diverdriver

Derek, It's better to vote for fewer people than 8 if you are not sure. Your vote for another candidate can actually cancel out a vote for someone you really want. Chris Schindler

DiverDriver.....aka Random Task.....let me show you what I can do with my SHOE! sswswswswsswswswswsswswswswswsswswssw......WHAM!!!!!!

Hmmmm...... Here we go again...it's all MY fault. Uh huh. Yah yah.

I think the user is flakey....

Headed now where yet. They haven't set up the course for pilots to carry guns yet. I'm just going to the local shooting range and gun shop to get instruction on basic firearm stuff. The tactical stuff will be later. Chris

You mean chicks with big BOOBS?!?... In cockpits?!? Now that this thread has been succesfully hijacked.......we return you to your regularly scheduled post whoring.

I don't think you can go wrong with a Glock but I also think that they aren't for everyone. Some may like and need a bit more safety features. The Glock is pretty much a "Combat" pistol. Uh.....if someone breaks into the cockpit...it's gonna be a combat situation.

I'm looking at a Glock 31 but that's part of what the course is for. So I know enough to ask the right questions and get the right feeling for me. Chris

Yes, Glaser. Forgot the brand name. I've had a pretty steep learning curve on this as I was originally opposed to guns in the cockpit just after 9/11. I have since changed my view. I am going to take my first gun course some time next week before I buy my pre-second hand gun. Chris

Buzz Lightyear quote:

It's ok.....I just hit the "auto-pilot" button and that little guy inflates taking control.....no more problems.

You can carry silver tip bullets that "splatter" on impact. You can also carry a firearm that does not have as much velocity as others. There are options here that will still kill without doing catastophic damage to the aircraft. And do you think the airplane is a perfectly sealed tube now? That's incorrect. We have 2 big holes in the back of the cabin called "outflow valves". They open and close to maintain a certain cabin pressure. Punching holes in the hull IS undesirable but losing pressure as opposed to losing control of the aircraft totally is an acceptable risk. Chris

"Qualified to fly. Qualified to defend." It's not that we want guns in the cockpit and look forward to actually having to take a human life. But if someone wants my weapon of mass destruction (read airliner with thousands of pounds of flamable Jet A fuel) then I need the tools to try and prevent that from happening. Those that think only large airplanes are at risk are nuts. ALL flying aircraft can be used for terrorism. I'm not letting any secret out. Take a Cessna 206. Fill it with fuel. Then fly it into an open air stadium on a nationally televised football game. Makes no difference. NFL. College. Whatever. Even if they only kill say 100 people the effect is terror and the economy will suffer again. That's what they want. The killing of the people is just a means to an end. They want to destroy our way of life. So, since an airliner is a much more efficient tool of potential destruction we need the ability to keep control over the aircraft. If a passenger is used as a shield and we shoot them I'm sorry. But I did not create this situation. They could use that passenger as a shield whether I have a gun or not. Difference is, without the gun, they are most certainly going to have control of the aircraft. First line of defense is terminal security. X-ray machines, hand wands, and pat downs. Second line is security in the boarding areas. Look for any suspicious activity. Third line are the passengers. If there is an uprising, they need to fight back immediately en-mass. Fourth line is the cockpit door. It needs to be as strong and tamper proof as possible. Remember, it has to have some sort of holes in it to equalize pressure in case of an emergency depressurization. But a body should not be able to fit through these holes so as to defeat the locking mechanisms. And the LAST line of defense, after all the other lines have failed to prevent intrusion into the cockpit, is a HIGHLY trained, HIGHLY motivated pilot officer with a gun. The ONLY shooting I will do is if someone enters the threshold into the cockpit. I will not leave the cockpit to fight in the cabin. If they get my gun away from me and kill me and my First Officer then we lost. They were going to kill us anyway with a suicide attack by flying the aircraft into something anyway. The outcome is still the same. Guns in the cockpit is but another tool in an effort to BREAK the chain of events that could lead to another attack like 9/11. Nothing more. Chris Schindler Airline Pilot CRJ-200

You know, you are quoting stuff from another message board and posting it here. This really does seem like a personal attack. Maybe you could let this go here. Chris

YES, very, VERY long days! Yeppers! No time to talk!

Oh brother..... Yah, wave off.

