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How odd that you never took issue with a president who said that COVID would just go away in the spring, and that if people supported him they wouldn't wear masks. His lies led to about 400,000 excess deaths. Could it be that you have a double standard here? So here's a question for you. 80% of the people in the US are vaccinated against COVID to some degree. If 60% of COVID deaths are in vaccinated people (this is NOT an accurate number, it is an example) - does the vaccine reduce death rates or not? OK. So I went to the source for that. Here's the actual data: Infection rate: No/partial vaccination 20/100K Full vaccination 11/100K Full vaccination + boost 7/100K Death rate young No/partial vaccination.5/100K Full vaccination .1/100K Boosted 0/100K Death rate middle age No/partial vaccination 3.6/100K Full vaccination .6/100K Boosted .3/100K Death rate old Not fully vaccinated 32/100K Full vaccinated 5.7/100K Boosted 2.7/100K https://www.health.state.mn.us/diseases/coronavirus/stats/vbt.html So: 1) Yes you can conclude that vaccinations greatly reduce the incidence of both infection and death. 2) Given that you misrepresented the Minnesota numbers above, why should we take your OUTRAGE! over someone's dishonesty seriously? You did something very similar.

I hope you are trolling for the sake of spirited conversation, but I fear you are not.... Yielding to the lower jumper is NOT OBSOLETE! In fact, your suggestion is dangerous and I encourage jumpers to disregard it. The reasons we yield to the lower jumpers are simple. First, jumpers in the pattern are (correctly) focused on their landings, which dictates giving primary attention to what is BELOW them. Jumpers are ALWAYS responsible to clear the area in their flight path - like clearing the area to the left or right AND below before making a turn. This includes pattern flight and final approach. Second, it is often impossible to see traffic above us because our canopies block much of the view. Yielding to the higher jumper simply doesn't make sense and much of the time would be impossible because of the blocked view. It also distracts from the mission at hand - clearing the flight path ahead and below, and landing safely. The "low person has the right of way" is a basic premise in all of aviation. CFR 92.113.g states in part "When two or more aircraft are approaching an airport for the purpose of landing, the aircraft at the lower altitude has the right-of-way...". Additionally, the USPA Skydiver's Information Manual agrees with this rule. SIM Section 6-1.C.3.c states "the low person has the right-of-way both in freefall and under canopy". Deciding on our own to buck accepted practices leads to confusion, and that leads to problems. As for high performance canopies and the jumpers who fly them, they are ALWAYS responsible to yield to lower traffic. This makes perfect sense. The higher jumper has the best field of view of the jumpers below them, they can monitor lower traffic without looking away from their flight path, they have more altitude to make an avoidance maneuver if necessary, and it's consistent with aviation and skydiving norms. I am a former high performance canopy jumper (and still have a rate of descent faster than many others) and can say in practice that yielding to the lower jumper works. When I am descending faster than the jumpers below me, I have the best opportunity to observe what they are doing and have the best field of view to decide how to avoid conflict. There are a lot of great ideas out in the field. Suggesting lower jumpers attempt to yield to traffic above them is a really, REALLY bad idea. My suggestion to other jumpers - no disrespect intended - is to COMPLETELY ignore your advice.

now this is epic

Nearly every COVID death is preventable. He was correct in his 2022 statement. I posted the proof above, from the very state you were talking about. Young people - massive improvement; deaths don't even show up on the graphs any more for vaccinated people. Middle age people - factor of 12 reduction in deaths. Old people - again a factor of 12 reduction in deaths. So yes, if 11 out of 12 deaths can be prevented by vaccination, then nearly every death IS preventable. Based on the facts of what is actually happening, not what FOX News is saying. Your posts are a great example of how easy it is to mislead people with the right misinformation.

Don't feed the troll folks, as usual, he's either not bright enough to check out his own sources, or just doesn't care that he's lying. The Author is from this organisation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CO2_Coalition

Let no one claim that unrestricted big turns in the general canopy flight area are dangerous. It's so easy to blame the swooper but why wasn't the lower jumper looking up? This is 2022 and we've evolved beyond old thinking. No longer does the low man have the right of way: modern parachutes have rendered that old thinking obsolete. The reality now is that the low man is in the way and should defend themselves accordingly, pulling at 10 Grand for example. I have no doubt that the honorable DZO at this unfortunate facility can argue that they do a usually great job of separating HP flight from Unfortunate Flight according to USPA Standards. But the sad reality is that our Gods are weak and consequently many bad things happen.

What is it with you two? It seems like you both go to great extremes to get yourselves annoyed. Please do these back-and-forth one liners in PM's (or better yet just avoid them.)

Since we're on that subject. I'm not a fan of taping up pc handles, especially in base. It defeats one of the big advantages of the handle in my opinion; being able to grip it with the edges. I'm much more a fan of stuffing the handle with pipe insulation and holding in place with double sided tape. If you fall through cloud and the taped up handle gets wet...

MEGA seems better. Screw the Scots, Welsh, NIrish.

I've been preaching that for quite a long time now.

Good riddance to that fu#ker. He messed up the Olympics.Messed up any covid response.Messed up the economy. Bulldozed the rain-forest. Equally as bad as trump.

Decision altitudes should be adjusted to circumstances. Am I having a malfunction over the Ranch or Perris? Am I over water or trees? An aircraft emergency bail out at Eloy or Lost Prairie? Pull altitudes and decision altitudes vary. Hard deck also varies if I’m over hills like at Lost Prairie. Nothing like having a 1,000 ft hard deck over an 800 foot hill. We can’t rely on our electronic devices to save us. We need to train for the circumstances and handle malfunctions quickly.

Someone posted just yesterday that claims without unbiased citations in support are meaningless. I wonder who it was.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9715182/ https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2022/04/handguns-homicide-risk.html Need more citations? Google is filled with them. Or you could call BillyVance's family for their opinion.

If you have sincere suggestions, I recommend you (and everyone else) put your thoughts into an email and send it to Ron Bell, director of safety and training. I would also cc Michael Watkins, chair of the safety and training committee on the board. The vast majority of everything in the SIM, the governance manual, and the other documents published by USPA come from the field. We rely on this input and ideas from the membership to hone our documentation. It's a group effort. Thanks to everyone who shared their thoughts here. It makes all the difference in the world to know our membership and rating holders are engaged.

Probably more because the inherent stability (or lack of) in varying parachute planform designs is a pretty obscure and esoteric subject. It's not something many people are interested in. Except on here, of course.

From the USPA Skydiver's Information Manual: DECISION ALTITUDE: A predetermined altitude at which you must decide and act during an emergency. HARD DECK: A predetermined altitude above which an action must occur or below which an action must not occur. In rating courses, it indicates a minimum altitude by which a certain maneuver must be performed in order to get credit for the action. No need to guess or invent definitions when there are accepted ones already in use.

Really the same for all religions. Majority of followers are not devout and pick and choose which parts of the religion they wish to follow.