ZigZagMarquis

G. MINIMUM OPENING ALTITUDES [E] Minimum container opening altitudes above the ground for skydivers are: 1. Tandem jumps–4,500 feet AGL 2. All students and A-license holders–3,000 feet AGL 3. B-license holders–2,500 feet AGL 4. C- and D-license holders–2,000 feet AGL *cough* Okay, okay, not that a D-License makes gravity not care... I've been know to "pull low for safety" sometimes myself... ...

I've see 8 and 12-way interlocking tubes lauched from a Twin Otter. I even once saw a "13-way" tube, which consisted of a 12-way interlocking tube with a little gal lieing in the middle, launched form a Twin Otter. Tubes are a lot of fun, but require a good dirt dive and jam-up practice on the ground so everyone knows what to do once in the airplane & so they don't kick or pull anyone's handles by mistake... ... hard helmets and AADs are a good thing to have if going tubular too...

Do RW! You get to track like your life depends on it... because it does... at the bottom of every RW jump!!

Well, there are some secrets us riggers are not allowed to divulge to the general public... ... but its not like we're endowed with every tid-bit of knowledge about all canopies, rigs, etc. when we get our rigger's ticket. I've known the proper way to measure a PD slider, as you describe, but I didn't know that until I had reason to ask PD and I learned. When I got my rigger's ticket, I was told by an ol' grey hair master rigger that's probably forgotten more about sport skydiving gear than ten of us put together will ever know, that a rigger's ticket is a license to learn, don't start thinking you know everything now, keep asking and learning. My words to what I think he meant, in part, was don't let the fact that you're now a "rigger" stop you from asking questions because you're afraid folks will be disappointed in you since you're a "rigger".

I do understand the desire to not jump canopies that fell like you just hit the ground when they open... That be as it may... I also don't understand the trend towards the opposite, being taken to the extreme, where some of the "shit hot", "cool" canopies "kids" today "gotta have" that open into a streamer that eventually clears. Yes, I've jumped a Spectre. I wouldn't always smile at that... kinda takes away some options if your down and dirty.

I recall hearing some pretty intersting stories from folks way down San-Dog way in California that used to jump at the DZ that was at Brown Field... right on the border between the U.S. and Mexico... about getting back your cutaway main and/or freebag that landed in Mexico... also... similar stories about jumpers getting back into the USA after a bad spot put them in Mexico. It may all have been BS, but fun to listen to.

Et all... can I get $20 on freeflychris? Can I watch you dump, at terminal, a Sabre (or other modern ram-air conopy of your choice) packed slider down?

Ummm... maybe its just me, but a 1200 foot opening is a bit more that a snivel... its more like a streamer that cleared...

Doh! I forgot that you young-in's have an affinity to have all those new fangled gizzmo's that tell you how fast the airplane is climbing, what altitude you got out at, how fast you fell in freefall, how long you were in freefall, when you opened, how many points you turned, where to adjust the spot to on the next load, plays music and packs your parachute for you...

Ummm... I hate to nit-pick... but... Usually folks track and THEN wave off before tossing their pilot chute... not wave off and track away. Maybe you just typed it backwards, sorry then. If you really did start your track at 5K... tracked for really 5 seconds... checked altitude (say 1 - 2 seconds)... and checked airspace again (say another 1 - 2 seconds)... do the math, there's no way you pitched at 4K, unless you were in a wingsuit. What am I getting at? I've been down this road with folks before... myself too ... where someone gets called out for pulling low and what do they usually say? Something like, "I checked altitude when I pulled and my altimeter said ABCD, so that's when was open" comes out their mouth. Bull! Not enless you already had your pilot chute out and in your hand and just let go of it. If you check altitude then wave & pull, figure that's another 1 - 2 seconds (at least) and at 200 ft/s that means your pilot chute was coming out about 200 - 400 ft lower then that altitude... add to that a snivel and you get my picture. Not a big deal if ABCD = 4000 ft... kind of a concern if ABCD = 2000 ft or lower. Again, IMO, I'd not recommend making radical packing changes based on a few openings. Also again, IMO, the original Sabre's rep as a hard opening canopy is somewhat unwarranted, but all canopies can give you a rouge opening from time to time that will make you see stars and later be laying on the couch drinking copious amounts of beer with a heating pad on your lower back trying to dull the pain... this can happen based on poor packing. Talk to the experienced folks, riggers and jumpmasters at your DZ about what's going on.

