lurch

Hell. Last vertical challenge I attended I had to ditch the S-Bird in favor of Purple Mike's P2. Fallrate was way high, forward speed rather low, big suit was washing all over the place even with my wings behind my back. I can fly anything, under any conditions, but trying to force that suit to do the job would have just been stupid. The only way to hold that slot was to fly with armwings completely shut down and my tail squeezed almost entirely shut. Looked like crap and flew worse. Like driving a car on 3 flat tires. If I'd insisted on continuing that way I would have ruined the event. It only took two tries for me to ditch the big suit with no hesitation. Granted, I'd have liked the whole formation to jack it up a bit since higher forward speed and lower fallrate would make the whole flock work better in addition to making it easier on me, but you work with what you've got, not what you'd like to have, and Mike's P2 was the right tool for the job. Now can we please, please outgrow that snooty elitist "I'm too good to bend my legs a little to fly with others" routine? Its getting old. I'm 135 lb and can sustain mid-20's as long as I damn well please. If I insisted on only ever flying flat and wide and legs out I'd be flying alone. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Well, ever since Justin stopped jumping here, people have been telling me I should restart my school again the way I used to have it before. None of this would be happening without them. They just said come on, we'll help you do it, and the team just sort of formed itself. I'm going to leave the promotional stuff to them for the most part from here on out because I feel like a dork when I try to do it, and they're better at it. Jeff, Rick and Andreea bring organization expertise and video skills I lack so this isn't going to be my school, its -our- school. Here goes... -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

By popular demand, Skydive Pepperell's wingsuit school is being re-founded by its original creator and a new team of dedicated pilots. Our mission: to promote safe wingsuit flight. To teach others to fly as we do, so they may know our joy. To spread the light, and look out for one another. We are: Rick Hough Jeff Donohue Brian Caldwell Andreea Olea Justin Pabis Matt Veno We offer basic one-on-one first flight courses, introductory followup coaching, and instruction in advanced performance techniques including speed, distance, time, acrobatics, and the all-important flight planning and navigation. Customized lessons on the student's topic of choice available on request. More to come as we get ourselves organized. If you're already an experienced wingsuit pilot, then just come fly with us anytime, help us look out for the new birds and challenge the older ones. Its time to start again. Looking out for our own, so the USPA doesn't have to. Welcome. -Brian Caldwell, "Student-in-chief", Northeast Bird School. Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

The whole thing is silly. Nothings going to change. Its one big set-piece and the protesters are following the script laid out by the authorities... wave useless signs, yell a lot, get clubbed maced herded and arrested. It'll maybe start to change if the protesters get serious. If they're so sick of being easily manhandled by the cops they should do something about it. Show up in armor as a coherent group, goggles and gas masks, a few tasers and clubs of their own and dish out what they've been taking. The shrieks of high outrage from the authorities that they would DARE actually fight back effectively and "decline to be arrested" not to mention the resulting slaughter when the cops resort to lethal force, might actually force a reexamination of the way these things are handled. The cops would unfortunately have no choice but to start killin' people. Maybe that should be the protesters' game plan. Provoke the authorities into a good old fashioned soviet-style slaughter of civilians. And put to the wall, they will. The only thing that'll create serious change is a high body count. Sad. Bunch of idiots. This is still just a game to them. The only way to win is not to play. But they're gonna keep showing up with signs making noise and congratulating themselves on standing up to the man and making a difference. If they want a revolution (and nothing less is gonna change jack shit) they should STFU and do it and skip the foreplay. Ain't gonna happen. I'm kinda expecting a few more years and we fall apart like the USSR did through economic irresponsibility. And of course, then, like them, rule of law all but collapses and the gangsters wind up in charge, again, anyway... no-win scenario. This is SUCH a lame rerun of history. I don't suppose anybody ever considered putting down the clubs, mace and signs and actually TALKING to each other in a reasonable fashion...? Nah. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

THAT, is the kind of thing -I- would build, although I'd have thought it through a bit more thoroughly since if I'm going to take the trouble to make a gadget I want it to actually WORK. Having spent much of my life whipping up one gadget or another I can say with authority that 3/4 of the fun is in the building of the gadget itself. Guarantee that guy is having the time of his life with that toy, and to his neighbors, he's a god. A noisy god, but a god nevertheless. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Hmmm... Missed you at Gransee, Jarno. Had a blast... great people there. Fierce comp... lotta X's and Apaches, and some of Robi's more monstrous creations. Can't guarantee it, but I might have a whack at attending this. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

