Oracle employs kite in search of advantage

AUCKLAND, New Zealand — The San Francisco-based America's Cup team made like Benjamin Franklin and flew a kite in a storm yesterday.

But the Oracle syndicate of software magnate Larry Ellison refused to say if kites would become the latest technological breakthrough in Cup competition. Oracle drew attention to itself on busy Hauraki Gulf when it hung out a radical sail that flew from a tether above its masthead.

Oracle cruised for about 30 minutes, moved by the steady tug of the soaring sail. Franklin flew a kite with a key attached to it in 1752 to prove his theory of electricity in the atmosphere, and it attracted lightning.

This time, however, there were no strikes, but upper-level winds moved the yacht along nicely.

Navigator Ian Burns was coy at a news conference on the eve of his team's showdown with Seattle's OneWorld Challenge. The winner of the best-of-seven series will face Alinghi of Switzerland in the challenger final starting Jan. 11.

"We've had a lot of innovative ideas throughout our project, and this is certainly one on the edge of innovation," Burns said. "Anyone who has ever flown a kite of that type knows that there are some significant advantages in having something of that nature, so there's distinct possibilities that it could pay off."

Burns said the kite sail could best be described as "an ongoing research project." He said the value of a kite sail, if it could be used successfully, was obvious, particularly in the fickle winds of the gulf.

"The higher you go the stronger the wind is," he said. "Certain days on the Hauraki Gulf we've had almost no wind on the water. But at 300 or 400 feet there's been 20 or 30 knots, and so there's obviously a benefit to flying a spinnaker at a higher elevation than your masthead."