Hang gliding
air sport or recreational activity
Hang gliding is an air sport or recreational activity in which a pilot flies a light, non-motorised, fixed-wing heavier-than-air aircraft called a hang glider. Most modern hang gliders are made of an aluminium alloy or composite frame covered with synthetic sailcloth to form a wing. Typically the pilot is in a harness suspended from the airframe, and controls the aircraft by shifting body weight in opposition to a control frame.
Early hang gliders had a low lift-to-drag ratio, so pilots were restricted to gliding down small hills. By the 1980s this ratio significantly improved, and since then pilots have been able to soar for hours, gain thousands of meters of altitude in thermal updrafts, perform aerobatics, and glide cross-country for hundreds of kilometers. The Federation Aeronautique Internationale and national airspace governing organisations control some regulatory aspects of hang gliding. Obtaining the safety benefits of being instructed is highly recommended and indeed a mandatory requirement in many countries.
History
In 1853, George Cayley invented a slope-launched, piloted glider.
Most early glider designs were not conducive to safe flight; the problem was that early flight pioneers did not sufficiently understand the underlying principles that made a bird's wing work. Starting in the 1880s, technical and scientific advancements were made that led to the first truly practical gliders, such as those developed in the United States by John Joseph Montgomery.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Hang gliding” as air sport or recreational activity. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as air sport or recreational activity. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 24, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q208147. The Library of Congress control number is sh85058738. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1853.
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This entry incorporates text from “Hang gliding” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.