 | Lutz Kite flying Germany |
About the kites and Greenpeace:
I brought 65 kites with me from Germany. Included in these is the big blue kite you have seen me flying. Called a "Doppel-sled", it is 18 square metres, and works well in slow wind. The kite has Velcro for attaching banners, but in this case I will use it to pull aloft a large (3m x 50m) tube banner, which reads "Stop Plutonium". Although, it will stay under 60 metres for this action I have flown it up to 600 metres in the past. The record (not mine) for this type of kite is around 9,300 metres.
I also have with me a large yellow box kite - the type known as a "Cody" - which is good for fast wind. This is the same kite I used five years ago in my very first Greenpeace action, which was also about nuclear fuel reprocessing. We used this kite to pull a suction tube up to take air samples, which proved that the COGEMA reprocessing plant in France was releasing radioactive contamination in the air.
When Greenpeace asked the people at their local kite shop who could help them with this action they were told, "There is only two people in the world that could do it, and only one of them is crazy enough." So, that's how Greenpeace found me.
Personal history:
I have been serious about kites for over 15 years, and for the last ten have owned my own kite business. I make special custom kites, such as for festivals, and am the only person in the world producing this particular kind of kite.
I made my hobby into my job. It's what I love. Years ago, a friend of mine and I invented a new technique - to make a kind of kite arch. Instead of selling our idea or trying to make money from it, we published what we had learned so that anyone could do it.
In the kite community I belong to, it is not about money. It is about sharing ideas.
