Is paragliding safer than skydiving?

It’s not easy to find definite answers. Based on my experience of many years in both activities I would say that skydiving should be safer, because:
- it is a mature sport with long tradition of improving both the gear and procedures,
- it’s regarded as aviation and often regulated by state authorities far more strictly than the paragliding, in turn seen as leisure and mostly self-governed,
- it’s perceived as potentially more dangerous, therefore people tend to pay more attention while exercising it.

Nevertheless I tried to find some hard numbers. For the skydiving that will be the USPA statistics as that’s where the sport is most popular, and by the same token paragliding numbers come from DHV, the German paragliding association.

Fortunately, base numbers are the same - according to the USPA skydiving was exercised in the USA in 2014 by ca. 36,770 of its members[1] while DHV says it had ca 35000 active pilots in 2015[2].

As for injuries, in the year mentioned there were:
729 skydiving injuries with 24 fatalities
220 paragliding injuries with 10 fatalities

And here I must admit I am surprised, as it is contrary to my expectations :) Even as the number of paragliding injuries is higher in reality, as not everybody reports a sprained ankle, it’s not that the grey number would be half as big, and certainly not in case of fatalities.

The answer may be that the real percentage should not be measured against raw membership, but actual number of jumps vs. hours flown. USPA says in 2015 there were 21 fatal skydiving accidents out of roughly 4.2 million jumps. That’s only 0.05 fatalities per 10,000 while wiki estimates PG deaths as 2 per 10,000… alas, pilots not flights.

Even when these numbers may seem inconclusive to you, one thing is certain. As in all airsports the actual cause of accidents are 95% human errors. Very rarely an equipment malfunction occurs, and even then it can be mostly explained by human factors again, like improper maintenance or setting.

I must admit I find this trait of flying activities really attractive - you are always responsible for your actions in pretty direct and spectacular way. Therefore if you are not honest to yourself with assessment of your skills, you will know that pretty fast, and sometimes painfully. The nature knows no mercy for dumbasses up there.

To sum it up - don’t be scared, if you will exercise any of these activities with your brain always on, you will be all right. Many people do that and have many years of beautiful experiences to dwell on and there is no reason you shouldn’t too.

Footnotes

USPA > United States Parachute Association

The United States Parachute Association and its nearly 40,000 member skydivers enjoy and promote safe skydiving through parachuting training, rating, and competition programs. USPA represents parachute jumping from aircraft and helps keep skydivers in the air.

[1] United States Parachute Association > Facts/FAQs > Demographics
[2] https://www.dhv.de/web/fileadmin...

"Once you have tasted the sky, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return."

--Leonardo DaVinci.