Westerly

More changes presumably? Of course they are going to change things. Why wouldent they? Change is necessary to advance the sport. What is the alternative? Never update the BSRs or consider better ways to do anything? Well that is how it works at literally every BOD meeting for any organization I have ever seen. What exactly do you expect the USPA to do? There is no date, time or location at any point in the future that will work for everyone. Accommodating everyone's schedule is an impossible task which is why no organization does it. They could maybe set up a public VTC where everyone could voice a concern. That could be useful, but even that is rare. I dont think I've ever seen a BOD do that. At most, some will film it for viewing later.

I bought my altimeter and helmet right after I finished AFF. I got my first rig when I had about 50 jumps (received in the mail, not ordered).

The USPA requires it. The rest of your typing was nothing more that thin personal attacks and not worth a response. Except people have repeatedly claimed the USPA does not enforce any of its rules, and if it's not enforced then it's not really a requirement now is it?

YUP Yanks have no clue how good they have it in regards Petrol costs. It cost me $110 -$120 AUD per week to fill my vehicleYou can thank your government for that. The oil isint really any more expensive in AUS or the EU, but the government taxes the shit out of it so most of what your paying is taxes and not the cost of the fuel itself.

Or you could just use rubber bands like most people. The tube stows always worried me a bit because they are much stronger than a rubber band. It's pretty well known a good PC can easily break a rubber band, but a tube stow is less clear. It seems like a tube stow could increase your chances of a bag lock if one bight of line were to wrap inside another.

It should be visible fine on a mudflap since it won't be facing the sky. Unless the sun is low and you're flying towards it. $100 for Mission is a good deal. Yes, it's much more powerful and capable than Flysight, but the GPS update rate is only 1Hz (vs. 5Hz). For wingsuit performance measurements, I have an app called L/D Vario, but the watch (or phone) needs to be mounted on a vane like so: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_iPSSV-5qY No, I didn't write the pro version. There's no wide interest in all this, so I basically created the basic functionality for myself and called it a day. (I do use it on every jump, and it does what I need.) Psyched to try your app, I ended up picking up the Nixon Mission today but I dont see your app in the Play Store. I searched for Smart Altimeter on the watch and there are no apps named that in the store. When I search for the app on the Internet on my phone, I am able to find it in the Google Play Store. I signed into my Google account and when I try to add it to my device it says "this item is not compatible with your device." I looked up L/D Vario and I get the same incompatibility error message on my phone and computer. I have the latest version of the watch software OS installed (Android 8.0.0). When I go to settings, the watch says I have the latest version of the OS. A screenshot is attached.

I never really understood the need for skydivers to have liability insurance. Liability against what? The scenario I was given when I asked was if someone pounded into a car on landing, damaged it and the owner sued the skydiver, the USPA's insurance would cover the tab. That sounds like an exceedingly rare scenario. Like, so rare it's probably never happened. In any case, umbrella insurance costs around the same as the USPA membership, but covers all your activities, not just skydiving, and is much more broad in scope allowing for far greater coverage. If you want to protect yourself from liability while skydiving, there are certainly better products out there. Anyway, can anyone cite an actual example of when a skydiver used the USPA's liability insurance benefit? Rare?? Hardly!!! I can guarantee you that there have been many, many cases just like you describe. Here are a few: Skydiver pulls up to a new DZ, parks his van in the parking lot. Soon after, one of their students lands on top of the van, crushing the roof. USPA insurance paid. Skydiver has his car parked in another DZ parking lot, experienced jumper goes through back window, USPA insurance pays. Skydiver has his car parked behind the DZ fuel tanks so that to hit his car a jumper would have to fly above the tanks, go through a 20', 2", steel vent pipe to get to the car. Skydiver did just that, USPA insurance did not pay as jumper was not a member. A group of 6 skydivers hanging on the side of a King Air blow the exit and one destroys a $5,000 flap. USPA paid. How can I be sure that all of the above actually happened? Easy, it all happened to me. And, as a member of the Membership Committee, I have seen all the accidents that USPA insurance has paid for over many years and I could name a lot more. BTW, there is no other insurance available to a skydiver that will pay for the damage he causes, and if not for the availability of this insurance many DZs would not exist at public airports, and without the USPA demo insurance, there would be very few demos. The insurance alone is a bargain that is worth your entire membership fee. The cost of the insurance to USPA varies, it has been about $250,000 per year, this year we have had a carrier change and it went down to $240,000. That works out to about $6.00 per member, per year, or about the cost of a burger at McDonald's. Mike Mullins USPA National Director Cool, thanks for the info. Interesting to know.

