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Parasailing in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic

Parasailing, also known as parascending, is a recreational activity where a person is towed behind a vehicle (usually a boat) while attached to a specially designed parachute, known as a parasail. The boat then drives off, carrying the parascender into the air. If the boat is powerful enough, two or three people can parasail behind it at the same time. The parascender has little or no control over the parachute.

There are six parts of a parasail. The harness attaches the pilot to the parasail, which is connected to the boat, or other speeding vehicle, by the tow rope. The activity is primarily an amusement ride, not to be confused with the sport of paragliding. There are parasailing locations all over the world.

Land based parasailing has also been formed into competition sport in Northern Europe and especially in Finland. In land based parasailing, the parasail is towed behind a car or a snowmobile. In accuracy competitions the tow-vehicle controls the speed and height, and the parascender controls the lateral movement of the parasail. The competitions consist of two parts: dropping or throwing a streamer to a target, and accuracy landing. The sport was developed at the end of the 1990s in growing rapidly. The first international competitions were held in 2004.

History

Chris Abbott designed chute

The first Parasails were developed by Pierre-Marcel Lemoigne in 1961. Lemoigne is a well known developer of ParaCommander-type of parachutes known as "ParaCommander" or PC-canopies. The date of the first towing of a parasail is not known, but one of the first mentions is a flight by Colonel Michel Tournier from France flying behind a tractor in the same year - 1961. In 1963 Jacques-André Istel from Pioneer Parachute Company bought a licence from Lemoigne to manufacture and sell the invention with a name "parasail".

Mark McCulloh of Miami, Florida is the original inventor of modern day parasailing equipment.

In 1973, McCulloh introduced the world’s first Stationary Parasailing Platform. His continued innovations, inventions and accomplishments within the parasailing industry are broad in scope with a focus on improving the safety of parasailing.

His most successful invention was called the wangboat, which he patented in 1976 and made its commercial debut in the 1980s. Riding the wangboat is a lot more pleasurable than the normal winchboat. Today nearly all commercial operators use winchboats equipped with a PTO (power-take-off), which uses the boat's engine to drive a hydraulic winch. The combination of these two designs ushered in the era of widespread commercial parasailing.

Another highlight of McCulloh’s inventions, was the Aerial Recliner and the Rider Assembly strap design, which made its debut in the mid-eighties and inspired NASA’s new X-38 Crew Rescue Vehicle.

Aerial perspective of parasailing, Bali Indonesia

To date, the United States Patent and Trademark Office has issued McCulloh the only patents ever granted related to commercial parasailing methods and equipment.

Many of McCulloh’s accomplishments have been aired on worldwide Television & Print Media, such as Good Morning America, Inside Edition, Fox News NBC, LA Times, New York Times, and the Miami Herald.

Since the early 70's, McCulloh's innovations, inventions and operating techniques continue to advance safety within the parasailing industry and has set the standards by which responsible operators follow. ___

Brian Gaskin, the founder of Waterbird, created some of the first parasails after experimenting with ex-military parachutes. In 1974, he created and tested the first true parasail which he named "Waterbird". Nearly all commercial parasails canopies in operation today were derived from Gaskin's original "Waterbird" design. In 1975 Gaskin founded his company "Waterbird Parakites" which is still in operation today, producing commercial and recreational parasail’s in the UK.

Parasailing Associations

Commercial watersports winchboat

Today's parasail operators have evolved into highly organized and professional operations. Many of the largest operators are located in the Southeast US and Caribbean.

In 1998, Mark McCulloh formed “Parasail Safety Council”, [www.parasail.org] [1] which established the first commercial parasail safety guidelines, procedures and provided the public with valuable information about parasailing.

In 2003, Arrit McPherson, an advent parasail operator formed PAPO (the Professional Association of Parasail Operators to also promote safety throughout the sport and help the industry's failing image in recent years.

Operators have moved from small (20-foot range) parachutes to large (30-40 feet) parachutes which utilize high-lift, low-drag designs enabling operators to fly higher payloads in lower (typically and more preferably extremly dangerous) winds. Most operators now offer double and triple flights using a tandem bar. The tandem bar is an aluminum bar attached to the yoke of the chute, allowing two or three passenger harnesses to be attached side-by-side. A tandem bar can be seen in the photo showing the Chris Abbott designed chute.

Typical parasail flights are performed with 500-1000 feet of line, although some operators use as much as 2,000 feet (610 m) of line. In some locations, notably Myrtle Beach, SC, FAA regulations limit flying height. In the case of Myrtle Beach the max height off the water is 300-500 feet. Daytona Beach, Fl, on the other hand has flights as high as 2,000 feet (610 m).

The tow line is normally made up of braided nylon.

World Record

OLDEST PARASAILOR RECORD

On Tuesday July 29th 2008 a 92 year old women parasailed for her 6th consecutive year. She flew with a line length of 1000' with her 10 year old great grandson. She flew with Captain Mark and Chris at Shark's Cove Marina in Fenwick Island, DE.

LONGEST ROPE USED

Shark's Cove Marina Parasailing in Fenwick Island, DE currently operates a 28' Premium boat with a 1000' 7/16 in. line. They have been using 1000' lines since 2003 and the line is changed twice a season to prevent any failure.

OLDEST PARASAILOR RECORD (Authenticated) On 13th April 2007, 87-year-old Mr. N.K. Mahajan from Pune (India) took a Parasailing flight. Indian Limca Book of Records has approved it as a National Record in its 2008 edition. Limca Record had also approved his earlier attempt of Feb 2003 (in its 2004 edition). Incidentally, when a camera crew team of Star News channel came to shoot this event (for its TV serial on Limca Records) Mr. Mahajan repeated his performance again on 27 May 2008 at Lonavala. He was 88 years old when he did this feat. He is the oldest Parasailor (probably in the world) to do so.

As "Federation Aeronautic International" doesnot approve Parasailing records it is not possible to claim any World Record. There is no other international authentic body to do so.

LONGEST ROPE USED (Authenticated)

Similarly, on 29th Feb 2008, Master Kedar Anand Munje (Pune) took two Parasailing flights by using Longest Rope for towing Parasail (Jeep Launch). He was 21 years old. He used 565 feet of rope when normally only 200 feet of rope is used in India.

This too has been approved by Limca Book of Records. He performed Parasailing flight with the LONGEST ROPE.

Both the flights were supervised and controlled by Senior Instructor Anand Munje (Pune)

See also

Look up parasailing in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Kite types
• Kite line
• Kite mooringwww.cwsboats.com

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