Why Separate HP & Standard Landing Areas Aren't Enough

[jacketsdb23 49]

In an ideal world, separate landing areas make a lot of sense. In the top half of the attached drawing, separate landing areas look good. HP pilots doing a 270 have a very good view of the traffic in the Non-HP landing area.

The problem is, landing is a very dynamic situation from load to load and there are so many variables that a simple "separate landing area" plan many times will not work by itself.

As an example the bottom half of the attached drawing illustrates a poor spot by the "spotter". Now separate landing areas make no sense and the HP pilots must understand that there is a high probability that non-HP pilots are crossing over "their" area. While it would be great if every single non-HP pilot went around the HP landing area, in practice and reality this does not happen. Be it from lack of experience, lack of understanding the pattern, etc.

The drawing in the bottom half of the picture has happened to me and I aborted my swoop in freefall. Landing is much more than wait until I get to 1000ft and figure it out.

A bad spot is only one example of how "separate landing area" by itself just doesn't work all the time.

Other factors that may diminish the effectiveness of "separate landing areas" :

Wind direction changes
Bad Spot (new pilot, poor spot from jumper, etc. etc.)
Clueless Jumpers
Major Wind Direction Changes from 12K to the ground (affects the spot)

The bottom line is, with so many dynamic issues...separate pass is the only thing that takes most of those elements away.

Losers make excuses, Winners make it happen
God is Good
Beer is Great
Swoopers are crazy.

[popsjumper 2]

I agree with that!

Congrats on aborting...not all people would have been that heads-up.

My reality and yours are quite different.
I think we're all Bozos on this bus.
Falcon5232, SCS8170, SCSA353, POPS9398, DS239

[nigel99 616]

This is a question rather than a suggestion and please take it as such.

With the very high speed obtained on modern swooping canopies would they not benefit from some sort of traffic control? Clearly DZ's don't want to put 1 swooper out per pass and I understand that completely.

One concept would be radio - clearing a person for a swoop, another would be a semaphore go/no go.

Other than the fact that any system is a nuisance to someone why would such a system not work and make things safer?

Experienced jumper - someone who has made mistakes more often than I have and lived.

[Ron 10]

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One concept would be radio - clearing a person for a swoop, another would be a semaphore go/no go.

Even easier is to have people do a hop n pop and stack the landings.

You leave first On your 2.5WL and take a 10 second delay, I leave second on a 2.1WL and take 5, Bob pulls out the door on his 1.8WL.

You land, then I land, then Bob lands.

The problem is some people think that a HP landing can be done with other traffic. And that some people think they should get to hook no matter what the traffic is like.

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334

[virgin-burner 1]

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The problem is some people think that a HP landing can be done with other traffic. And that some people think they should get to hook no matter what the traffic is like.

it seems to work around here..

and the "other" people should get told off once it happens, and the 2nd time they should be chased off the dz..

“Some may never live, but the crazy never die.”
-Hunter S. Thompson
"No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try."
-Yoda

[skybytch 273]

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Even easier is to have people do a hop n pop and stack the landings.

Even better would be to have everybody stack the landings on every load, regardless of whether they are flying a traditional pattern or a high performance pattern.

[billvon 3,114]

>and the "other" people should get told off once it happens . . .

I think it would be sorta pointless to tell Chris Stasky or Danny Page off.

That's the problem. This isn't something where you do something stupid and then get yelled at. This is something where you do something stupid, kill someone else, and then die yourself. That's not a mistake you can be allowed to make.

[virgin-burner 1]

is that the guys that died recently!?

what i tried to say was, that if somebody keeps on swooping through traffic over and over again, it wont be long until someone gets hurt. so yea, usually it's always the same people. tell them off, bann them from the dz for 30 days, whatever it takes.

we have sort of a tight landing area, and many swoopers. but everyone behaves because they know what the consequences is.

“Some may never live, but the crazy never die.”
-Hunter S. Thompson
"No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try."
-Yoda

[billvon 3,114]

>so yea, usually it's always the same people. tell them off, bann them from the dz for
>30 days, whatever it takes.

That's the problem. Jason Peters, a world-class competitive swooper and professional skydiver, recently almost killed another skydiver. They were the only two people in the air. He cleared his airspace before the swoop, and is about as safety conscious as they come. Are you going to ban him? If so - do you think you can clear your airspace better than he can?

[jacketsdb23 49]

This is exactly the problem. Everyone thinks they can clear their airspace on every skydive, and its just not possible. Even with separate landing areas, there are circumstances that diminish the effectiveness of that approach.

ETA: I didn't always feel this way, but the more I learn about HP landings, the more I feel that losing 500 - 1000 ft in mere seconds for landing should be done on a separate pass.

Losers make excuses, Winners make it happen
God is Good
Beer is Great
Swoopers are crazy.

[virgin-burner 1]

well, i know a couple "world-class" swoopers that ended up getting a holiday at the dz i jump at.

and hell knows, people usually dont just pop into time and space, do they!?

since you brought it up, WHY did he almost kill the other guy? distracted? by what?

“Some may never live, but the crazy never die.”
-Hunter S. Thompson
"No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try."
-Yoda

[Ron 10]

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it seems to work around here..

and the "other" people should get told off once it happens, and the 2nd time they should be chased off the dz..

What if the first time ends in a death?

I have said this before... HP canopy flight has evolved just like CRW. It is not something that can be expected to be done on a regular jump and needs a dedicated jump.

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334

[ianmdrennan 2]

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well, i know a couple "world-class" swoopers that ended up getting a holiday at the dz i jump at.

and hell knows, people usually dont just pop into time and space, do they!?

since you brought it up, WHY did he almost kill the other guy? distracted? by what?