Well, I'll tell you what I do but we might have different body types. This may not work for you. I'm 5'11" and weigh 150 pounds. Tall lanky poll. When break off comes I imediately start to flatten out my body to start floating. As I do this I turn 180 and pick a point on the ground to hold heading. Through the whole turn I start to straighten the legs. My arms are coming into a cross position by the time I'm reaching the 180. It gives maximum float while allowing me to start moving away. Very quickly as I start to move out the hands come to my side and even point down below me a bit. My shoulders roll forward as though I'm trying to put them on my ears. The chest gets cupped. My legs are now straight out and as the speed builds I can start to stick my butt up in a more de-arched position. My toes are pointed. Think of it as doing a "tippy toe" stance on the ground. Track for 5 seconds then throw (I mean really through) your arms forward and I almost "sit up" in the track to decelerate the forward motion fast. Reach back and pull the hacky and throw. Once released I go back to that hard de-arch, head high position to make sure I am finishing my deceleration. It takes practice and is not perfected overnight. Chris

A flat track is one that you move away from the formation but you do not go below level with them. That you stay "Flat" with the center. I see a lot of "tracking" where people dive straight down practically and think they have gone somewhere. All they did was lose a lot of altitude. When I track I usually see myself floating ABOVE the level of the formation. I don't have to track faster than anyone because I can track LONGER than they can. It will cover more ground. Chris Schindler

I think we are taking this a bit far. I think with education like this so people understand what is going on and telling them how much to count before launching (which includes your climbout, read, set, go) is all we need. I fly using a moving map GPS. It is a Garmin III pilot. I set it up to determine distance from the center of the landing area but that does NOT mean I will be flying directly over the middle of the landing area. Most of my jump runs in the summer (low winds aloft) are curved jumpruns. They are horse shoe patterns too. They can go down one side of the landing area and then turn to come back down the other. So setting up any display that shows distance from any point on the airport is almost useless to the jumper. What IS important is the groundspeed. That way you know how fast you are traveling away from the previous group. Once you know that (which is the useful thing to be displayed for the jumpers) you will be able to apply proper seperation. Computing your True Airspeed is nice to know but doesn't help the jumper directly. Knowing your exact groundspeed is the most helpful thing to the jumper. Chris Schindler www.diverdriver.com ATP/D-19012 FB #4125

Using an AAD is still pulling. You gonna require everyone to jump a Cypres then? The original part of what I was commenting on was that people say we should not have an age limit in the BSRs because there are other inherently dangerous activities that 16 year olds do. My arguement is that skydiving is way more inherently dangerous than driving a car. You are correct about the social acceptance of driving cars as not being inherently dangerous even though it is. I just think we need to take our collective heads back out of the sand because SKYDIVING IS DANGEROUS! (even with a cypres) I think USPA has every right to put an age limit in the BSRs. Do people jump that are younger than 16? Yep. And most of the ones I've seen are the DZOs kid or a JMs kid. Who are they going to sue? I think they have made a more reasoned decision on letting their child skydive than Joe Schmow off the street who bought their 13 year old a tandem jump. Does it belong in the BSRs? Yah, I think it does. It IS a safety aspect because the general public does not know enough about what skydiving is. They can not make a truly informed decision to let their 14 year old make a tandem or AFF (etc...) jump. There has to be a line and this is where it will be drawn. You don't like it? Then lobby your board members to change it. You guys can keep arguing semantics all day. I think I'll move on to something else now. Chris

Now, as for a standard printout I actually don't think you could put in enough variables into it to cover all possibilities. I think communication with basic education is what you need to get proper seperation. A chart may not keep up with flock dives and birdman suits, etc.....see what I mean? Chris Schindler www.diverdriver.com ATP/D-19012 FB #4125

Number nine....number nine...number nine....number nine.......

Um, I don't remember the last time I drove my car at 120 miles per hour. There ARE times where you could not use the brakes and still survive the impact. The car may not. I doubt there are any impacts that you can survive in skydiving without an act of God. Chris

DATA BASED ON 221200Z VALID 221800Z FOR USE 1700-2100Z. TEMPS NEG ABV 24000 FT 3000 6000 9000 12000 18000 24000 30000 34000 39000 BRL 3611 3623-05 3529-07 3555-07 3563-19 3579-29 349142 349849 348756 DBQ 3609 3620-05 3523-08 3648-08 3559-20 3579-29 349343 349849 348555 FWA 3424 3626-09 3622-11 3523-16 3322-28 3536-39 357641 355742 323643 JOT 3415 3622-08 3628-10 3535-14 3679-22 8602-31 851543 851049 358250 MKG 3521 3624-09 3624-11 3526-16 3536-28 3686-34 861443 359248 355547 Take this for example. I pulled it up for the Chicago area. It is valid on the 22 of the month at 1800Z. That is 12:00 Local. (The correction for Central Standard Time is GMT (zulu time) minus 6 hours.) It is for use at 11:00 am local to 3:00 pm local. Then I look at JOT for Joliet, IL. Across the top of the report are the altitudes of reporting. 3,000 6,000 etc. You would read the line JOT as 3,000 winds from 340 at 15 knots. 6,000 feet 360 at 22 knots temperature minus 8 degrees centigrade. 9,000 feet 360 at 28 knots temp. minus 10. 12,000 350 at 35 knots temp. minus 14. ETC..... Does that help? Chris Schindler www.diverdriver.com ATP/D-19012 FB #4125