While in the learning stages of Kitesurfing you will inevitably be crashing your kite more often. The more you crash your kite, the greater the chance that you will twist your lines or that your kite will invert.
There is also a high chance that you could accidentally activate your main safety and if any of this happens while you are in deep water, you need to know how to fix it and get back to the safety of the land without making things worse or putting yourself in more danger.

Putting your safety back together under tension in the water
Firstly make sure that you have a modern, one line safety system, so when your main safety system has been activated, you have as little power as possible.
Secondly it is crucial that you know how your safety system works before you go out. Practice putting your safety system back together on the land when it is not attached to your kite so you are confident enough to be able to put it back together in the water.
To put your safety back together so you can fly your kite again, follow these steps
When your safety has been released you will be attached to your kite by your safety line.
- Pull yourself up your safety line using the palms down, hand over hand, thumbs up technique. This is the same technique to handle your lines as the self-rescue and the self land.

- Pull yourself all the way back to your bar

- Make sure you stay upwind of the excess line so you do not get tangled.
- Important: When you get back to your bar, avoid holding your bar and letting go of your safety line. When you hold on to your bar, your kite will start to catch the wind and pull your safety line back through your bar. This means that your kite could power up aggressively, very quickly. This would be dangerous because the excess line could get caught around a part of your body or another piece of your equipment. You would also be fully powered while be holding your bar without being connected to your harness.
- When you put your safety system back together you will need to continue holding on to your safety line and slowly feed it back through making sure the line does not wrap around any part of your body or your bar.
- If you cannot put your safety system back together with one hand while you are holding on to your safety line, you can secure your safety line by wrapping it around your spreader bar on your harness two or three times.
- Wrapping your safety line around your spreader bar will prevent your safety line from being pulled back though your bar while you reload your safety and will free up both hands to put your safety back together. Be cautious when unwrapping the line from your hook.



- When your safety system is back together, hook your chicken loop into your spreader bar and put your chick stick through the bottom of your spreader bar to secure it in place as normal.
- Check that your lines are not wrapped around your bar which could cause a death loop.
- When your safety is properly put back together and you are hooked back in, let the excess safety line back through your bar as slowly as possible.

- Be prepared to let go of your safety line at any moment if your kite powers up and the safety line starts being pulled through your hands
- Relaunch your kite as normal.

If there is a large amount of tension and you struggle to hold on to your safety line, bar or chicken loop at any time during putting your safety back together, you must remember to simply……
Let go!
Its good to know that if you really struggled to put your safety together, you have the option of performing a self-rescue.
If your lines are twisted because your kite flipped over then as long as your bar is the correct way round (most bars have red on the left) then you can fly your kite as normal and ride back to the beach to land your kite and then untwist your lines.
Putting your safety back together made simple
- Use the palms down, thumbs out, hand over hand method to get back to your safety system making sure you stay upwind of your lines so you do not get any body parts tangled in your safety line.
- Do not let go of your safety line or hold on to your bar or chicken loop as your safety line will move through your safety system with great speed and power up your kite. Consider wrapping your safety line around your spreader bar hook to take the tension off while you reload your safety system.
- When your safety is back together feed the safety line back through as slowly as possible.