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not true. They (at least here in Iowa) they take a picture of the plate. The owner gets the ticket. And the courts have upheld it here. That is the law in Ohio as well, but a Cleveland law firm is taking a new position to court. Nobody that leases a car is the legal owner. The leasing company, or a holding firm is. Should be interesting to watch. Tom B

Find something to do on the way up. Get one of the bald guys to tattoo a tic-tac-toe frame on his head, then play with a grease pencil. but I am the bald guy... Then be a team player and get the tattoo. I am working on joining you. Maybe five more years. Tom B

Find something to do on the way up. Get one of the bald guys to tattoo a tic-tac-toe frame on his head, then play with a grease pencil. Tom B

Like my close friend Bozo, who also replied, I have been doing the back thing in the sport for a long time. It is an individual decision, but there is a lot you can do to help yourself if you decide to continue in the sport. You can can go with a larger canopy than you might otherwise. You may be the best canopy pilot on earth, but when things go wrong, a bigger one is more forgiving. Select a canopy known to have less opening shock. Choose the days you jump carefully. Do you really need that jump so badly as to be out in high and changing winds? Your biggest protector will be use of judgement with each jump, but your physical condition helps too. Do the exercises they advise for your spine every day. I elected to not become a tandem master because it simply is much harder on the spine. I quit S/L jumpmastering because doing so in a 182 puts a lot of stress on the spine. Cameras are getting lighter every day, and your problem is lumbar, not cervical, but still they complicate things. Personally I found packing harder on my lumbar spine than jumping, but know that if you let someone else do it, that you live with however they wadded it up and shoved it into the container. Finally, I strongly recomend a book to anyone with back problems. It is "Do You Really Need Back Surgery" by Aaron Filler. He is a CA neurosurgeon who specializes in the most complicated cases. I realize you have alread had your surgery, but he does a great job of explaining things that can help avoidng more surgery in your future. It is something like $15 on Amazon.com. Tom B

I think they have a very good team this year. But the reality is that money drives a lot of this, and they simply don't generate it. In last year's Orange Bowl, they were still trying to sell tickets in Cincinnati December 31st. And the game's tv share was lousy too. It takes a long time to create a fan base willing ot spend big bucks in mass numbers. It requires a football tradition, and UC doesn't have one. Yet. Tom B

I used to travel to Germany quite a bit. I have to admit they are far more disciplined drivers than Americans. I had to laugh my first trip there however. Some of their traffic signals gave a yellow light "warning" that it is about to turn from red to green. Do not just casually drive through an intersection there as green turns yellow, for someone in the cross street is already revving up that big Mercedes and rolling. Also, they quite seriously demand an open left lane to pass in. Once I was in an autobahn traffic jam with at least a mile of stopped cars in front of me blocking all lanes. But the guy behind me sat there blinking his lights and occasionally honking, demanding that I change lanes so he could pass. I have no idea where he thought I could go, or even where he could after I did. Tom B

I have no idea where you drive, but if you do that near any of the large American cities I have lived in, four or five cars enter the space between you and the car in front of you. Since they always agressively fill that space, it is simply impossible to stay two seconds away from the car in front of you. All that happens if you try is a whole lot of dangerous lane changing by others, and no two second interval whatsoever. Tom B

And when you slam on those brakes, and the idiot behind you doesn't notice in time, and it causes a multi-car accident with a fatality, how will you feel then? His riding your ass is wrong no doubt. But a deliberate decision to slam on one's brakes in busy traffic is just plain nuts. Is your anger at him worth the risk of a huge accident, and someone even dying? If someone crowds you a bit in approaching a big way, are you going to take him out too, resulting in both of you funneling the formation base? Tom B

It has to be Sbozo! Tom B

Would you rethink that, given the significant number of people out there with completely open and unsecure wireless routers? I know... that is the first thing to fix. But as my freshman chemistry professor tried to explain, a little knowledge can be a very dangerous thing. Tom B

In frustration I did that on a work computer once and the network security people went nuts, describing all kinds of scenerios that could happen with people wandering our network. Tom B

Gee... And I thought rec.skydiving was dead. Hell it just moved. Tom B

Where can I get a video of the stalled, upside down CASA from the Richmond Boogie a few years back? It was on Real TV or a similar show. Thanks. Please reply to tombirdwell@aol.com. My account here has some problems right now. Thanks. Tom Tom B