I prefer inside exit AFF style, have em with wings scrunched up and hop out sideways facing prop, head high. I have em exit first and I follow, cause if they forget to look at the prop they often look up at me which causes the same effect. That exit also has the side effect that if the student gets sloppy with limb management on a sidestep Otter exit they often pop their tail open, since they were heavily focused on arm position and keeping those armwings tightly shut down for the first second. This also tends to make for a nice smooth exit, they get out looking up and the popped tail lays em down flying, neat. I figure, why not try to arrange things so even the student's smaller mistakes actually make the whole thing smoother? -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold it. Chuck's got a WHAT? Damn. Probably faster than his bike. Alright, just tell me he's got kills painted on the fender. You know... dogs, wheelchairs, marmosets, grannies, Stegodons, Yuppie Spandex Biker Clan members, the usual. Whatever's considered good hunting when you're Chuck in a Porsche. I just get the impression the Chuck/car combo is the sort of thing you'd use to bag large multiton prehistoric mammals with lots of teeth. Or maybe it's just me. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Hmmm. Ya know, that little not-quite-a-rant of mine was in response to Jcoolhand's call for standardization. It was not intended to be used as a vehicle for attacking Spot. Not cool. Right about now Spot is doing a better job of it in a more systematic way than our northeast crowd is. Just because I prefer to work in a more freelance fashion does not mean there is any sort of "us versus them" dynamic. Have you flown with Spot? Met him? Worked with him? I have. He is a man of very strong opinions and not shy about expressing em... and also of extremely high and uncompromising integrity. Right or wrong agree or not, he calls it as he sees it regardless of the consequences. I've tangled with him once or twice in the air in big events and he chewed me out for it. I didn't give him any bullshit back even though I had seniority and easily 2 to 3 times his experience. He was right. I'd screwed up and earned it, was flying too much like a hotshot when that shit was inappropriate. I knocked that shit off quick when he pointed it out and tuned my flying to work with him. We had a job to do. I hold the man in the highest personal and professional respect and you just used my words to back up a rather juvenile attack on him. "Great spotted instructor" jesus christ show some fucking respect. He's got his way. I've got mine. Those ways are not in conflict. If you're not gonna step into the ring with us and try to do a better job of it than we're doing, then at least have the dignity and manners to stop throwing peanuts. We're trying to work here. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

I use it to stash spare stow bands and closing loops and stuff, myself. The placement may be rather awkward but it makes for a very secure pocket. I've also taken to keeping an old spare pair of goggles in the left inlet. Even a 12 ounce beverage bottle is barely noticeable in flight actually. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Ok just some thoughts... Am -I- legit? Serious question. I've got an old expired PFI card from back when that program was current. I did Rob Laidlaw's Skydive University coach rating to learn how to REALLY teach. I've got an expired USPA Coach rating... its not that I haven't been teaching, its just that as of last time I tried, USPA does not recognize wingsuit instruction as a valid use of that rating and does not consider wingsuit instruction acceptable to renew that rating... if I don't take off the suit and do a minimum number of non-wingsuit instructional jumps just to satisfy that, I can't keep the rating. The only reason I HAVE the rating though is to bring some credential to my game, the only thing I teach or am interested in teaching is wingsuit. I don't do enough wingless jumps to be anything like a competent freefall coach, so I have no current ratings at all. I'm not working under any particular group, logo or suit maker. I currently fly a Tony suit but I teach with whatever I have at hand... mostly a rather dated old fleet of Birdman suits, or Intros if the dropzone has any kicking around. I -am- largely a self-declared independent wingsuit instructor. The curriculum I teach is my own. I'm as current as any wingsuiter out there... about 2,500 flights total, I've been in virtually every significant record setting flock for the last 6 years, I just got back from competing in Germany, been flying wingsuits for 8 years now, I have never gone uncurrent since the day I started skydiving and I understand wingsuit flight enough to have built and flown my own suit designs. If anyone ever made a list of the happy, safe and satisfied students I've taught, that list would speak for itself. By now my former students are everywhere. I have had no student incidents of any kind, ever. For the last few years we had a well known Tony rep and rather gifted promoter as the public face of our school. He has moved on from our dropzone and we are rebooting our local school as a kind of partnership between myself and the other remaining senior wingsuit guys around here, the goal being simply to keep teaching and watching out for the new birds, welcome them in and educate them. So far as I know I am still the only one around here to have held a recognized wingsuit rating at all that was not self-issued. But thats as dated as a Classic 2 and I haven't taught by a Phoenix-Fly standard since Phantom 1's were popular. I don't advertise... what students I get, seek me out based on our reputation for having a good school here. My question is, do we really need to standardize? Right now I'm happy doing what I do for the joy of it. I take the responsibility very seriously. I have nobody judging or second-guessing me because I -am- the local authority in the art. But if things get bureaucratic and we start requiring papers, where does it stop? Am I going to have to start proving myself once a year to somebody else who may not have 1/10th the airtime I do? Am I going to have to apply yearly for ongoing permission from somebody else to be allowed to do what I've done all along? I am not on Skydive Pepperell's payroll yet they tell me I am definitely considered Staff at the DZ for my role in maintaining the safety of our wingsuit community. They don't care if I've got papers to show, they just want me to keep doing my thing. I didn't start teaching out of a desire for status, I started teaching because the people at my home dropzone -asked- me to. I suggest that instead of standardizing, with all the jumping through hoops and bureaucratic requirements it involves, that we embrace our variety and promote a wingsuit instructional culture based on individual instructors sharing a sense of personal responsibility about what we do. Being safe, not because someone made us, or someone issued us a card that SAYS we are, but because we care. Right now the wingsuit instructional game belongs to those of us who created the wingsuit scene itself. When the day comes where somebody finds a way to force me to jump through their hoops and tells me I'm not allowed to teach without paperwork granting me their permission to do so, I quit. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Hey Theres gonna be a drunken wingsuit pilot staggering around the woods looking for hugs beer and boobies in any random order. Look for the hawk-nosed guy in glasses with wild long curly hair looks like he just got run through a blender, flies a blue and white wingsuit and howls a lot when he lands. Answers to "Lurch" "Beer" "Wingsuit freak" and "Hey you". -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

