I cannot agree with the conclusions from tonights (8th March 2006) programme. The man could not hold onto the plywood because he was strapped to the truck. If he really jumped from a building he would travel with the plywood, maybe at a slightly different speed. The speed differential would be significantly less than when been strapped to a truck with a free floating sheet of plywood. The myth has not yet been disproved in my opinion.

This could be an easy one to try for yourself. Try to pull yourself off the ground quickly by holding on to a window sill a few times and see how long your grip lasts. This a solid fixed straight piece of timber. Now try the same thing whilst holding a thin piece of flexible plywood at an angle. You can't - i've tried it. Your hands just can't get enough grip to support your weight, as your fingers have nothing to grip around. This was the conclusion they came to on the show. I would agree however, that if the force exerted on the board was way more than required to lift the guy off the back of the truck, then his grip would fail instantly anyway.

However, one thing they didn't try on the show was to put holes near the edge of the board to give the truck guy something more substantial to wrap his fingers around. This would defeat the myth anyway, as the original builder was said to just have a plain piece of timber i.e. no hand holes, but at least you could have taken it as far as possible.

No I too have not seen anything on the show to conclusively disprove this myth.
On the show a big deal is made of not being able to control the flight but if this ever did occur I doubt the builder deliberately flew his board back into the building. It is far more likely to have been a fluke.
Also with reference to being able to hold onto it I think if the gust of wind lifted the guy from the floor (or sideways off the building) his survival instinct would have kicked in and I'm fairly certain he would be able to hold on for the few seconds his flight would have lasted.
I have been a labourer on a building site and have carried plywood in windy conditions - not easy !

when faced with the prospect of falling to your death the human body can perform massive feats of strength, so it is not impossible to think that you could cling on to the ply, it is indeed bloody hard to grip however!

I can't remember if the ply bent up at the front and back (if held in the centre) or if the ply bent like an arch above his head (this would make griping it even harder!)