The day after a new paragliding death in the Hautes-Alpes, the toll is eight dead in the last three months in France. The National Federation of Free Flight has noted a sharp increase in serious accidents.
The Richards, Lake Léry, Port-à-Binson, the Parchets, Lacarry, the Chalvet, Doussard, the Chabre. Paragliding enthusiasts know these spots well known for the practice of free flight, in the four corners of France.
All have been bereaved since last March. The practitioners were between 20 and 71 years old. Eight deaths in three months. Three of these fatal accidents took place in the Southern Alps.
The first of the year 2022 occurred at the Richards in Saint-Jean-Saint-Nicolas (Hautes-Alpes) on March 19. The victim was 28 years old. At Chalvet on June 2, a 20-year-old Dutch woman killed herself in Saint-André-les-Alpes (Alpes-de-Haute-Provence). The latest death to date occurred this Friday in the Montagne de Chabre sector, in Larâgne (Hautes-Alpes). The deceased paraglider was 38 years old.
The macabre count seems to be racing this spring, recognizes Pierre Braems of the national paragliding committee within the French Federation of Free Flight (FFVL).
“We are in a weather situation with a lot of good weather and a lot of drought, and therefore aerological conditions which are sometimes difficult, sometimes violent, he points out, it will be necessary to analyze the causes of these accidents but I think that it plays”.
On son site internet, the federation lists the accidents declared since 2017 and analyzes the causes. Apart from 2019, a dark year marked by 18 deaths, the annual toll is around 9 to 11 killed over the year.
Of the nearly 500 accidents recorded in 2021, 368 involved injuries, 140 serious injuries and 11 fatalities.
In general, experienced people have the most serious accidents, this is a phenomenon that is known in outdoor sports and mountain sports.
Pierre Braems national paragliding committee FFLV
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“These are people who take more risks than others, he analyzes. The more expert people are, the higher they set the bar in terms of risk taking.”
With experience, some practitioners feel like they are growing wings. “It’s risk taking in tactical flight choices, in decision-making, perhaps a lack of ability to give up in relation to difficult aerological developments”, explains Pierre Braems.
It emerges from the FFVL’s analysis that the most frequent accidents occur during landing (212) and take-off (179). Impact on the ground, obstacle, fall on takeoff, lack of attachment are the main causes.
“These are phases near the ground where the reserve parachute is not useful to “save your skin” but these accidents in the landing or take-off phase are rarely fatal, they can be serious accidents, but it can be also bobology”, emphasizes the paragliding instructor.
The most dangerous accidents remain those that occur in flight (105 in 2029), several tens of meters above the ground.
It can be a collision, an impact with an obstacle in the approach phase… “or a very powerful thermal trigger”, completes Pierre Braems. The current very dry climate is difficult for our activity”. Especially in the south east of France.
This implies for him to choose his exit time carefully, early in the morning or late in the evening, but not in the middle of the day.
If accidents are increasing, it is also according to Pierre Braems because the number of practitioners has increased considerably in recent years. Many discovered this discipline after the end of the confinements. Today, the federation has nearly 32,000 licensees against 26,000 in 2016.
Like rock climbing, mountaineering, alpine hiking, hang gliding is a dangerous sport. The risk is inherent in the element in which one evolves, but not only reminds the representative of the FFVL.
It also requires having good self-knowledge, and above all the ability to have renunciation, to make the right choices… it’s the human factor and it’s the most difficult to educate.
“I don’t know anyone who goes paragliding to scare themselves, on the other hand there are some who don’t know how to manage the risk because they are in a process of always more, more, more. They have an ego, they have need to value themselves and rather than give up, they go anyway and that’s it…”
“Fear is a good advisor but the more you progress and the more this fear disappears, the more you are sure of yourself and that’s where accidents happen”.
The federation carries out actions to raise awareness among practitioners, but Pierre Braems recognizes this: “it is difficult to lower the statistics”.
With his students this Saturday, in the paragliding school he runs in Isère, Pierre Braems will once again get the message across. “The simple fact of hovering in the air, of having this height of view on the environment, it is already so extraordinary, we are not always obliged to do more, more, more”, he concludes with passion.
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