I think he's talking about a much more compact maneuver. Combine a barrel roll with a front flip. I've sorta done that as a result of recoiling backwards off my tail out of a 3/4 front loop and initiating a twist roll halfway through that. It ended up being a snap shortcut back to stable flight out of what would otherwise have been a standard symmetrical reversed front loop. Although I can repeat the maneuver by daisychaining the two moves, interrupting the first into the second making it a combo, its actually too fast for me to deliberately stage and coordinate it yet. I just have to twist sideways at what I think is the right moment and let my reflexes manage the rest. If I get the timing right I finish on-heading, if not, I've just launched myself in some random direction and I have to stop and reorient. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Lurch reporting in from Newark airport in New Jersey... it rocked the place BIGTIME. No noticeable damage, airport still operating after brief tower evacuation. Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

...and Spot, you never said... what DID actually cause this? This looks a lot like a stepthrough complete with twisted risers but that doesn't account for the crossed lines. I'm wondering did he maybe bounce the Dbag and lines off his tailwing and get the Dbag through a few slack lines you were hinting about? ...@JMurrell: That technique hasn't gone away... some need it and use it, some don't. I started that way. Eventually I used to pitch in full flight with medium-large suits. When I worked up to homemade megasuits and Tony suits I reverted back to collapsing wings and scrunching down really small like I MEAN it... the burble off some of the biggest wings with a light slow falling pilot can just plain prevent deployment at all if I don't make myself really small a second after the throw and delete that damn burble. I've tested full flight deployments on an S-bird and even with a medium long 9 foot bridle and somewhat oversized PC for this canopy if I don't get small it will tow it to the ground. So these days my pull technique is throw, and scrunch as small as I can. Not as flashy as open winged pitching but a lot more reliable and much safer. If I were gonna BASE the suit and had to pitch in full flight with no allowable plummet factor I'd go with a gigantic 30+ inch PC and a 12 foot bridle but this isn't base, and so I choose to plummet a bit. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Thanks, Twardo. Since rumor has it you're 9 months older than dirt and have been skydiving since 1874 I feel a bit better. I'm not reinventing the wheel, the old guys figured this stuff out long ago. Totally doesn't surprise me but its reassuring. I'm not being the asshole promoting a stupid method I'm just rediscovering techniques you guys used to use. Funny thing is I didn't even look at the student's performance first time I watched the video. All I watched was the canopy and my brain went into analysis mode, thinking of the mal itself and how I'd deal with it and how it could wind up like that. Releasing the brakes was a REALLY bad idea. I woulda got rid of it the second I saw a line crossing the lineset from one side through or around the other side's slider/toggle area. I've watched and studied enough mal videos to know if a line is crossing the slider and the gap between left and right linesets at an angle, its fuckin' tangled to shit and it ain't gonna be fixable or landable. I wouldn't even try. I think this video and the behavior in it are a good illustration of a case of somebody who -looks- ready, seems ready and is equipped as if he -were- ready to fly wingsuits... and isn't. I very strongly urge my own crowd to do their own packjobs and learn their gear really well. Maybe I'm old fashioned but I think in something this gear intensive, if you want to get into it long term and be able to manage the risks you just have to get real personal with the gear and understand its subtleties, and manage them yourself. Doesn't necessarily mean becoming a rigger, but thoroughly learning and mastering manipulation of the factors influencing a good deployment has been key to having a relatively incidentless wingsuit career, at least for me. 2500 wingsuit flights, total of 1 cutaway. You get to try minute subtle variations on every packjob, fine tune the values from jump to jump... a little more or less line bite, a little further forward or back on the slider, etc, and actually build up a mental database of what packjobs do what. A guy with 400 jumps and 5 packjobs knows NONE of this and can have very little practical understanding of how his gear actually works or what caused his last set of line twists. He can't even begin to diagnose it without outside video and he's still not going to have a clue. He can blindly follow recommendations and instructions... "Go get longer bridle/bigger PC/docile canopy" and hopefully be somewhat safe on blind faith and obedience but not understand how or why these things matter or what to do when it doesn't work as expected. Thats no way to get into wingsuit... guy needs to be a lot more interested in what he's doing if he wants to succeed. Incidents don't prevent themselves. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

