Should we watch or turn our heads ?

[rs2kmk5 0]

I would have to watch. As a newbie I'm lucky in not having witnessed anyone bending themselves yet. Apart from myself, and I was lucky it was only my ankle.

I also know it's just a matter of time before we end up witnessing a nasty. The sport does not allow for mistakes, whether it be user, packer, spotter...

Wishing it never happens, thanks for starting the thread though. Raises many important and interesting questions.

Mike A

Out of 10,000 feet of fall, always remember that the last half inch hurts the most — Captain Charles W. Purcell, 1932

[lisamariewillbe 1]

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The sport does not allow for mistakes, whether it be user, packer, spotter...

Actually I disagree, I have made many many mistakes and I am still here... a packer can mess up, and we have our reserve, we learn to spot and make a mistake we are trained to find a safe alternitive, and so on. I know this sport is dangerous but if you look at incidents overall, most fatalities and bad injuries are due to a series of mistakes often times starting on the ground. And often due to the jumper becoming complacent and not taking corrective actions to fix thier mistakes.

Sudsy Fist: i don't think i'd ever say this
Sudsy Fist: but you're looking damn sudsydoable in this

[soberamprat 0]

seen a double mal didn't turn away. Still hear him screaming NO NO NO. Some times i wish i had turned away.

http://www.swoopstudios.com/videos/videos-rex.php

[RhondaLea 4]

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I think I would watch out of respect. I know this is kind of an odd concept, but this person, possibly a friend, is in deep shit, and if I can't even stand to witness it, then part of me is denying their suffering.

Weird, I know, but that's how I see it.

I started to post something very similar to this, and then I deleted it.

It's not only that, though. No one should have to die alone. And even if that person doesn't know I'm there with him, I know.

rl

If you don't know where you're going, you should know where you came from. Gullah Proverb

[cocheese 0]

I thought of that also. I think it is a little disrespectful not to see this person during their last second. They might be waving good bye or flippping us off, but we all know the visual will stick. It's just something i think i want to avoid seeing and replaying over and over for the rest of my life. I think i will close my eyes one second beforehand. Besides, dying in public is not very respectful now is it ?
Saw a guy at bridge day do a hand held off Piney. I turned my head after looking him right in the eye thinking i saw a dead man.Thought i was going to get splattered. His shit opened and he racked his ass on the tracks. Damn that was close.

[scrublink 0]

I have unfortunately seen more than my share of really bad accidents. Some fatal others that should have been. The older events are not forgotten but thankfully the details and images are foggy. I never even thought of turning away. Not out of some noble duty, but because the only thing my brain thinks of at the time is "shit I can't believe this is happening". I refer to it as "watching the train wreck". Maybe some of us have wiring that causes us to be memerized by impending doom. When I am involved in an emergency personally I don't get this kind of fixation. Which is good for my physical self preservation. I am sure there is a therapist somewhere that could explain this to me.

Ed

[Usetawuz 1]

I've seen. I've heard. Several times. I didn't want to see and/or hear. That's just the way it went down. I doubt that having a "plan" would have made a difference. Like someone said - "instinct takes over".

_________________________________________
The older I get, the better I was!

[wrightskyguy 1]

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I turned my head as my close friend bounced, but the sound is still with me 10 years later.

*** That was the only one I've actually watched myself, Wish I hadn't.

John Wright

World's most beloved skydiver

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[ACMESkydiver 0]

The only times I *thought* I was going to see some bad stuff I could NOT look, even though I tried. I wanted to look to follow them down and see if I could help, but when it came down to it, I turned away and just kept talking to myself "he'll be fine...he'll be fine...he'll be fine" -and he was, thank God. But what you INTEND to do, and what your body and mind will ALLOW you to do are sometimes, entirely opposite.

Quick case in point: I was horribly embarrassed to find out that I froze in an 'emergency' situation instead of reacting -I couldn't get myself to crawl out the top of a stuck elevator and cross the shaft to the half-opened door. My fear of heights (seeing the shaft from many floors up, which I knew I'd be looking straight down into when atop this elevator)paralyzed me in the elevator, and my husband had to do everything in the book to get me out up onto the roof, then he had to throw me across the 6 inch gap between the shaft and the half-opened doors because I could *not* cross it myself.

I don't remember ever being that humiliated, and it definitely was NOT what I would have 'planned' on doing in a stuck elevator a few floors above the ground.

~Jaye
Do not believe that possibly you can escape the reward of your action.

[BlindBrick 0]

I've been fortuante enough never to see anyone bounce, but there's been three times when I was 110% positive I was running towards a corpse. Despite that, I knew I still had to try to help.

-Blind

"If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

[matthewcline 0]

I watched all the way to impact as I ran and yelled to him.

I actually got there as his canopies settled on him (double mal on a triple rig, his mistake with the handles) we where real close, so close we made eye contact.

That look of "Shit, I am low thats Matt! he was packing!". That is how explained the look to me, but to me it looked like terror, I have seen that look before in my line of work, one of "I am not ready to go! not me!".

He made a recovery that now has him limping and shorter on one side, but alive. It was a "worst of time best of times" day.

Worst, I saw him bounce.
Best, I saw our team cometogether in the most stressful of times and work fluidly at saving him.

We also got to see a Blackhawk exceed 200mph and do a text book ER pad langing at a very high rate of speed.

Still see him every year and he always introduces himself as "the dude that bounced".

An Instructors first concern is student safety.
So, start being safe, first!!!

[happythoughts 0]

I find that when I see someone going very low, it is not morbid curiosity, it is hope. Inside, I am screaming for them.

Kind of like when you are bowling and the ball is heading for the gutter, so you lean your body to the left and do an "air push" to correct its path. All you can do is look and project some kind of hope.

Most of the time, there is a low opening or a cypress fire.

I saw a guy fight a spinning mal down so low that his wife (standing next to me, also a jumper) thought he went in. He was ok.

I think that most people watch out of concern.

[Zennie 0]

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I never even thought of turning away. Not out of some noble duty, but because the only thing my brain thinks of at the time is "shit I can't believe this is happening". I refer to it as "watching the train wreck". Maybe some of us have wiring that causes us to be memerized by impending doom.

This is exactly the same thing that happened to me when I watched a friend come as close to going in without actually going in as you possibly can.

I just stood there... in almost a dream state... thinking "I can't believe I'm seeing this happening".

- Z
"Always be yourself... unless you suck." - Joss Whedon