Dieter Strasilla

Dieter Strasilla (born July 26, 1943 in Troppau , Sudetenland , German Reich ) is a German aviation pioneer and chemist .

Due to its patented Skywing system, it is known as the "father of the paraglider". Together with his brother, Udo Strasilla, he was the first person to fly from the Jungfraujoch 2676 meters deep to Lauterbrunnen with the paraglider he developed .

Life

Family history

In 1940 the publishing house Strasilla's Sons, Opava, published the book "Vom Vogelflug zum Menschenflug". After the war and the resettlement, his family came to Berchtesgaden . There he had first contact with parachutes; his mother was a master tailor and sewed pajamas from "parachute silk" for a living.

Udo Strasilla went to study in the USA from Berchtesgaden. Udo studied electrical engineering, did his doctorate and worked for NASA in satellite research for many years . Today he is a professor at San José State University . Dieter devoted himself to chemistry, did his doctorate in Freiburg and worked for many years in Switzerland . During their stay in the USA, the two of them were working on a new piece of sports equipment. With the help of modified parachutes, they developed a sailing system as early as the 1970s that could be used to sail on land, water and snow. With their patented "Skywing" system, flying became possible. In an interview with Charlie Jöst at DHV in 2009, the brothers revealed some previously unknown details of their development work.

youth

Even as a child, Strasilla was fascinated by flying and playing with the wind while sailing, so he built model airplanes . At the age of 17, he went to Texas , USA, at the invitation of the Rotary Club and Student Council . In his free time he wanted to learn how to parachute. Unfortunately, as a minor, he was not allowed to jump. He had to stay on the ground and so he began to pass the time with various experiments. In 1965 he learned gliding in Freiburg im Breisgau . He developed various wing umbrellas with which you can not only cruise against the wind, but also fly.

Employment

Since 1977 Strasilla has worked in research and development at Ciba-Geigy (later Novartis) on various projects: NMR sequence analysis of copolymers , paper sizing agents, flame-retardant polymers, polymers for hair cosmetics, UV-curing adhesives, electronic materials and slow release hormone plasters as well Nitroderm and Nicotinell patches.

Patents

From 1972 to 1995 Strasilla worked in research and development in Freiburg and Basel on various projects and applied for numerous patents in various countries. Five of them concern sailing and flight technology.

Skywing development

As a part-time job, Strasilla developed various wing umbrellas with which you can not only cruise against the wind, but also fly. With a modified round canopy, he sailed up the speed route on Monte Rosa . With the patented wing umbrella, he and his brother were the first to fly from the Jungfraujoch (3471 m above sea level) to Lauterbrunnen (795 m above sea level). This first paraglider, an 11-cell made of spinnaker fabric, can now be viewed in the Schleissheim aircraft yard (branch of the Deutsches Museum ) in Oberschleißheim.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME	Strasilla, Dieter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German aviation pioneer and chemist
DATE OF BIRTH	July 26, 1943
PLACE OF BIRTH	Troppau , Sudetenland , German Empire