kkeenan 14 #26 June 27, 2007 Using a hook knife to cut the offending brake line, then using rear risers to steer and land allows you to get back to the DZ, which stowed brakes may not. A cut brake line is easier to fix than repacking a reserve, and you're not cutting away a flyable canopy. People who know only one way to deal with any canopy anomoly (cut away and pull reserve) are limiting their options. Reserves actually do malfunction, now and then. Why roll the dice unnecessarily ? Kevin K._____________________________________ Dude, you are so awesome... Can I be on your ash jump ? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
stratostar 5 #27 June 27, 2007 QuoteOf course, I have a very limited amount of experience as a skydiver, even less as an instructor so I could be totally wrong. Nope I think you said it quite well and addressed the points i was trying to make way better then I did. QuotePersonally, I do not allow the thought of a reserve malfunction to ever enter my mind as part of the equation That is well said, on the other side, no reason to just chop from a stuck toggle, it is a workable problem in more then one way, one of those ways is of course a cutaway. Anyway were on the same page here great post.you can't pay for kids schoolin' with love of skydiving! ~ Airtwardo Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Jazzthieve 0 #28 June 27, 2007 QuoteGood job staying unbroken. I would certainly consider landing on rears on my current canopy, but only because I know it works...not because I think it might work....if I thought I "might" be able to safely land my canopy....I would chop it! Landing too many "might" situations will certainly decrease your odds of becoming old. More interestingly....You didn't have to do rear riser flares before getting your "A"? Or worse...no one even told you about rear riser flares/turns? Most instructors I have seen, teach rear riser flares and turns during AFF...on like the second or third jump. You might want to see if your instructors failed to share any other critical skills/knowledge. Other situations might not afford the time to make connections with things you've seen on video or the time to experiment with what you think might work. So acording to your "advice" I should have chopped it, you probably missed the part where my post said "my right hand got stuck with it". Perhaps I'm a noob and I know nothing but I don't think it's a good idea to chop while your stuck on your main with your hand. Also for a guy with only 157 jumps your giving away "advice" like your an instructor. I was able to think and experiment about what I could do because I had the time or do you realy think I would do this every time when I'm confronted with a malfunction. The fact is I had a mal I dealt with it the best way I saw fit and I landed safely without any problems so don't tell me how I should have dealt with it according to you cause you "know", you weren't there. The USPA's licensing is apparantly totaly different then what we have here in Belgium, here you automatically get A after 25 jumps, B is 50, C is 100 and D is 200 jumps. During AFF most emphasis is placed on the skydiving part (stable freefall, altitude awareness, pulling, exits,...) canopy piloting is something that's not realy handleled in depth during AFF. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
AFFI 0 #29 June 27, 2007 QuoteThe USPA's licensing is apparantly totaly different then what we have here in Belgium, here you automatically get A after 25 jumps, B is 50, C is 100 and D is 200 jumps. During AFF most emphasis is placed on the skydiving part (stable freefall, altitude awareness, pulling, exits,...) canopy piloting is something that's not realy handleled in depth during AFF. Point of clarification: In the USPA, getting to the 25 jump mark does not automatically give you an “A” License. There is a list of Skills that are required for a skydiving student to reach a level of proficiency in prior to being awarded the “A” License. There is sections that include Exit and Freefall skills yes, but there are also other categories such as Canopy Skills, Aircraft and Spotting, Emergency Reviews, Equipment Knowledge and a License Examination. Follow these links for a detailed description: http://uspa.org/publications/form.pdf/A_Lic_Prof_Card_09-06.pdf and http://uspa.org/publications/form.pdf/A_Lic_Prog_Card_ISP_09-06.pdf So there is much more to obtaining USPA license than just freefall skills. In fact, the USPA rated school where I instruct, freefall skills as a priority is secondary to the safety aspect of skydiving concerning various Emergency Procedures (and all that that implies) and Canopy Piloting. All of which is detailed required learning in order to obtain a USPA license. -Mykel AFF-I10 Skydiving Priorities: 1) Open Canopy. 2) Land Safely. 3) Don’t hurt anyone. 4) Repeat… Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
AFFI 0 #30 June 27, 2007 QuoteThe fact is I had a mal I dealt with it the best way I saw fit and I landed safely without any problems Based on reading the account of the event in the original post, you did a good job of evaluating your situation and improvising solutions that resulted in a landing that did not leave you injured and gave you a good learning experience. Overall, at your experience level you did an outstanding job of handling the situation you had created for yourself. If there is a red flag area that you may want to consider focusing on (based on the written account of the event) is altitude awareness. You never once mentioned in the original post that you checked your altitude. Whether you did or not is not my point, being altitude aware is so ultra important, and often overlooked that it should have been a point of focus in your written description. This way it will help to solidify the practice of being altitude aware, especially when you are in a situation where you are trying to deal with a problem such as you were. It is at these times that altitude awareness can easily be lost because many skydivers do not put forth a conscious effort to ensure that altitude awareness is a top priority. Many think that is “goes without saying” but if that were the case, there would not be so many fatalities worldwide that were a direct result of skydivers loosing altitude awareness while dealing with a potentially reparable partial malfunction. Once again, you did a fantastic job in dealing with your situation. Keep training and learning, good job! -Mykel AFF-I10 Skydiving Priorities: 1) Open Canopy. 2) Land Safely. 3) Don’t hurt anyone. 4) Repeat… Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
