An Oh Sh!t Moment

[sflinux]

Anyone know the makes of these runaway kites.
I am just wondering if the runaway kite at Alameda was a slingshot. I despise the snap shackles that come with slingshot kites. Both me and my buddy and others have had the shackle open up on its own when the safety was engaged. I prefer carabiners to snap shackles for this reason, just more reliable. I have used the clip that comes with Wipika bars, and those suck too. Yea they break under a certain load and have saved my ass in that respect, but I would prefer to pull the safety on my own rather than have it release unexpectantly on its own.
As far as the runaway kite at Sherman, I am wondering if this is a Cabrinha kite. I really don't like any kitebar that uses a chicken loop as your safety attachment to the kite. I haven't used a recon system, but it is my understanding is that this is how they are setup. A safety should be a leash that attaches before you even pick your bar up. Even donkey dicks can come off and there is no excuse for runaway kites.
Having a runaway kite is an awful feeling. All of my runaway kites have had to do with equipment failures (shackles coming loose, wipika clip breaking, lines breaking, kite pigtails breaking, leader line breaking, stitching of kite failing). I consider myself lucky that I've never had a kite cause any damage to property or person. Knock on wood, but I I've learned from the equipment failures and now believe that I'll never have a runaway kite again. I think that we as a kiting community should do what we can to learn from each other's mistakes to keep runaway kites to a minimum.
Amen to people body dragging away from shore.
Amen to people respecting other people's kite lines in the launch zone.
Amen to people honing up to the damage caused by their kites.

I support people being dogmatic and vocal when it comes to safety. Otherwise people will never learn and continue with their bad habits.
-bric