Sorry but had to share this vid... most have probably seen it
I spat my beer all over my screen when i saw 3:36 XD

@3:59 Same thing happened to me at sandy point when I went for a bar pass, missed and the safety leash attachment line snapped off the back of my harness.

In this case and in most cases, the leash isnt snapping, its the Metal hook design, they commonly come off, it defies logic how they do it.

IT is Common knowledge to use the leash designs with the rope and pin design.

zarb said..

How many of those accidents would have been avoided by using a smaller kite? Honest question. A lot of them looked VERY overpowered?

PS: I am scared of kite loops now.

*Most* of those crashes were pretty ordinary crashes. That's what happens when you go big and eat it.

They weren't overpowered. They were mostly powered just right for doing big moves.

The things that made some of them worse than they needed to be were guys jumping in shallow water or jumping too close to the beach. Being unhooked made a lot of them look worse than they actually are.

I have to say that my worst crashes came from overdoing a relatively small jump with a small kite. There's nothing worse than realising you've done it wrong when the kite is behind and below you when you've made a small mistake with big consequences.

Some of the worse looking crashes were unhooked with leashes activated, so not "suicide" leashes. If you're riding hooked in then you're always in suicide configuration until you release. It's not really an issue. Modern kites have sufficient depower to handle most crashes. If you do your big jumps with deep enough water and enough room to ride out the aftermath then it's not a problem.