

It was an aluminum frame Rogallo glider with wheels, basic control rods, and a passenger seat. These innovations were a build-up to the first true hang glider built by American engineer Thomas Purcell in 1961. Rogallo's kites even inspired NASA to design spacecraft parachutes that were used up to 1967. The para-wings were simple in construction, assumed a firm shape by the wind in flight, were capable of slow flight, and could land gently. The most significant innovation of the modern hang glider was in 1948 when Americans Francis and Gertrude Rogallo designed a kite-like, flexible wing called the para-wing. The glider pilots' hip and leg movements would control the flight. Earlier hang gliders were designed in a way that the hang glider pilots would hang from the armpits beneath the wings of the vehicle. His biplane hang gliders played a critical role in the groundbreaking invention of the powered flight by the Wright brothers. With the turn of the century, America also witnessed innovations in hang gliders, with engineer Octave Chanute demonstrating his biplane hang glider from the Indiana dunes. He built several controllable gliders and took over 2,000 flights, leaving behind a legacy that inspired successive generations of inventors. After Cayley, the next significant milestone in the history of the modern hang glider was achieved by German inventor Otto Lilienthal. He took his first successful hang glider flight in 1804, and by 1853, Cayley had devised a functional human glider flight that could be launched several hundred feet into the air. The origin of modern hang gliders can be traced back to the late 18th century when English inventor Sir George Cayley came up with the design of a hang glider. To launch a hang glider, the hang glider pilot takes off from a high point like a cliff or hill into the air and gradually descends.

Hang gliding is a recreational flying sport quite similar to paragliding.Ī hang glider is an unmotorized, heavier-than-air, foot-launchable flying vehicle that can carry a passenger hanging underneath the aircraft's massive wings.
