Postby Palmolife » Fri Apr 05, 2019 7:50 pm
Sorry guys that you did not hear from me, I simply missed anyone answered to my post. I apologize for the delay.
So as far as I can tell a lot can be learned from this accident and be advised I don't post this tragedy to get attention, I do so to create some awareness of possible dangerous situations. As I said before, it's not an easy task to recall this happening..
Some friends and me were kiting in the lagoon when all of a sudden a thunderstorm started building up on the horizon. Since it was obvious it was approaching us and the wind was picking up quite a lot while changing direction to straight on shore, with many strong gusts, the supervisor of the kiteboarding school blew the whistle, signaling everyone to come back and stop his session. Everyone did so except some people which did not see the dark clouds coming or simply ignored it.
I remember while rolling up my bar, I saw a kite surfer with an RPM kite approach the shore. He was kiting way to close to the shore considering the weather conditions! I assume he wanted to get off his board and eventually land his kite. When he was about three meters away from land, his kite suddenly started looping out of nowhere. (I can't tell why.) Since he could not control the situation he was thrown off his board and dragged towards the shore. We yelled at him too release but instead of releasing his chicken loop, he held onto the bar und pulled in and the inevitable happened.. The kite picked up power, pulled him several meters into the air before he hit a small hill. I think he lost consciousness right after the impact since it was a very hard one. The kite kept looping and dragged him over the ground away from the lagoon. A friend of mine and me started running as fast as we could, trying to approach him but he was so fast that we even lost vision contact. Unfortunately there was nothing the kiter could have done in this situation because he was unconscious.
So we kept running as fast as we could, the terrain was very rocky. After about 400 meters we could see the kiter lying under a pole in the vineyard. His kite was gone, I think the power lines must have ripped, I cannot tell for sure though.
You sure can imagine the injuries this person has suffered from. So since he stopped breathing after a couple of seconds, we performed a cardiac massage and tried to help him. People from all the kite stations around came and wanted to help. Finding someone who actually knew the emergency number was very hard! (So please always make sure you know the emergency number!) Even locals had issues figuring out what number to dial! Finally someone knew what number to call but no-one picked up.. This guy was dying and we could not reach an ambulance, this still drives me mad! Then my friend got through and told them in English we needed assistance, however the other person on the phone did not speak any English and therefore could not send any help.. So it took us about 15 minutes to actually get a hold of the emergency department.
Eventually an ambulance arrived after about 30 minutes. The doctor took over my job and quit after a short period of time for obvious reasons.
I don't want to name the injuries this person suffered from since I want to be respectful but I can go as far as saying that a helmet would NOT have saved his life.
So thank you for taking your time and reading my post, I hope this helps understanding potential dangerous situations and how to properly handle them once you are in them.
My thoughts are with this person's family and friends he was spending this vacation with.
- These users thanked the author Palmolife for the post (total 3):
- Toby (Fri Apr 05, 2019 9:40 pm) • edt (Fri Apr 05, 2019 9:42 pm) • purdyd (Sat Apr 06, 2019 2:31 am)