18.07.2019
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Air and space
https://www.airspacemag.com/airspacemag/rise-and-fall-of-hang-gliding-180972601
To see the feral origins of hang gliding as a popular sport, do a
search on YouTube for the 1971 Otto Lilienthal Universal Hang Glider
Championshipthe first of its kind in the United States, held at Corona del Mar,
California. Young enthusiasts run down grassy hills, holding homemade flying
contraptions, some of which were actually made from plastic sheeting. If they do
launch, the pilots simply hang by their armpits and swing their legs around in
an attempt to steer the glider by weight shifting. Theres more than one crash
and more than one run down the hill without getting airborne. The film ends with
a glider crashing into the cameraman. National Geographic covered the 1971
event; the article got a lot of people building hang gliders, recalls Harris.
Harris got started when he saw a picture of a hang glider in his local paper.
It was an epiphany a flying machine you could put on top of your car. I
couldnt think about anything else, he says. Harris ordered a glider, which
came with a silent Super-8 film that showed him how to launch and land. With
some friends, he took it to Jockeys Ridge, a giant sand dune on the Outer Banks
of North Carolina, and they taught themselves to fly. Soon after, Kitty Hawk
Kites now the largest hang gliding school in the country was born.
https://OzReport.com/1563458914
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