Update: October 4, 2008 Spray Day Confirmed.  Meet at 9am bottom of Mauna Kea Rd.

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It’s that time again for all good PG pilots to go poison themselves and some Gorse while we’re at it. How bout Saturday, October 4th??????? I was up there with some students/friends and it’s looking
pretty good, BUT, it could use more attention. Let me know guys.
aloha, Da Pres!  Yeti

Pictures once again will tell the story. Charlie is still a little sore from rolling stumps around, Neillybird missed all this action the previous week, but made three attempts at toplanding last Saturday. Scotty toplanded twice. All pilots please note: Mr. Windsock out there 24/7 in summer sun, wind, and acid rain was not even 4 months old. Inspect your gear, and most importantly don’t fly IN acid rain. I have not gotten my new wing wet in the past year flying in voggy conditions and it seems ok…. Neillybird

Many thanks to Bill Brodbeck for allowing a group of local paraglider pilots to purchase the Kealakekua launch property. Bill had gracefully allowed local and visitor pilots to run off his front lawn for at least 11 years. So now it was retirement time for Bill and he gave first choice to the local paraglider pilots. A hui of dedicated pilots rearranged their finances and have acquired the property. This is truly historic. This only happened because it was meant to be. Kealakekua “just may be the most consistently flyable site in the Pacific”. Certainly in Hawaii. Launch clean up photos tell part of the story. Neillybird 

Aloha everybody, as you may or may-not have heard a good friend and P1 pilot was kiting halfway up the hill and got taken up in a thermal in early afternoon (approx. 1:30 p.m.). Roy had a 35 min flight and almost landed but got taken up again and blown over the back of Pu’u Loa into the rotor. He suffered a L2 fracture and was life flighted out to Hilo then onto Queens.That’s all I know for now and will let you know more later. He is expected a full recovery. This happened on Sunday, June 29th. Aloha Yeti

—story from west hawaii today

A paraglider injured in a crash Sunday was taken to The Queen’s Medical Center on Oahu for treatment, police said Monday.

The victim, a 43-year-old Kailua-Kona man, suffered back and leg injuries after the paraglider he was operating fell about 100 feet to the ground near Mana Road, in the Puuloa area. He is listed in serious but stable condition, police said.

Police classified the incident as a public accident, and are investigating the crash. A witness reported that the paraglider fell out of a “thermal draft” while descending and was unable to maintain altitude.

Spray day at Puuloa was very successful. When we got to the Mauna Kea Summit road junction around 8:30am it looked like clouds and moisture might be a problem. As it turned out the inversion was strong and below 6,500 feet so we had a magnificent sunny clear day on the mountain. A number of the club actually found time to fly between rounds of spraying. Thanks to our Pres Yeti Deffebach (pending Guiness book of records holder for most touch and goes landing a powered paraglider on an international airport) Peter Follet (his wing was a sight to behold, with clear blue skies, white puffy clouds and the mountain…) Charlie Crocker and Scott Gee (first to fly) Sam Blankenship and Roy Volkoff (students kiting in catabatics before it warmed up) MY Instructor Shawn Baker and DON BARTON one of our founding fathers of paragliding on Mauna Kea!

It took only one supercharged 3 gallon spray load to hose every piece of living gorse I could find in and around the summit of Puuloa. Last year it took two loads. We are winning the battle but we will not win the war without continued perserverance. There are camoflage keiki’s sprouting which will take over the moment we turn our backs! Easy enough to kill, if we keep on it. Otherwise the gorse wins. The koa trees which Charlie has be spraying around look just great! We still need to attack the roadway coming up so that we don’t drag gorse seeds with our vehicles.

Please beware of wild bulls. I was working my way down the south side of Puuloa and ran into 3 ornery abandoned pissed off old bulls. Luckily I was over 100 feet above them. The off-white bull looked me in the eye and basically said he would kill me if I came any closer. I slipped away out of his sight to the east. He was not going to run uphill to ruin my day. Neillybird

According to our president Kirk (Yeti) Deffebach this is a red tie event (ie be there). We have recieved our 2009 permit extension for limited (club) paragliding use of Puuloa from DHHL which if you look at the big picture is incredible. And now is the time to do our part, spray the hell out of the gorse that is attempting to re-grow on and around Puuloa cinder cone. We actually can do it if we all pull together. There will be little suckers sprouting a few feet from previosly dead clumps, there will be little suckers growing from the trunks of what appear to be dead mini trees of gorse. Get there early before the clouds come in (9:30 -10 am) lets get the job done! Call our pres at 987-0773 with questions. Posted by Neillybird