This reply is not so much to Alex or the others as a general comment. I had a major spinal military accident in 78, damaging disks L3 to S1, breaking three vertebra, etc. Back then it was weeks of traction, not screws. There is no doubt that living with back issues is not fun. But having lived with it for 30 years, I have seen all kinds of interventions, operations, and gizmos come and go, and most end up with major downsides not so many years later. Sometimes there simply is no choice but surgery. I ended up with one. But I have avoided several others, and am very glad I did. Today I have no metal hardware, and that is a plus. If you can get away with it, live with it. Exercise, weight loss, discipline, and acceptance of some limits goes a long way. Regardless of what kind of surgery you consider, consequences of long term scar tissue is a very serious concern. That I know and promise you. Again, sometimes surgery is the only real alternative, but give more conservative paths a real try first. Be patient. It has worked for me for 30 years, 1,600 jumps, two kids, and a pretty full life. tom Tom B

Number two? I don't think so. Mine go back to 79. Tom B

Oh, one more thing. Remember the first jump classes then? Monday through Friday every evening, then a jump on Saturday if weather went well and we had aircraft?. In addition to all the jump and safety stuff, everyone learned to pack their own rigs, and did so for their very own first jumps. Can you imagine that today in all the AFF and Tandem mills? Tom B

Thanks for all the info guys. Yes I remember Al Pohl using the paper grocery sack for a deployment bag, and just stuffing his suspension lines in the tray of his rig. Who could say no? After all he was our ASO then then if memory serves. Anybody remember the kid who got bit by the rattlesnake when collecting his canopy after his first jump? I can't recall his name. In my logbook somewhere, along with the lost pictures. Gary Lash? Now there is a memory. Anybody remember the day about 9K when all the lights and buzzers went off, he went ashen and yelled at us to get the hell out NOW? Easy for us, as we had parachutes. Seems the trany lost all oil pressure and he was left hoping to get it back on the ground before it seized up and inertia seperated the rotor and engine from the airframe. That ended that day of jumping. How about the bad spot that put us all landing in the ammo dump, south of the DZ, just inside the electric fence? I was on a 28' 7TU then. I remember on the way down thinking that if I didn't get electrocuted on the fence, that there were drugged up privates there with real guns and ammo, probably deciding we were commies, and cheerfully ready to shoot us all. When I had about 100 jumps, Pohl and some other wizzards planned a cross country jump perfectly. 10 miles out, on a PC, and I landed in the peas. I must have weighed less then. I caught up with Bruce Funk maybe 20 years ago in Germany, where he then worked as a contractor for DOD. Not sure where he is now. Bruce was from the Chicago area. About 10 years ago I was jumping at Skydive Chicago and called Bruce's ex-wife Marlice to come out for a beer. I started to give her directions to the DZ. She started laughing. Turns out the farm Roger Nelson bought for his DZ there was literally Bruce Funk's family farm. Small world. Like I said in the other posts, if anyone has any pics they are willing to email, I would greatly appreciate it. So many great memories. Blue Skies guys, Tom Birdwell tombirdwell@aol.com Tom B

"If I'm not mistaken Tom Birdwell used to jump with that crew, I know he was stationed there, got hurt in a jeep roll over. He still jumps today some. " Just for the record Mr. Cooper, We didn't roll the jeep over, we jumped out of it while driving across the impact area, after smoke started pouring out from around a .50 cal can of C4 and caps. We (EOD team) carried them for daily use. Turned out to just be that the can had grounded out a range control FM radio electrical wire, missing a 25 cent fuse. Murphy lives. Those were the good old days. Tom B

To all former Ft Hood skydivers. If any of you have pics from there that you are willing to share and email or snail mail to me, I would greatly appreciate them. All my pictures of those days were lost in a PCS long ago. Thanks to all for the memories, and have a great Thanksgiving. I will fix my settings here soon, but please use the contact info below. Jumping at Hood, with you guys, was one of the greatest privileges of my life. :) Tom Birdwell 6031 Bendel Drive Middletown, OH 45044 tombirdwell@aol.com (513) 539-7411 Tom B

