Flying contraptions land hard in Sydney Harbour

THOSE magnificent men and their flying machines were absent when everything from a giant flounder to a massive pizza slice took to the air at Sydney Harbour.

THOSE magnificent men and their flying machines were absent when everything from a giant flounder to a massive pizza slice took to the air at Sydney Harbour.

More than 60,000 people swarmed the water's edge of the Royal Botanic Gardens yesterday to witness the Red Bull Flugtag competition.

Flugtag means "flying day" in German, and it certainly lived up to its name.

The creative competitors took a running start, pushing their crafts over the edge of a 6m platform into the water.

The judging was a combination of creative design, showmanship and total distance travelled before slamming into the water.

A wingless clock, an ACME rocket and a Lego biplane made out of polystyrene were just some of the contraptions that plummeted into the harbour along with their pilots.

Sam Becomes A Man, a replica car attached to an overhead tarpaulin wing, managed to propel the farthest distance of the day - 18.2m.

The hybrid entrant was piloted by 16-year-old carpenter's assistant Sam Wilson.

The pizza slice failed to measure up at a distance of 13.7m but the crew of a giant flounder garnered enough points for creativity and a distance of 14.5m to take first place.

Pilot Roland Kenway, from Sylvania in Sydney's south, said the flying fish barely made it to the competition.

"We brought the craft in on an open truck, risking low-hanging trees and wires," Mr Kenway said at the competition.

"It wanted to take off while we were on the road and we ended up driving at 35km/h for four hours."

But the effort paid off once the flying fish was airborne.

"I couldn't see the water, just fish all round and I thought at one point, `how long is this going to last'," Mr Kenway said.

"Then I hit the water. I feel a bit like I jumped off a one-storey building onto my bum, but it was worth it."

It is the first time the 16-year-old event has been held in Australia.

The competitors fell well short of the record distance of 60m set previously in Austria.