So the USPA requiring a few belly jumps before you can get your C license infringes on your American freedom? hahaha. ok. You do realize you are not required to get a C license, right? You dont even need a license at all. You can just be a self-supervised solo student forever if you want. I know two people with over 5000 jumps that dont have a C license. One has an A license, the other B. I think the changes the USPA made are not enough. They should have gone even further. It's a ridiculous assertion that we should be lowing the standard because it's too burdensome already. All of the license levels, A - D, are not that difficult. Considering a lack of competency in this sport can quite literally get you (and possibly someone else) killed, we should be finding ways to raise the bar, not lower it. I think the USPA needs to make the license requirements for B - D even harder as they are still pretty easy.

When the fear leads to panic or the fear is so great that it overrides your training. If crap hits the fan and you need to execute your EPs or deal with some other form of emergency, you need to be able to do it decisively, quickly and correctly. Panicking during an emergency will make things far worse and possibly lethal. Skydiving is not for everyone. It is what it is. I would not skydive for someone else. You have to do it because you want to do it. At least your tried. My significant other wont even attempt AFF. As others have said, if you decide to try it later, the sky will always be waiting.

I never really understood the need for skydivers to have liability insurance. Liability against what? The scenario I was given when I asked was if someone pounded into a car on landing, damaged it and the owner sued the skydiver, the USPA's insurance would cover the tab. That sounds like an exceedingly rare scenario. Like, so rare it's probably never happened. In any case, umbrella insurance costs around the same as the USPA membership, but covers all your activities, not just skydiving, and is much more broad in scope allowing for far greater coverage. If you want to protect yourself from liability while skydiving, there are certainly better products out there. Anyway, can anyone cite an actual example of when a skydiver used the USPA's liability insurance benefit?

I like my Nixon Mission a lot, it's a very chunky watch, like a little tank. It has this unique feature - mic lock (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wa43HDmKpQc) - that we might never see again in a smartwatch, since it's getting a lot of critique from regular users - "why do I need to open this little door with a lever to just say 'ok google'?" But for us, it's god-sent, since it gives the barometer unblocked access to ambient pressure. And it measures pressure every 6 milliseconds! The screen is not so well visible in the sun. It's ok under canopy when wearing it on the arm, since it's not reflecting the sky so much. Battery life is good enough; about 40 hours with watchface always on. When using as an altimeter, it's enough for a jump day. Mission has a weak spot: charging pins, they rust. I had to send mine for warranty repair. Now I try to limit the exposure to sweat by wiping the pins more often or by wearing it over a sweatband. I wonder how visible the screen would be when wingsuiting. I plan to pick up one of these watches to mount on my mud flap when wingsuiting and I am curious how the Nixon would be for that. I found one locally for $100 on Facebook so I figured I might try one out. Considering how powerful these watches are, it seems like they could serve as a replacement for a Flysight. I would think a modern watch is much more powerful than the hardware components in a Flysight. So the main piece left would be the software. Did you end up writing a pro version of the software that would allow for logging, charting, ect of altitude and speed?