(sigh) Spot... I can shed a little light on the reasons the packjob was being done like that. I think. IF it was being done deliberately for the same reasons -I- do. I bet I'm going to get torn to pieces by wolves for this but I'll say it anyway. I've been using a similar technique for years now. Properly done the long unstowed line trick is PART of my own personal packjob which has so far been 100% linetwist-proof for well over 1000 jumps now. (But I am also not using a stowless bag and wouldn't pack like this if I had one... no stows, no need to adapt the packjob to eliminate problems caused by them. Which is what this packjob is.) Granted, I'll NEVER claim its a magic bullet or anything and I could get twists tomorrow just because reality feels like punking me to prove me wrong but so far since I started packing this way its been a perfect score.... and you know the kind of flying I do and the fallrates I specialize in. My line twist mal rate went from 2-3 out of every 5 to 0/1000 which is how I know I understood the physics and events happening behind me correctly. Worst twist I've had since I worked it out after I wrecked under my reserve out back 4 years ago has been 180 degrees, single half-twist, risers crossed behind my helmet caused by radically butchered body position on opening, which self corrected before I even had a chance to start doing anything about it. For awhile I was teaching the packjob to my immediate wingsuit crowd around here as a way to prevent line twists. After awhile the effects of this packjob started to attract attention, since the general wingsuit population gets line twists constantly and I don't. So when people asked me about it, I answered truthfully and told them how I do it. I'm not the only one who has figured this setup out, though, and this doesn't surprise me. Somebody using an (improperly configured) variant on the same packjob. Probably without fully understanding the reasons, or the limitations. I do not allow anyone else to pack for me though, I do ALL my own packjobs... with all due respect (and thats a lot) to packers, I would not trust a packer to get this packjob done right and done the EXACT same way every time. My dominant priority when packing this way is to be VERY meticulous and particular about the packjob. I've mostly quit teaching it in light of how many other people are getting in trouble with it. For it to work the user has to understand it. The long unstowed line serves two purposes which work with each other. 1: the line bites are very small. I typically only have a thumb's knuckle worth of line sticking out beyond the stow band. The intention is to make the stows pop loose very easily. Picture a Dbag with a crude student-style packjob with big fat 3 inch line bites: The plucking force needed to unstow any given loop is a lot, and goes on for some time as the line is pulled free from the band. Under low fallrate wingsuit conditions and with the Dbag being extracted from the rig in a low energy state (I.e. without the quick sharp yank of a 120 mph freefall deployment) big fat line bites make the Dbag tumble and yank all over the place while the PC is pulling the whole thing out. 2: and this interacts with #1: 3 feet of unstowed line plus the length of the risers means by the time the Dbag hits the ends of the lines (3-4 feet off your back while all the stows are still stowed) the bag has already accelerated, undisturbed, to a speed at which by the time the lines DO start pulling at the first stow, its too late to spin or tumble the Dbag. And again, the small bites ensure those asymmetrical side to side plucking forces are small.... certainly smaller than the inertia the bag has picked up by the time the first stow hits. Certainly not enough to disturb the path of the mass of the bag. BUT... This also goes with packing grommet up! The Dbag does not rotate but lifts almost straight up off my back. If I pitch in full flight maybe it rotates about 45 degrees max. When I pack I free-coil the excess in 3 neat loops on the bottom of the container and carefully PLACE the bag on top of it being very careful not to snag lines with the closing loop attachment point. If somebody is packing this way but putting the Dbag in and twisting it so the bridle attachment point is up against the bottom of the reserve tray its GOING to grab a massive fistful of those lines and make a BIG snagprone mess of it both when the bag is initially placed, and later again when it is deployed. Packed grommet-to-reserve that Dbag is being yanked through a 135 degree rotation while sitting on a coiled pile of lines or while in-process of being lifted off of it as the container opens. Guaranteed to scoop up a big mess of line on the stows themselves. Snag City. If the rig cannot be packed grommet-up it cannot be packed this way at all. Or shouldn't be. I had considered writing an article for Parachutist after some urging by others that I should share what I know since it DOES work so well... but I eventually decided not to. Partially because I didn't want to deal with the flak that I would attract for teaching such a packjob (imagine the furious responses and condemnations I'd get from older jumpers/instructors in the "letters" section the next month... they'd eat me alive) and partially because I do not want to be held responsible when somebody else does it wrong and gets into deep shit. Just like this incident. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Ok now THATS dedication. (applauds) Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Rub it in, why don't ya... Although I admit I envy your local puffy resources, 15,000 footers being rather hard to come by up here, I simply could not deal with your climate. You know how I am about heat... when its too cold for you, its getting just right for me. Gotta be something to do with your redbull habit or something. Last week we did a high pull flying party cross country style jump. I exited after the others, flew back and intercepted the canopy group, then we all flew home. A weather system was coming in and much to my surprise since I'd been jumping all day, discovered the temperature at altitude had suddenly dropped below freezing and I was hanging under canopy at 12,800 feet gasping like I'd just been tossed into a half frozen lake... so unexpectedly cold it was breathtaking. I freakin' LOVED it, it was stimulating as HELL. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

