Wiktionary
n. 1 A parachute, kite or glider with an aerofoil shaped fabric canopy or wing 2 The wing or sail of parachute etc. as (1)
Wikipedia
A parafoil is a nonrigid ( textile) airfoil with an aerodynamic cell structure which is inflated by the wind. Ram-air inflation forces the parafoil into a classic wing cross-section. Parafoils are most commonly constructed out of ripstop nylon.
Domina Jalbert (1904–1991). Jalbert had a history of designing kites and was involved in the development of hybrid balloon-kite aerial platforms for carrying scientific instruments. He envisaged the parafoil would be used to suspend an aerial platform or for the recovery of space equipment. A patent was granted in 1966.
Deployment shock prevented the parafoil's immediate acceptance as a parachute. It was not until the addition of a drag canopy on the riser lines (known as a " slider") which slowed their spread that the parafoil became a suitable parachute. Compared to a simple round canopy, a parafoil parachute has greater steerability, will glide further and allows greater control of the rate of descent; the parachute format is mechanically a hang glider of the free-flight kite type and such aspects spawned paraglider use.
The air flow into the parafoil is coming more from below than the flight path might suggest, so the frontmost ropes tow against the airflow. When gliding, however, the angle of attack is lowered and the airflow meets the parafoil head on. This makes it difficult to achieve an optimum gliding angle without the parafoil deflating.
In 1984 Jalbert was awarded the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI) Gold Parachuting Medal for inventing the parafoil.
Parafoils see wide use in a variety of windsports such as kite flying, powered parachutes, paragliding, kitesurfing, speed flying, wingsuit flying and skydiving. The world's largest kite is a parafoil-variant.
Usage examples of "parafoil".
We were falling-I was too terrified to scream-Lizard released the parafoil, I heard it pulling away-something went FWOMP!
The silken shroud of the parafoil had draped itself across the slope ahead of the ship.
With the parafoil deployed and stabilized, the bottom two-thirds of his penetrator slipped smoothly from his body, the reentry canister plummeting groundward.
Tatum hiked along the meandering brink of the precipice, hoping a navigable cleft or rift would show itself, enabling them to descend and backtrack along their original parafoil flight path.
The lander, suspended beneath its blue parafoil, had come bellying down out of the sky, crashing through the trees with abandon, and had left a clear trail of its glide-down in snapped trunks, crushed branches and ripped-up bits of parafoil.
Malenfant sacrificed more parafoil silk to make a hat and a scarf for his neck, and he added a little of a silvered survival blanket to the top of his hat to deflect the sunlight.
The cold-gas rocket abruptly ceased its hiss and Hakim saw the parafoil gently accelerate, now climbing at a shallower angle.
The parafoil was a technology he deeply mistrusted, but once he had felt the same way about microprocessors.
Nor that a sweep-winged parafoil had narrowly missed a redwood tree while banking upward from a school playground near Soquel, California.
The other parafoils disappeared against the dark backdrop of the mountains.
He secured both parafoils to the assembled mass and gingerly redeployed the foils in the freshening wind.
To the skittish dismay of the buffalo, the parafoils billowed open and jolted their load over the uneven terrain.
Down came the Sodes and Demis, up ran parafoils and drab battle-kites, another pair of death-lamps.
They were not true charvolants, these raiders, but atabanques, with canopies consisting only of photonic parafoils and death-lamps, none of the vast array of traditional kites used on tribal ships and National vessels.
Guerrero boasted that the dual wing gave his craft such a low stall speed that, unlike earlier parafoils, it could fly at the pace of a trotting man.