I had to repeat cat B as well. It's not a big deal. Most students fail at least one level. Some students repeat the same level multiple times. I saw a student pass every level until cat D which he had to repeat some 6 times. I also saw a student pass every level until cat F which she had to repeat four times. It is what it is. You'll be fine I am sure. The extra money does suck, but AFF is cheap compared to what you will be spending once you graduate. If you do the math on 200 jumps. 190 x $25 per jump = $4750 Rig rental fees until you get your first rig = maybe $300 - $800 depending on how long you wait. AFF = $1600 + $300 or so for cat G and H jumps rig, helmet, altimeter, jump suit, license fee, USPA membership, ect. ect = $4000 (cheap crappy gear) - $10,000 (all brand new) Fuel driving to the DZ and back for 200 jumps = depends, but say $200 - $800 depending on many factors. You're looking at around $10,000+ for your first 200 jumps.

I would recommend Moto, since the R is not easily readable in direct sun. With the R, you take the plastic back off (4 screws), then you'll see the membrane on it covering the breather hole. Yes, if you run the app continuously, it won't last a day since the always-on screen consumes a lot of juice. It will last several jumps if quitting the app between the jumps. I only fly wingsuit, so can't say about belly or freeflying, but my watches show pretty much the same altitude as Viso. How do you like your Mission? Is the screen visible in the sun? How's the battery life?

Apple products (iphone 6/higher and iwatch) only sample pressure once a second. This pales in comparison to Android WearOS smartwatches that have fantastic sample rates: Gold: Nixon Mission 166Hz Silver: LG G Watch R* 90Hz Bronze: Moto 360 Sport 25Hz Other WearOS devices with barometer: LG Watch Sport (10Hz) LG Watch Urbane Huawei Watch (20Hz) Casio Pro Trek Smart Hugo Boss Touch MontBlanc Summit ZTE Quartz Apple watch (and iphone for that matter) is not suitable for measuring rapidly changing altitude. --- * needs to have the waterproof membrane be punctured with a needle to let the quick pressure changes in I was thinking of getting one as a secondary altimeter since I can find a few on your list for $60 online used. At the moment it looks like the LG G R is the same price as the Moto 360 online. Which of the two would you recommend and how do you puncture the waterproof membrane that you're talking about? Someone else mentioned that his watch would turn off in the airplane and the battery did not last all day. Have you had those issues with your Moto 360? I am curious as to how accurate these watches are in freefall since that's what I'd be using them for.

Smaller wingsuits are far more readily able to be flown with more aggressive canopy combinations. The larger and more aggressive wingsuits become, the more critical a low aspect ratio 7 cell is for a reduction in the incidence of deployment and opening issues. . I was curious what about the larger wingsuits causes this. Is it the actual increase in surface area? If you measure the surface area of a smaller suit like the Swift and compare it to a bit larger one like the ATC, it's not hugely different from a mathematical prospective. Maybe a 20- 25% difference? However, someone once told me that the issue is not as much the increase in surface area while flying as it is that if you open in line twists, a larger wing means you can start to flip around aggressively adding severely to the number of twists in the lines whereas a smaller WS wont do that as much. So I guess one argument as the larger surface area creates a larger burble which affects the opening and the other argument is the larger wing means once line twists occur, an unstable deployment will be exacerbated by a large wing amplifying the number of twists in the lines as you spin around. Which would you say is more correct?

I recently got into wingsuiting and during my FFC I used the Bonehead mudflap altimeter mount with a Galaxy. It worked fine, but I dont like analog altimeters that much (unless it's a Stella or Alt Track) Anyway, I have a Viso2 on a wrist mount. I am trying to figure out if there is way I could reuse that. The rig is not being used only for WS. I want to be able to do a WS jump, pull the WS off and then hop on a 4-way jump or something like that. As such, I dont know that the Viso pillow that L&B makes will work as it would be a PITA to switch the Viso between mounts all the time. So is there a way I can reuse the wrist mount and mount that on a mudflap or chest mount somehow, or should I just buy a second Viso or Stella and use that for WS jumps?