World class doesn't mean "never makes a mistake"

Might want to remember that the people we're discussing all made mistakes - just like the rest of us do.

Ian

Performance Designs Factory Team

[-ftp- 0]

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it seems to work around here..

and the "other" people should get told off once it happens, and the 2nd time they should be chased off the dz..

[Rick 67]

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>so yea, usually it's always the same people. tell them off, bann them from the dz for
>30 days, whatever it takes.

That's the problem. Jason Peters, a world-class competitive swooper and professional skydiver, recently almost killed another skydiver. They were the only two people in the air. He cleared his airspace before the swoop, and is about as safety conscious as they come. Are you going to ban him? If so - do you think you can clear your airspace better than he can?

Doesn't that mean that he did not clear his airspace??

You can't be drunk all day if you don't start early!

[theonlyski 8]

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>so yea, usually it's always the same people. tell them off, bann them from the dz for
>30 days, whatever it takes.

That's the problem. Jason Peters, a world-class competitive swooper and professional skydiver, recently almost killed another skydiver. They were the only two people in the air. He cleared his airspace before the swoop, and is about as safety conscious as they come. Are you going to ban him? If so - do you think you can clear your airspace better than he can?

Doesn't that mean that he did not clear his airspace??

I hate to say it, but that's what it sounds like.

"I may be a dirty pirate hooker...but I'm not about to go stand on the corner." iluvtofly
DPH -7, TDS 578, Muff 5153, SCR 14890
I'm an asshole, and I approve this message

[wmw999 2,587]

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Doesn't that mean that he did not clear his airspace??

I think the point here is that if someone really experienced was unable to accurately clear his airspace with only one other person in the air (i.e. he thought he had, but hadn't), then maybe it's not something that can reliably be done by anyone using just their eyeballs.

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[champu 1]

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>so yea, usually it's always the same people. tell them off, bann them from the dz for
>30 days, whatever it takes.

That's the problem. Jason Peters, a world-class competitive swooper and professional skydiver, recently almost killed another skydiver. They were the only two people in the air. He cleared his airspace before the swoop, and is about as safety conscious as they come. Are you going to ban him? If so - do you think you can clear your airspace better than he can?

Doesn't that mean that he did not clear his airspace??

I've about had it with the term "clearing your airspace" when it comes to swooping. You plan for clear airspace and survey for traffic all the way up to a swoop. You "clear airspace" with an AA flak battery.

At the risk of coming off as a pedant, I think embedded in the use of a term like "clear your airspace" is the assumption that it's a momentary task. (i.e. I flat turn to base leg, I check altitude, I adjust for winds to reach my initiation point at the right altitude, I clear my airspace, I let up on the breaks, I go to double fronts, I start my harness tu-) This is, of course, the wrong way of going about it. This is also why I find all the talk of various blind spots existing for different degrees of turns ridiculous. If you're relying only on your field of view from the moment you initiate a turn until you touch down to prevent running into someone then what the heck have you been looking at the last 1500-2000 ft of your canopy flight?

Swooping or otherwise, one of the really good reasons to fly a nice big pattern is it lets you "court" the landing area and identify hazards. And just as you can't only look straight down when spotting, you can't only look at the grass when you're flying your pattern. Learn to identify people who are WAFDOF below about 1000 ft and assume that they lick windows and can't be trusted. So long as it's even physically possible for them to get into the path of your swoop, keep checking up on them as you continue to survey for others.

[billvon 3,114]

>and hell knows, people usually dont just pop into time and space, do they!?

From a swooper's perspective, they do just that.

>since you brought it up, WHY did he almost kill the other guy?

Because if you are doing a 270 it is physically impossible to clear the airspace below you just by looking.

[yeyo 1]

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Because if you are doing a 270 it is physically impossible to clear the airspace below you just by looking.

shouldnt we 'clear the airspace' hundreds of feet before starting the turn?

HISPA #93
DS #419.5

[billvon 3,114]

>shouldnt we 'clear the airspace' hundreds of feet before starting the turn?

Yep. Which swoopers try to do. As we have seen, they fail with great regularity. This is either because all the swoopers who have had collisions or close calls are idiots - or because it's something that's simply not possible even for careful, conscientious swoopers.

[virgin-burner 1]

and i thought there was this thing called "separation" for that..

“Some may never live, but the crazy never die.”
-Hunter S. Thompson
"No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try."
-Yoda

[ianmdrennan 2]

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>shouldnt we 'clear the airspace' hundreds of feet before starting the turn?

Yep. Which swoopers try to do. As we have seen, they fail with great regularity. This is either because all the swoopers who have had collisions or close calls are idiots - or because it's something that's simply not possible even for careful, conscientious swoopers.

Bill,

The longer you attempt to make this a 'swooper' only problem, the longer you do a disservice to skydivers as a whole.

The problem is across the board. Non-swoopers are flying into each other too, just as much.

Is there a problem with swoopers flying into people? YES
Is there a problem with non-swoopers flying into people? YES

Ian

Performance Designs Factory Team

[billvon 3,114]

>and i thought there was this thing called "separation" for that..

There absolutely is. Get out on a separate pass and you're guaranteed to have no one else in the air.

[billvon 3,114]

>The longer you attempt to make this a 'swooper' only problem, the longer you do
>a disservice to skydivers as a whole.

The issue of collisions is a skydiver-wide problem. The issue of collisions after a 270 is a swooper-only problem. I am absolutely fine with telling ALL jumpers they can't do 270's when there is any other traffic in the air - but if I did that, I have a feeling you would take it (rightly) into a swooper-only issue.