The Big Kiting Accident

What?!?! A KITING accident? How can you get hurt flying kites?

Seriously, as it turned out, I should have been wearing a helmet out on that beach. Someone even called an ambulance for me!

So.. This guy was flying this quad-string stunt kite by us, buzzing us with extra strings unused and flailing about. I googled quad-string kite and they're what's used to pull someone sitting in a go-cart type vehicle down the beach. It's referred to as a "power kite".

No, he didn't snag anyone in the strings. It was actually my fault. The old "good Samaritan" gets injured helping his fellow man.

His kite crashed, the lines got twisted and the easiest way to fix this is to have someone hold onto your kite while you untwist, then they can help launch it again once it's straightened out.

So I held onto his kite, he walked out to where the handles lay on the sand, untangling as he went. He put the straps on his wrists and I held up his kite to take off. Just as it began to rise I felt something on the back of my ankle. Oh, one of those unused strings was wrapped behind my foot, I'll just lift and untangl.....

That thing lifted violently while I was standing on one foot. It pulled me off my remaining foot and dropped me on my tailbone, then my head bounced on the concrete-like sand.

But my camera was safe.

I lay there for a minute very still with my eyes shut. The guy with the kite may have seen me fall. The kids thought I was taking another strange angle shot. It took a minute for everyone to figure out that I was hurt. It didn't knock the wind out of me but rang my bell real good.

I finally started to talk and open my eyes, I thought maybe my head was bleeding, it hurt so bad. But it was just a big jarring, bruising accident. Immediately my ears, jaw, face, butt, and back o' my head hurt. The next day my wrist and shoulder hurt, then my stomach muscles and the tendons in my neck, I musta tensed up before I hit my head, trying to not hit so hard.

Today I'm pretty good, the only thing is the first and last few inches when I raise myself from a sitting or crouching position.

So, the next time you go kite flying DON'T FORGET YOUR HELMET!!!