Join the military, become a parachute rigger and you'll pack more parachutes in a year than most riggers do in five. I once watched as a tour group came through the military paraloft pulling all the reserves on all the sport rigs. There were about 20 guys on the tour and the 'tour guide' said "hey, any of you ever pull the ripcord on a parachute?" Everyone said no, so they all strapped on a sport rig and pulled the reserve. They sat the 20 rigs down, walked out and then two guys had to repack 20 reserves. I also once watched as 60 Airborne guys came in with their giant rounds from a static line jump. They all piled them up in the loft making a massive pile the size of a semi-truck. Then three riggers spend the next few days repacking all of them. I asked the riggers how often they had to pack all of those rounds and they said basically every week.

Sounds like one of the springs broke. I had one break on my first jump. Just get new ones. I replaced the stock ones with the white 'freefly' springs/ bands which are a bit stronger and I havent had an issue and the helmet is still easy to open even with the stronger springs.

I have a Mars M2. Also, I dont want to repack the reserve just to open it to get to the interface. :( Anyway, here is a video of some of the openings. On all the jumps I threw the PC at 4000' (had my hand on it and pulled it right as the Viso said 4.00). Both the Viso and AAD reported deployment altitudes around 3200' and I was around 2800 - 3000' by the time the slider came down. However, that's impossible as if you count the frames in the video, the entire deployment process takes 5 seconds or less on every deployment. So on one hand I have the Viso and AAD which very dependably report very similar deployment altitudes on ever jump and on the other hand we have basic math which says a 5 second opening cannot take 1000' to open--it's impossible unless I was doing 190 MPH+ when I opened (which I wasent). https://youtu.be/gVSTEILsIMM

And... many DZs have modeified their exit orders from the "standard" exit order, and for good reasons. . What are those reasons?

Exactly. There is no free market. You can either join, or not be able to jump at the vast majority of DZ's in the US. The USPA did this by design. Except you've repeatedly said that the USPA does not enforce any of its rules. So what would happen if a GM DZ allowed a non-member to jump? You said they dont enforce the rules, so the logical answer would be that nothing would happen so why bother? Funny side note. The other week I checked into a new DZ. They asked to see my USPA card but dident bother looking at my reserve packing card or inspect my rig in any way... This was a pretty well-known DZ that has a ton of fun jumpers too.

OK a great opportunity here. Go ahead and contact the USPA about this violation. Then report back on the results and what the USPA does. I'll use my prognostic abilities here... The USPA will do exactly... Nothing. Maybe call the DZ, but all that is going to do is out YOU as a troublemaker. I don't disagree with you here. If the USPA enforced the rules I wouldn't see this crap in the first place. I don't pretend that the USPA actually enforces their rules regularly. I've seen enough affiliated DZs doing unsafe stuff to know they don't. But I have also seen many DZs reference the BSRs and enforce provisions of the BSRs. I have seen people get grounded for failing to follow the BSRs. So I guess my point is some safety is better than no safety. The ideal situation would be for the USPA to step up and start kicking to the curb DZs that don't follow the rules, but completely dissolving it entirely certainly wont make DZs safer, that's for sure.

Well perhaps if the change is about international competitors which represent a small proportion of USPA members then you should consider something that they pay for to meet any international requirement rather than simply changing the requirements for everyone else. Instructors pay additional amounts every year as do pro rating holders then why not competitors, Shouldn't the idea of coaches be specific to the disciplines? (Example - Someone with 100 jumps most of which are freefly shouldn't be coaching in another discipline they know nothing about such as CRW for example). It is. The coach rating in the USPA ISP only focuses on categories F, G and H of the ISP. At some drop zones, it's only G and H as they integrate F into AFF. Categories F, G and H cover very specific tacks--namely, tracking after breakoff, taking docks on your belly, changing fall rates, executing a swoop and dock and a few basic types of unlinked exits. That's most of what a coach does (a coach can teach the general sections of the first jump course too technically). The USPA coach rating is not intended to certify coaches in other disciplines like wingsuiting, freeflying, ect. It's really only intended for people who want to help self-supervised students finish up the final tasks of their A license, and even then the Coach can only sign off on a few items. They cannot even sign off on any of the canopy control practice items in categories F, G and H. Only an instructor can even though the canopy control tasks are basic things that all licensed skydivers should know.

