The History of Paragliding

1970’s -  It all started with parachute pilots playing around thinking of new ways to get airborne, without the expense of taking a plane up.  One story is told of a pilot landing in a paddock in the French Alps.  The paddock was full of bulls, so the pilot kept running towards the cliffs at the edge of the field.  As he approached the edge his parachute inflated and he was able to escape the bulls, laughing as he flew away. Back in the parachute factory they started making adjustments to the materials the parachutes were manufactured from, and shaping the canopies differently. This in turn increased the glide and overall performance of the parachute, making it easier to launch them from the hills.

1986 - The first paragliders started to fly around Queenstown, introducing the sport to New Zealand. Shortly after the Queenstown Paragliding Club was formed and all the local flying sites were established. With the Skyline cable car above town the sport quickly took of with “keen locals” wanting to get in the air with very little expense and with lots of freedom!

1989-  The sport was taking off in Europe. The paragliding manufacturers had been making significant progress in both the design and safety of the gliders. Several companies started making equipment and pilots started pushing the limits with distance flights and acrobatics. Some of these paragliding pilots became professionals, with the resulting media coverage increasing paraglidings exposure to the public.

1990 - The manufacturers designed a paraglider that could take two people, mainly with the purpose of teaching. The first tandem was born ! An experienced pilot could take a person who had not flown before, and show them how to fly the paraglider in a safe environment. Many of the early Queenstown pilots just grabbed the gliders from friends and went up and flew down with very basic instructions all by themselves!

One particular day we were up flying and a tourist approached one of the lads who had a Tandem Paraglider and asked to fly down. He was not interested in lessons, he just wanted a “thrill” and offered to pay for the flight! That night the phones were ringing hot with pilots ordering the equipment required for Tandem Paragliding.

2009 -  We still have four of the original pilots flying for us, who togther have over eighty years of paragliding experience!