met Jean-Pierre.

"Jean-Pierre, nice of you to spend the time to show us your ideas", said newly recruited Pie reporter Björn Björkitup.

"Allo-allo", he said in slightly accented English, "It's nice to 'ave zomeone to talk zem zrough wizz"

"Indeed. So what's so special about your system?", we enquired.

"Well, it's so simple, you zee. It izzz amazin' zat no-one 'as zought of eet befour. It's zee zimple application of a littel velcro in zee private places and it's always to hand". He continued, "Ze velcro on zee speedbar simply attaches to zee front of your flight suit or your pantz and after clippin' in you just push zee speedbar on to your wazzzer and you are sorted, zo to speak"

He went on, "After takeoff you simply give your weener a thrust forward and zee bar drops gently onto zee shins where it eez always available for zee rest of zee flight, you zee?" Standing up, he demonstrated the detachment technique with a well practiced French thrust of the hips and the bar fell straight off his crotch and into place. Impressive! We could imagine the French and Italian pilots taking to this like ducks to water, although we imagined take-up might be more slow in, say, Germany or Austria.

Keen to give it a try Björn hooked himself in, velcro'd himself up and launched himself into the somewhat thermic air that is Annecy. The Chief Editor and Jean-Pierre naturally choosing to retire to the bar in Forclaz to await the test results over a remarkably unremarkable Chablis. Imagine our surprise, however, when 3 hours later Björn approached us hobbling quite painfully up the road with the assistance of our hired retrieve driver and with what can only be described as a look of "lost faith" on his face.

Declining a seat at the table and preferring to stand for some reason, he regaled us with a short story of pain, lost pubic hair, French-Icelandic translations for the word vertical, ripped flight suits, broken speedbars and dented pride. He even made us a quick sketch to illustrate how he would have been much happier wriggling around like a 14 year-old virgin as opposed to losing his virginity to a SoupAir Slider harness and a Blozone PopUp Speedbar at 1500m in a 7-up.

As you might imagine, after 3 hours of French wine and cheese we were, perhaps, too sympathetic to poor Björn upon which he tendered his resignation in return for the two extra cushions from our seats. A story to make your eyes water, perhaps you'd agree, but nothing gets between Pie and good research. For the cost of an economy ticket from Geneva to Rekjavik and a jar of vaseline, we've certainly got the new season of Pie testing off to a great start.

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident

Missing presumed ...

WELL IT rather seems that they just won't let us die in peace. Thanks to a few emails landing in the dusty editorial in-tray here at Pie we've had our arm twisted into putting together a new team. A dynamic group of individuals, keen to race up the slopes of journalism and launch themselves into the stormy leeside abyss that is satire, are throwing together wit at a level unseen before in the world of paragliding journalism. Maybe.

The cobwebs have been cleaned from the printing presses, the dried ink bottles replaced with the latest liquid-ink ballpoints and the vintage Remington thrown out and replaced with the latest in golfball electric typewriters. We're keeping the stupid barcode logo though, so shove it. [err... enough of the bullshit, where's the funny stuff? - Ed]

Pie in the Sky
Funnier than the 1972 "Robert Livingston Seagull patio door" accident