British Hang Gliding & Paragliding Association

France wins paramotor Worlds

The FAI paramotor world championships ended on April 30th at Saquarema, Brazil, with France taking team Gold ahead of Brazil and Quatar.

After eight tasks and only one cancellation, Italy's six-times national champion Pasquale Biondo emerged as individual PF1 world champion from French teamsters Cyril Planton and Jean-Emile Oulha.

France's Boris Tysebaert secured the trike class having won five of their nine tasks outright. The British contingent took 8th place, led by Dan Jones in 28th spot with Joe Womersley 33rd and Nigel Cosbie-Ross 36th.

Posted: 11 May 2022
By: J. Schofield

New Update to BHPA Technical Manual Published

Update 21 of the BHPA Technical Manual has now been published.

This latest update of the BHPA Technical Manual is available for download on the BHPA Documents page on our website, and supesedes Update 20.

Posted: 7 April 2022
By: Paul Dancey

A new way of paragliding!

Armin Harich, Jean-Baptiste Chandelier and Benni Bölli have come up with the Moustache. It looks like a conventional paraglider but has a reflex profile and is controlled more like a kite. Using pulleys to mix the B and C risers in proportion to brake travel allows the pilot to change the angle of attack at will.

Hands up you go fast with a steep glide angle; hands down you slow down and glide increases. Aimed at sand, snow, coastal soaring and speed flying, the Moustache, is ideal for swooping too. It converts energy from dives into turns or height in a more dynamic and efficient way than a paraglider.

Not designed for thermalling, the Moustache requires a different skill set compared to a standard paraglider. Its designers say it's like a mid-B wing, with the bigger sizes optimised for soaring and the smaller sizes for speedriding. The size you choose also depends on pilot weight and skill level.

Its roots are in Armin Harich's long history in foil kites, culminating in a one-liner that captured world and European foil racing titles. After years of development the team were able to reduce the steering forces to 'less than those of a tandem'.

The new wing is very resistant to collapse, but it still needs careful handling and will misbehave if the pilot reacts to deflation by going hands-up.

The Moustache is produced by Flare, a new offshoot of Skywalk. Armin Harich believes that one day all paragliders will end up being controlled in this way, and that it has the potential to revolutionise the sport. There's a series of videos explaining all this on the Flare website.

Posted: 1 April 2022
By: J. Schofield

Flyeo sponsorship

Flyeo - the Doussard, France-based paragliding training school and SIV provider - are seeking to sponsor some up-and-coming UK pilots.

This could be your big break into the world of competition and beyond. All you need to do is email info@flyeo.com with a link to your social media and Flyeo will contact you with more info.

Posted: 29 March 2022
By: J. Schofield

BHPA digital membership cards

Members may be unaware that the BHPA's digital membership card went live last summer. Invitations were emailed all members for whom the Association had an address; these have now expired.

Any member wishing to uses the facility should go to https://members.bhpa.co.uk/login. Clicking the 'forgot password' button will allow them to sign in. They will be asked to set-up a password enabling them to view a digital version of their current membership card, carrying details of their ratings and any IPPI or FAI cards they may possess.

Any member who needs to update their email details should notify the Office (office@bhpa.co.uk), quoting membership number and full name. The existing hard-copy cards will continue to be issued for the foreseeable future. 

Posted: 29 March 2022
By: J. Schofield

Gerald Williams

With great regret we report the passing of paragliding pioneer Gerald Williams, who died on March 1st aged 85. Gerald was one of the very first in the UK to realise that parachutes could be soared from a hill. By 1985 he had perfected reverse launching, using a heavily modified jump canopy rerigged with thinner lines and other ingenious modifications. Having taught legions of Derbyshire pilots to fly at Peak Paragliding, he retired from instructing in 2001. DSC pilots in particular will remember him for his unquenchable enthusiasm.

Posted: 29 March 2022
By: J. Schofield

Safety Notice Woody Valley X-R7

Woody Valley has recorded a case of low-load breakage on one of their X-Rated7 rescue handles. Test results on harnesses sold in 2016-2017-2018 show that the aging factor of the  materials is not the cause, and they think it might be the accidental sharp edge of one of the tallurit.

As a result, Woody Valley have issued a safety notice and have decided to replace the plastic-wired rescue handle on their X-R7 harness with the most recent steel-wired handle.

Owners of Woody Valley X-R7 harnesses are therefore advised to contact their local dealer or national distributor for a free replacement handle.

A copy of the full safety notice can be downloaded from the Importers & Manufacturers Safety Notices page on this website.

Posted: 21 March 2022
By: Paul Dancey

NOTAM Q-Code change

The CAA has acted on free flying attracting the potentially misleading WP code in NOTAMs, which has been taken to indicate parachute jumping instead of paragliding and hang gliding to which it refers. Our sport now falls under the WG code for gliding; the definition now being 'glider flying, paragliding or hang gliding'. The change was implemented by the UK NOTAM Office on March 1st.

Posted: 1 March 2022
By: J. Schofield