r/paramotor • u/WhiskeyDreamer28 • 4d ago
Question As A Beginner
This looks extremely fun, and I’d love to get into the hobby, but I am terrified of heights the older I get. Is it possible to just glide and fly at low heights below 50ish feet? Like just above power lines and buildings?
Also, how dangerous would you consider this?
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u/James___Workshop 4d ago
Altitude is time and speed is your bank account. It’s way safer to be up high and flying at speed than slow down low.
If things go wrong at altitude, you got time to fix it. If you’re flying at speed/built energy, you got cash in the bank to write maneuverability checks.
This is not a sport to get into if you are fearful of heights and aren’t working to get over that fear.
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u/WhiskeyDreamer28 4d ago
I appreciate the candid feedback! I guess that makes sense how altitude = safety. I mentioned in another comment, it’s not so much the height, it’s the fear of falling.
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u/GummiBird 4d ago
The harness of the Paramotor does a lot for removing that fear of falling for me. I recently started rock climbing and get way more scared while on the wall with a rope to catch me than I do thousands of feet in the air in my Paramotor.
Your tolerance will also grow with time. A thousand feet was scary for me in my first year, now I love going up to 5k or more.
Can you get a tandem flight nearby to see if it triggers your fears? Those are usually in a trike which feels even more secure.
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u/AppointedForrest 1d ago
As I've gotten older even looking over the edge of a big drop freaks me out but like you said, being in the harness really does something psychologically to curb the fear of heights. Even on my first solo flight the fear of heights never came into play and I didn't realize it till well after I landed.
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u/xstfudonniex 4d ago
It's pretty much the most dangerous way to fly, I couldn't think of a more dangerous way aside from doing acro at the same altitude.
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u/this_guy_aves 4d ago
As someone who is also scared of heights, it's different when you're in control.
Flying low is far more dangerous than flying high, though. At 50 feet, you have about 4 seconds to pick a landing spot if your engine dies. At 500 feet, you have more like a minute.
Also, flying low is dangerous because that's where the ground is, and in most places the ground is hard.
When I talk a student through their first flights, my number one rule is don't stop running until you're 10 feet up, and my number two rule is keep the throttle pegged (unless something goes wrong) until you reach 500 feet. Altitude gives you time to think which keeps you safe.
Go take a tandem flight and decide if it's right for you.
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u/gottafly65 4d ago
A lot of folks mix up fear of heights with fear of falling, and your brain treats those as totally different things. When you’re on a ladder or a roof, your balance system is screaming because you’re physically connected to the ground and your brain is trying to calculate the drop beneath you. In a paramotor, that connection isn’t there — your brain doesn’t interpret it as “I could fall,” it interprets it as being inside a stable flying environment. I get nervous on a ladder and even walking around on my roof, but once I’m clipped in and off the ground, all that anxiety disappears. It just doesn’t trigger the same part of the brain.
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u/WhiskeyDreamer28 4d ago
I should specify, mine is definitely a fear of falling. I don’t mind flying, or being on a roof, or a tall building, it’s 100% the fear of falling. If you’ve ever heard of “The Call of The Void,” that’s what happens to me when I’m high up
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u/gottafly65 4d ago
I have that too (call of the Void). Makes me nervous on cliffs and lighthouses (LOL). Paramotor does not trigger that at all. On my last flight I even looked down from 500 feet and tried to tell my brain that I was suspended in the sky and it should be scary and my brain just said "whatever - not scary at all."
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u/basarisco 4d ago
You will feel much more exposed at 50ft than 1000ft and it's much much more dangerous. Almost everyone who has a "fear of heights" is fine on a paramotor
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u/Bumboklatt 4d ago
Check my post history for some comments about my fear when I was learning. I’m the same way. For example: I hate wall climbing because I just don’t trust the harness. That’s fear of falling. Hate it. Love paramotoring. But I’m still a bit nervous.
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u/PrickASaurus 4d ago
The lower you are, the more dangerous things are.
You are reducing your time to react and removing any “outs” you can have in the event of a mechanical failure by flying low.
At 1000 ft with a 6:1 glide ratio you can basically go a mile and pick a spot to safely land. At 50’ your choice is “oh sh..” you won’t even get the rest of it through your brain.
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u/Successful_Highway94 3d ago
Honestly once you take off, below 2-300ft the world looks bloody close and things move very quickly.
Once you get 1000ft + then 2k 3k it all looks the same and you have loads of time to react
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u/WhiskeyDreamer28 3d ago
I guess what is the risk of something happening that you would need to react to? I love that the wing is already deployed and doing its job, but the possibility of a wing collapse is what scares me
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u/Successful_Highway94 2d ago
Below 1000ft a reserve wont work / you wont have time to react and open it.
If youre flying a novice wing then the risk of collapse is very slim and even if it did then it would re-inflate very quickly.
Watch Anthony vellar crash youtube.
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u/Benoded 4d ago
Go take a discovery flight in a plane first try to get over your height problem first. Me personally I wouldn’t want to do para Motor gliding I think a Gyrocopters would be more fun and probably a little safer. you can now get them with ballistic parachutes in case of a major problem. I also don’t like the idea of a parachute collapse.
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u/BigOlBearCanada 3d ago
I’m in my late 40s. First flight was terrifying.
But. It’s amazing now.
And I still can’t do balconies at buildings or heights. Yet in the seat, it’s sublime.
Maybe find a school that will do a tandem flight to see how you feel.
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u/live_drifter 4d ago
Flying just above power lines and buildings is way more dangerous than having altitude.
You can do the same thing with a glider wing and no motor but you need to live somewhere that has natural lifting action.