The wind beneath his wings

JOHN MASLIN | 8th September 2008

If you ever tell Ray McCully to "go fly a kite", be prepared to wait while he chooses one from his collection of more than 100.

As secretary of the New Zealand Kite Flyers' Association, Ray's kites run from the small to the very big.

He'll tell you his big one isn't the biggest you'll see, but at five metres across and 15 metres from top to tail, his "midi ray" still gobbles up a fair tract of air space. He says the larger "mega ray" kites have a 32-metre wingspan.

Ray was at RNZAF base Ohakea yesterday for the annual Fathers' Day Kite Day, which attracted a few hundred people trying to catch a breeze.

On a good day Ray and his wife Rosemary, who shares his passion for kiting, could have 50-60 kites aloft at once. It started in 1989 when their daughters were given a kite by their grandmother.

"My wife thought that if that kite could fly, why didn't the one she made when she was a kid? So she went and got a book, made a kite and it flew," he said. "She realised that if you follow plans and use the things that matter, you can get a good kite."

The McCully family then went for a holiday to the United States, found lots of kite shops and bought a few kites.

"We returned home and went to the international kite festival held in Napier in 1990.

When the kids flew the coop, Ray and Rosemary had time to indulge their kite passion. They've even got three sewing machines they use to make most of their own kites.

It's a hobby that takes them around the country and around the world.

Last year they were in Sydney and Brisbane. The year before it was Cape Town in South Africa and the year before that France and US. This year they're heading to Thailand and it's Tasmania next year.

At Ohakea he was flying a kite he calls a "lifter", one that's light enough that the slightest puff will have it airborne.

Having dabbled in kite flying for some years now, Ray soon learned that it's easier to have one kite doing a lot of the work.

"The lifter will keep flying even if the winds get lighter and lighter," he said.

So rather than tear around a decent spread of open land Ohakea airbase yesterday was the ideal spot he can get the one kite to launch several others strung out along the same or other pieces of string.

Kites like his midi-ray have impressive pulling power. The big ones are tethered to the McCullys' car, with the smaller ones attached to pegs. "But with the kite going up and down I have to be careful little kids don't get caught in the tail. Unfortunately, while I'm watching out for the kids, I can't be flying anything else or I could have a kid dangling from it."

Organisers yesterday charged a $2 entry fee, with the money going to the RNZAF Ohakea Visitor Centre Trust, established earlier this year. The trust is pursuing opportunities for aviation heritage for the region, following the closure of the Ohakea Air Force Museum.