VOTE: Birdmen will fly again in Bognor this year

The crazy challengers will be taking to the air on September 11 and 12.

The boost to the town's tourism calendar has arisen after a dramatic U-turn by Arun District Council.

It has agreed to modify its health-and-safety demands to enable the flying to take place off the current, shorter pier.

The new stance has enabled the International Bognor Birdman chairman Barry Jones to confidently state the crowd-pulling occasion was ON.

Eleven competitors have signed up so far.

He said: "We shall be putting something on for Bognor and having a bit of fun. This will show Birdman can be staged off the current pier.

"The main thing is that Birdman will be going ahead and Bognor will not be losing the event permanently. The town needs Birdman.

"Next year will not be anything like as difficult because the precedent will have been set."

The latest twist in the saga arose after an Arun senior councillor, Norman Dingemans, promised last week's meeting of the town's civic society he would break the impasse between the council's officers and Mr Jones.

They had been deadlocked about an insistence on the depth of water needed to enable the flyers to land safely.

Arun wanted 16.5ft of sea in keeping with national guidelines for jumping off the 35ft-high platform. But Mr Jones argued this was excessive because the Birdmen glide into the water rather than dive with force.

The council has now said it will accept the 14ft or so of water available for 20 minutes either side of high tide for those professional hang-gliders who will be flying from the platform.

It has said other entrants '“ the flamboyant Kingfishers and the inventive Leonardos '“ have to take off from the lower, 16ft-high platform which will give them 11ft 9.5in of water.

Mr Jones said this was acceptable. Arun also agreed to make a goodwill gesture to pay the full cost, some 750, of a structural survey of the pier which it insisted upon to ensure its safety.

The engineer visited the pier on Monday. His verbal findings are to put temporary strengthening sections along the pier to spread the load of the scaffolding for the platforms.

Mr Jones said the work would be done once it was put in writing.

A council spokeswoman said: "We have always been keen for this event to go ahead and have actively suggested alternatives to ensure the health-and-safety requirements of holding the Bognor Birdman rally are met."