Yes, I well remember the Ft Hood club in 76. Don McGillicuty, Al Pohl, Bruce Funk and more. Checking 10 reserves out from salvage, cutting five of them in half, turning the 10 half parachutes back in and keeping the other five off the books. Putting a hole in the oil pan of my 69 Z 28 at the creek washout. Jumping with General John Singlab, the guy later fired for saying Pres Carter's troop cuts in Korea were stupid and dangerous. 10 hours of Huey blade time per week. Having a bad spot and landing in the ammo dump, knowing there was a private down there with real bullets who will shoot us. I wonder where everyone is now. Tom Birdwell Tom B

I worked on the engine incident materials evaluation side for quite some time. There is no way to hide something like this. At a major airport you can bet there were Pratt and probably Rolls personnel there, with cameras. And the FAA will round up every single image and interview everyone in the valley that was even slightly involved. That was a pretty old engine. Newer more efficient models came out well over a decade ago, hell almost two. The materials in these engines are very sensitive to harsh machining. A little too much pressure on a drill, grinder, or ream, a part dropped, or a poor inspection at rebuild can all contribute, during manufacture or rebuilding. In the DC10 crash at Sioux City where a similar engine's fan disk failed, the cause was found to be a long growing crack in the disk, with FPI penetrant still detectable along half the crack, meaning it went right through United's inspection with that crack on it. After that, Pratt and Rolls were both banging the drum that this was a GE design problem, until months and a year later both had similar uncontained failures. All were later attributed to grain structure changes that previously were never known to exist in titanium, in effect creating very hard crack origination sites in the disks. Turbine disks are not the same materials obviously because of the temperatures, but the same principles apply. Quality manufacture, quality repair, and quality inspection are essential. Turbine blades themselves suffer creep growth in operation. As they grow, they are abraded by a ring at their outer perimeter. After enough time they are welded to restore that zone. Those weld zones can fail and unbalance the disk. The dovetail of the disk could have failed resulting in a massive mess. The disk itself could have been abused or just poorly inspected at the last tear down. There are so many potential causes for this at this point that it is not worth speculating. One thing is certain however. This will go into the calculation for approval of ETOPS, which is the reliability calculation system that permits twin engine aircraft to fly long distances over water. The fact that it was uncontained is another issue, as that was the actual cause of the Sioux City Crash, when debris cut hydraulic lines for the tail surfaces. It will be a while before this is sorted out. Tom B Tom B

I seriously doubt that even 10% of our membership would ever visit a skydiving museum. None of our membership has access to the database of members. Our organization does things all the time for subsets of the membership, on things that other members don't want their money spent on. I don't know if this has enough support to justify it. But simply having some members that don't like it is not sufficient reason to blackball the project. Tom B Tom B

While I understand the frustration of not having found the answer, that is a better situation than having verified a bad answer. Good luck. Tom B

Well it seems to make more sense than using my dues money to prop up the Group Member program. How much went to creating the database and software so DZO's can go on the web and determine if I am a member. Oh wait, that increases membership and dues, and makes things convenient for DZO's. Sorry, I should have known better than to make that comparison. My bad. While the animation would be nice, I would happily settle for just having the formations and the ability to place them in the proper order of the dive. Seriously, how much of our money is lost due to blown dives that people didn't fully understand, or remember? When the development cost is spread over the broad membership, and the benefits are made freely available to the membership, it seems to me to be an activity with payoff. Tom Birdwell

Are there any programs for PDA's/Palm Pilots to use for designing and organizing RW dives? It would be really handy to have one showing the jump's formations, and even the transitions between points. You could put a hell of a lot of formations in a PDA, and make designing skydives a lot easier. Even a low cost PDA could hold hundreds of them, organized in folders based on the number of jumpers. Got 5 people? Just open the 5 person folder and scan them. I realize there are already hard-copy dive planners, but they don't let you choose and arrange the formations in your dive's order. A color PDA would allow each jumper to easily see his position and movements. You could even take it onboard the aircraft and review the dive on the way up. BTW, this is the kind of thing that USPA could/should do, and then release the programs to the membership for our use. With 30,000 or so members, there should be funding available to do so, and it would be the kind of activity that would demonstrate USPA's support of skydiver needs, not just those of group members. USPA has developed software and web applications specifically for group members. It is reasonable to expect them to do similar efforts for mainstream members. Tom B