LMAO!!! Carey putting Anni out on a Static Line! I'd pay to see that!!

I talk to my canopy too sometimes during / just after opening... but it usually involves 4-Letter Words... Anyway, any idea how long, in terms of altitude, it took to open? Generally speaking, original Sabres (and "yes" its an original if its a Sabre 210 with double steering lines) are not known to be "snivel-ly" canopies... however... their rep as being "wack jobs" is also somewhat unwarranted too, IMO, but that's a different topic. Anyway, if its not taking like 1000 feet to open, I'd suggest not altering your packing technique too radically, but just putting somemore jumps on it. You may want to try not rolling the nose in so much, but, again, don't make big changes based on just a handful of pack-jobs / jumps, again, IMO.

Define... "it took a scary long time to inflate" ??? When you say..."the recommended rolling of the inner and outer 4 cells"... I'm guessing you mean this is a "legacy" Sabre and not a Sabre-2. When asking about packing an original Sabre, most folks are concerned about getting it to open slower & not faster.

Ditch the husband and the kid for a week... tell them you're going to visit relatives. Take the credit cards and the check book. Go down to Perris. Do some tunnel time. Go over to Jim Wallace's skydiving school, tell them your story... wear something low cut. Sit through fist jump course, do a recurrency jump (AFF Level 3 or 4?)... what ever they prescibe. Do a BUNCH of coach jumps and / or small ways the balance of the week. Order new gear from Square One... have it delivered to Square Two to save the taxes... before leaving at the end of the week.

A lot of folks have said quit doing Tandems... If you want to keep doing Tandems at all these places you plan to visit, okay, its your money, but at the same time you say cost is an issue? I don't follow your logic? You're worried about AFF being a bit more expensive at Perris vs. Elsinore (et all... I'm not sure if that's fact or fiction, just going with what the OP said), but you want to spend a bunch more money on Tandems for basically what amounts to "checking out" other DZs? I don't get it? You may want to rethink that one. As for wind tunnels, I'm fairly neutral about them. Great tool, obviously, but there are still lots and lots of folks skydiving today and still lots of folks learning to skydive without ever having set foot in a wind tunnel. If you really want to do AFF, welcome aboard. My 2 cents... you don't have to do it "right now", but get started on it sooner then later and commit to getting through the AFF progression in a timely manner. After you get off of AFF, get your own gear, get your A-License and get a few jumps under your belt... then a whole new world of skydiving opens up where you can go visit other DZs. In SoCal, the opportunities for that are abundant. Good Luck!

Thoughts... I've gotten open and found myself beak to beak with a glider... more then once... I just buried the right toggle.

I've got 3 or 4 Beech 18 jumps. It really wasn't bad, but there were only like 6 of us on the plane. I've got a few more then that out of DC-3s, maybe between a dozen or two, but now-a-day's a lot of DZs are classifying DC-3s as "specialty aircraft" and charging a premium rate to go jump them. And I've got no gutt-gear jumps. I'm really glad y'all old grey hairs jumped that scary shit "back in the day".

Ummm... Strat... wouldn't it really be a small door Beech - 18 or Load-Stall plus gutt-gear to "do it up right?"

Being a girl jumper, that meant I got to learn how to pack rounds without anyone holding tension Wendy W. Yeah, but I'd bet a pay-check that skydiving "back then" was no different then "today"... as in... I'm sure as one of the few gals on the DZ, you had LOTS and LOTS of men willing to give you help packing...

Maggie still knows how to point...

Et All, When / Where is mama getting hitched!!!?? I hear there is going to be free beer there!!!! Everyone who crashes at least put on a clean skydiving T-shirt!

Hmmmm... maybe... but you could circumvent it by buying BEER for your "100th"!

.... hmmm... need to figure out a way to vote again... works for the Democrats!

18 more "yes" votes and we'll have 100 folks that want to pie mama!

... well... yeah... I didn't say having a brightly colored main was "full - proof" when coming to help find it after a cutaway... just meant to imply that it might be more useful then way "desert camo" for us jumping in the Mojave Desert or "Euro camo" for y'all jumping in the pine barrons...