This season has been particularly good for us up northeast. Last summer was so-so with just a couple days where we got the big puffy 10000 footers, although those WERE very tasty. But this year since about mid july we've had a series of spectacular weekends go through. Either broken ragged walls 7k high and frequent multiple layering with good development all the way up. A couple weeks ago we got uniquely epic conditions. Extremely high humidity combined with several different weather patterns at differing altitudes. So depending on where you looked you could see 3 or more cloud decks, each going a different way, and actively building puffies coming off the lowest cloud deck at about 2k so it was surf all the way to pull time. The resulting surf was unreal. Total fluidity of movement, layer after layer of puffies, so cluttered with clouds I got lost for awhile till I spotted something familiar to fly by. The sense of flying in an enclosed, yet vast space is just amazing... walls, holes cracks and gaps to fly across EVERYWHERE. I was bouncing and giggling in the plane on the way up, rode copilot, got a good, long look at what I was gonna be flying in, thinking "Holy fuck this is one of the most awesome skies I have ever seen". Got reason to expect more of the same or similar this weekend. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Damn straight. Its not that I bail on my amigos. Its just that our predive go-over at 10k on the way to the top of a sky like that consists of "Screw the dive plan, lets go get those puffies!" This suggestion is typically greeted by huge grins among all concerned. Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Cloudsurf score: 10/10 Flawless. Last few weeks, seems like all I get is surf like that. I think we've actually executed the dive plan, what, maybe twice? In 4 weeks? -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

I once put up a thread about cloud porn pics. Now I've found some video. http://vimeo.com/18235468 I like. Can anybody find a better one? -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Scoob. I hope you're right about the SCOTUS. It will hold them back awhile longer. But it won't stop em. They'll just reshape it a little to satisfy technicalities and a need for "compromise". Said compromise to consist of negotiations of the exact terms and conditions of the sale of human beings to insurance companies by their governments. They will tell us we are still free, because we are still permitted to choose which insurance company. And they will just try again and again until something sticks. The real damage was done when such an amazingly unthinkable option made it onto the table for consideration or discussion at all. I kinda hope it DOES stand. I hope it winds up forcing millions of americans to choose between food shoes and obediently purchasing their mandatory insurance. Maybe the resulting destruction will teach the political classes to think twice. Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

Yeah. You're right. His skin color and hair texture are carefully crafted fakes to just look black. Or he played with too much nanothermite as a kid. His african name doesn't mean shit about his ancestry and his family is in fact from northeastern Europe. After all, there are lots and lots of white guys named Obama... right? Or, wait, I know! He was adopted into a family of Kenyan descent and his appearance self-altered to match a guy of african ancestry like a chameleon, hair and all! I didn't know us white guys could even DO that! I repeat: Black or white it does not matter. If he did the job and, like, gave us back our money and freedoms and stuff I'd be all for him. What matters is his quality... which is just as deficient as everyone else who gets the job. -B Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.