AFFI 0 #31 June 27, 2007 Quote“So acording to your "advice" I should have chopped it, you probably missed the part where my post said "my right hand got stuck with it". Perhaps I'm a noob and I know nothing but I don't think it's a good idea to chop while your stuck on your main with your hand. Also for a guy with only 157 jumps your giving away "advice" like your an instructor.” I share with you the frustration that you are expressing. There are often times when unqualified individuals attempt to give advice or instruction, both in person and especially in online forums. I really wish skydivers would not do that, because although they are well intentioned, they may be planting seeds into the minds of inexperienced individuals who may take their inappropriate advice to heart and disable a practice or understanding that is beneficial and replace it with an idea that may end up getting the person receiving the advice injured or killed. Another thing to keep in mind, even though a practice is a good idea for someone at an experience level with high jump numbers (perhaps in the thousands and decades in the sport), that same practice may not be a good idea for an individual with much less experience (say a couple hundred jumps or less) to put into their toolbox just yet. Furthermore, giving advice to individuals still on student status may undermine the quality instruction that those students are receiving from the rated instructors that are working with them first hand and in person. Even though I am an instructor, I still will not advise students who are actively working with another instructor either remotely of even at the DZ where I work unless I am specifically asked to do so by the instructor that is actively training that individual student. It is a matter of respect for the other instructors, but also because different instructors have a variety of methods in which they teach the varying aspects of skydiving. In this case though, I do not believe that mbondvegas was advising you to this particular situation as much as sharing an overall generic understanding as to what a good practice is in determining the limitations concerning making a decision to land a particular problem. I believe he was saying that "maybe" is not good enough for him, which is something I agree with wholeheartedly. For example, if landing a particular configuration may be more dangerous than cutting away and deploying the reserve, then it is perhaps a good idea to choose the lesser of two evils. Concurrently, it is not always a good idea to cutaway a parachute that although cannot be landed in a traditional method (flare with the toggles), can still be landed to a degree that is safe enough to not necessitate a cutaway and reserve deployment. That is where perfect altitude awareness and practicing using different control inputs on a regular basis come into play. This is a testament as to how difficult it is to understand completely what someone is trying to say in the written word because good and effective communication is exceedingly difficult to properly convey and express without the benefit of being in person, and even at that it is quite difficult to achieve complete effectiveness… -Mykel AFF-I10 Skydiving Priorities: 1) Open Canopy. 2) Land Safely. 3) Don’t hurt anyone. 4) Repeat… Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
stratostar 5 #32 June 27, 2007 Quote This is a testament as to how difficult it is to understand completely what someone is trying to say in the written word because good and effective communication is exceedingly difficult to properly convey and express without the benefit of being in person, and even at that it is quite difficult to achieve complete effectiveness… So very true, but your real good at it and covey quite well, if fact from now on I'm PM'ing all my post for you to edit.....you can't pay for kids schoolin' with love of skydiving! ~ Airtwardo Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
AFFI 0 #33 June 27, 2007 Heh, thanks... I think... Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mbondvegas 0 #34 June 30, 2007 Good interpretation. Thanks for clarifying for me. It is strange how the same written words can be interpreted completely differently by different people. Ain't human communication grand!- - - I am not afraid of tomorrow, for I have seen yesterday and I love today. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mbondvegas 0 #35 July 1, 2007 Quote So acording to your "advice" I should have chopped it, you probably missed the part where my post said "my right hand got stuck with it". . Your interpretation is entirely inaccurate. As is your use of quotes (""). Obviously I did not mean chop with one's hand still stuck, but after that, it was the lower risk choice if one did not know if the main was landable. My comments were related to risk management and ones understanding of risk management is not always directly proportional to ones jump numbers. If one requires jump #'s to listen to rational thinking, then one should listen to AFFI. So let's look at such situations rationally: Let's presume that reserves malfunction at a rate of 1 in 300 (someone can chime in, but I assume the rate is much less frequent). This would make the cutaway/reserve outcome a 'safe' choice 99.66% of the time. So, if your confidence in being able to safely land your "might" situation is greater than 99.66% ....then one would be making the right choice by landing the main...if your confidence is less...well...a cutaway and reserve pull would be the better choice. Personally, I am more than 99.66% sure that I could land my canopy (under most conditions) with a reasonable level of safety using only the rear risers. Furthermore, I assume that after this experience you will have the same (perhaps even a greater) level of confidence in landing on rears. So, faced with a similar situation in the future, we both probably should not cutaway.- - - I am not afraid of tomorrow, for I have seen yesterday and I love today. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Jon26 0 #36 July 9, 2007 Watching a couple of pieces of mal footage that were laying around at the dz i work at helped me out during my AFF. On my fourth jump, i encountered my first, and severe, line twists ( i was stable, honest!). They were pretty bad. I knew they were there before looking up. I could feel the risers crossed on top of my head and had to duck to get my head behind em to look up! I was obviously on a big canopy and it was square and flying straight but the slider was caught up halfway through the twists. Anyway, i couldn't remember what height is the minimum to cutaway when something like that happens. Since i had pulled way up at about 6 grand i had time to watch my alti and kick the twists out. I managed to untwist em by 2700. I had decided at the start to cutaway at 2500 if the lines were still twisted. Anyway, the point is i'd watched footage of others kicking out line twists and was surprised by how long they had persisted without chopping. Having seen that had made me more relaxed and able to calmly look at my alti while i kicked the twists out. I reckon if i hadn't seen the footage, i'd have looked up and said "WTF?" and chopped. Watch all the videos u can get ur hands on, i say. U might find urself in exactly the same situation u've watched someone else deal with. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
flyinchicken 0 #37 July 9, 2007 Yayyyy! You are alive and you can ANALYSE everything you did to make that happen and keep the good stuff. Sounds to me like you need to focus on the area that saved you. More videos and more questions. More information............keep learning and jumping. "Diligent observation leads to pure abstraction". Lari Pittman Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
KathleenL 0 #38 July 10, 2007 What you call negative turns we call flat turns. Flat turns are a very underrated but much needed skill. I am glad that you already know them. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
