Hang Gliding Instructor

A Hang Gliding Instructor helps students learn to use the wind and an artificial wing to soar through the air. When you’re a Hang Gliding Instructor, a glider may be attached to your back as you fly across the sky, but nothing comes closer to feeling like a bird, a plane, or even Superman!

Let’s just say, a Hang Gliding Instructor isn’t afraid of heights. Some people may tell you that gliding is too dangerous to be doing every day, but it’s only as dangerous or as safe as you make it.

You take off from a field on a gentle slope, and there’s certainly no jumping out of planes. If you’re as reckless at hang gliding as some people are at driving, you’d be more accident-prone. This is the type of advice you give your students.

The first half of the journey is always preparation. Unlike paragliding, you can travel long distances in hang gliders—one of the longest recorded flights stretched over 11 hours in airtime. Your lessons include just as much, if not more, time on the ground checking equipment, planning the flight track, and making sure every safety provision is in order. Anyone can take to the skies, but it takes a real expert to prepare and launch a glider single-handedly.

More often than not, your students will be strapped to you in a tandem flight so they can get the thrill and know-how of flying without having to pilot themselves. For the first couple of lessons, they put their lives in your hands, and you reward their trust with a confidence that will hopefully get them back in the air for a second try. And finally, once your teaching is complete, they’ll be able to leave the nest and take off into the air with their own glider to sail by your side.