Being a paraglider pilot was what inspired me to get my first DSLR. Over that 8 years of being a competition pilot and tandem instructor I saw several fatalities and once the magic of flying was gone, after like 3,000 airborne hours, I was glad to leave it in one piece. This guy will likely be just fine though, he avoids thermals and goes on stable days with a motor, the only relatively safe way to do it in any tiny craft. We went to the deserts and hunted thermals for lift, sometimes unimaginably rough climbing at literal 2000ft per minute, many times over 16K MSL. When entering a huge powerful thermal, there were big g forces, the glide shivering under the massive load, and if you froze up and flew straight or turned the wrong way and hit the edge of that thermal there would be sinking air and BIG turbulence. Lost my entire wing several times over the years and once at a comp in Mexico I was hit by a huge sinking tail wind that literally blew the right half of my wing down and out in front of me sending me literally helicoptering . The wing blew back into the lines and go tangled as it did a full 360 twisting the lines as I entered a HUGE DEEP spiral dive pulling mega Gs. As I reach for the reserve parachute handle about 300 over a tree covered plateau the g forces were high enough to untwist the lines, I was "bar stooling" rotating in place, until my lines slammed open and I smoothly exited the deep spiral and actually gained some altitude from all the energy of the dive, just enough altitude to fly over the trees and off the edge of the plateau, gaining me 1000 feet! That was the beginning of the end of that career, I started flying more RC gliders to test conditions and ended up falling in love with that, taking no risks and flying like a wild man with a foam combat wing battling my buddies by flying a low race like pattern while slamming each other out of the sky. That was SUPER FUN!
Dale- I know you mentioned getting a
Mini 2 for Africa. Just got one, OMG, so cool! Amazingly light, small and portable, so little hassle. A small fanny pack/hip belt and you are flying in a moments notice. No more major unpacking and all that fiddling. . . I am SOO excited just for the instant tripod where ever I want it with ZERO running around, not to mention all the rest of the cool things a drone can do. It's potential is huge. The picture quality definitely rivals the
Air 2 as long as there is good light. Both ships can be on one controller too! Great for my use as an ultralight climbing drone pilot! I think for the epic traveler you are, it will be incredible! The only down side for me is a flight ceiling of 13,100MSL but, it is usually quite wind up there anyway,
Air 2 country. . .