Again, I am just shocked people really care. I am going to bet that with the exception of canopy pilots and Crew dogs (I have done both) anyone that meets the other requirements will have the new ones. And I admit that the fact AFF counts is just stupid. ***The USPA should be focused on creating standards that enhance safety - particularly in the realm of canopy flight - and less worried about international competition You need to read the CHARTER of the USPA. You can read the Constitution here: https://uspa.org/Portals/0/files/Man_GovMan.pdf It specifically mentions competitions. So like it or not, competitions are part of the USPA. I am going to break it to you. The USPA does not care about you. Not one damn bit. It is not a feeling you are getting, it is a fact that they have shown over and over again. Rig manufacturers make "freefly" friendly rigs that now don't open in time according to the STC... USPA does nothing about it. AAD makers complain that the pull altitude is too low to allow them to set the AAD's to fire higher, USPA jumps and raises the min pull altitudes so the AAD makers can cover up for the rig makers no longer meeting TSO standards. In every case where it is skydiving company vs individual members... You are GOING to be ignored. Look at the USPA website, they claim this is a volunteer organization... But then they require group members to only let members jump. What do YOU as a member get by a DZ being a group member? Jack shit. The USPA gave a "safety" award to a guy that was fined over and over for not doing the maintenance on his planes. What does happen is the USPA gets to play both sides. See they make the DZ join as a group member for basically, advertising. The group member DZ gets to say they are members of the USPA and the USPA will direct people interested in skydiving to the DZ. Look on the first page of the USPA website: "Learn about the methods to make a first jump and find USPA Group Member Dropzones near you." Ah, then the USPA makes the Group member DZ's sign a pledge. Part of that pledge is that they will only let USPA members jump there! They have created their own monopoly. Sure, you can not join the USPA, but then you now can't jump at most DZ's The Group member program is the BIGGEST line of crap ever. The individual member gets exactly NOTHING from the program and it makes you join if you want to jump at most DZ's... But the USPA KNOWS that if they drop the requirement that most individuals will drop their USPA membership. Long story short, unless you are a student, instructor, or a competitor, the USPA is worthless for you, and the USPA KNOWS it. So they make you join to be able to jump. So yeah, it is true, the USPA does not care about you, the individual member. They just gave 125K dollars to a museum no one really wants, while crying they don't have any money. So what's the better alternative? Dissolve the USPA completely and let DZs do whatever they want, however they want? Even USPA affiliated DZs often do unsafe stuff. Even at drop zones explicitly known to be safety-eccentric DZs with many rules and tight oversight, I still see people do unsafe things. Just the other day I was at a USPA affiliated DZ that openly states it's very safety focused and one of the instructors ordered the exit order to be one wingsuiter out first, followed by two high pulls, then my 2-way freefly group followed by the tandems. I asked him why in the hell he thought that was a safe exit order. His response was that he wanted the wingsuiter out first to 'get out of the way' and then him and his friend doing a high pull because they wanted to be 'out of the way of the tandems'. I explained to him that he is at a USPA drop zone and has on official obligation to follow the BSRs regardless of what he thought was convenient or whatever other BS and putting out a wingsuiter and high pulls before a freefly group is pretty stupid. He responded to me was that the exit order 'doesn't really matter anyway'. Yea, okay. The point is even with the USPA many (if not most) drop zones still regularly do stuff that is unsafe. I cant imagine how bad it would be with no oversight at all.

Formation Skydiving which is apparently the new-age term for RW. FS = belly jumps, FF = freefly jumps.