FrogNog

How much money will starting over cost? How much money will reinjuring your spine cost? (Optionally, repeat comparison for "time cost" and "potential for permanent injury".) -=-=-=-=- Pull.

When I had about 10, 15, and 25 jumps I asked every experienced jumper who visisted our DZ when this sort of thing would go away. The consensus answer I got was "it's all about how many times you get into the plane." Some said it would take about 50 jumps, give or take. I got to 50 jumps and found I was still scared of something every time, usually at least the plane ride. But by jump 45 I loved skydiving enough that I wouldn't let the fear stop me from going out and getting in the plane again. By jump 100 I wasn't much scared again. By jump 200 I was sleeping in the plane. Then I took 4 forced months off (hint: read the downsizing threads) and when I came back, I was scared of the plane ride again for 50 jumps or so. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

Are you worried about the corner of the building cutting your static line? No, it's not razor sharp, but if it has a very small radius that wouldn't be good for the static line, would it? -=-=-=-=- Pull.

Not a lot of jumps (maybe 75 total) on my old Sabre2 150 and my new Sabre2 170. They would sometimes open "affirmatively" but never like a ton of bricks, like sliding down a staircase headfirst, or in the famous "insta-canopy" style. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

My only jump on a Lotus 190 beat me like I was an ugly red-headed stepchild. I opened it at 8k msl and I probably packed it wrong, but it was still a week before I was right again. My Hornet 190 opened painfully hard a few times but I think that's under control. About 150 openings since the last. As a student I got a lot of painful crotch-bruising openings on skymasters. I didn't count those because I usually didn't pack them. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

Did you mean Safire or Safire2? Of the Sabre2, Safire (or Safire2, whichever one you meant), Pilot, Nitro, and Axon, which of those is the oldest model? BTW, if a canopy always takes an immediate left or right on opening, that's predictable. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

There is an online calculator somewhere that can estimate the market value of the Cypres for you. You should be able to search the forum for it. I would estimate the Dolphin D2 9/96 VG condition at whatever similar containers in the classifieds have been listed at previously, minus any incentive you want to give for quicker selling, etc.. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

If someone dies jumping a Swiss wall, can their family sue the Swiss government and have the same chance of a court seriously considering their case, as can happen in the United States? The United States has had some freaky-scary liability/tort lawsuit runaway that other countries have avoided. I can't say this is the main issue behind the NPS's behavior but it shouldn't be ignored. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

I don't think we are seeing the same thing in the first entry in this post. I saw a general complaint about bodycounts/bonecounts in skydiving and an accusation that we know what things are hazardous or contribute to danger, but we still go ahead - we do bigways, we load large planefuls of people with different ideas of landing patterns, we swoop, we have multiple planes in the air at a time, we land near the packing area, etc.. I didn't mean to say that landing a canopy after a normal skydive is a stunt. (Unless it's a swoop. Doubly if there are gates. Triply if the purpose of the load wasn't primarily canopy flight.) And before someone jumps on me for calling a bigway a stunt, defending them by saying the people go to extraordinary lengths to plan for safety and pledge to each person act in a safe manner: that's the preparation and training part I was talking about, which we use to counter the increased danger of doing crazy sh*t like putting so many people in one place in freefall. The last thing I wrote was we can't draw a line and say "this side is safe, and this side is not safe." This extends from the fact we can't quantify the risk increase of each action and we can't quantify the risk amelioration of each preparatory or training measure in order to put them together and decide whether something is sufficiently unlikely to cause injury or death to ourselves or others. We certainly can't do this with precision and speed while in the air when we decide there's "enough room" between us and the second guy down in order to spice up the landing a bit. Instead we ground review, we don't do things that appear super-dangerous unless we have some good excuses, we add preparation and training wherever we can (and sometimes that falls by the wayside when we don't want to spend the time/money or miss the load), and we make in-air decisions using our gut and eyes which make mistakes. And in all that, we don't have hard lines. -=-=-=- Footnote: when I say "crazy sh*t" I mean that in an appreciative way. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

In addition to the controllability/landability check, I also have the "ugly check". If my stomach ever turns looking at what's left of my canopy, it doesn't have long to "get all better" before I chop it. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

Humans are inherently fallible. This is something we have to fight against with preparation and training and so forth. An example of preparation is having a set landing direction for a load. But humans also have egos and are fun- or thrill-seeking. Skydivers especially. This can work against preparation and training sometimes. I don't think we can ever get skydiver perfection. We can perform planned stunts that will cause less or more risk and individual jumpers can act in ways that are less or more careful on each jump. Is it possible to draw a line? And if so, where would we draw it? -=-=-=-=- Pull.

Someone recently posted that there are no "hard limit" answers in skydiving questions. This would be one of those places. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

The black lettering on my Hornet label was screened on, not dyed, so it flaked off. I think I can read the serial number if I try really hard. Some manufacturers produce their labels to have more durable lettering, like this old 1994 PD 170 I got where the fabric is definitely well-worn but the label is 100% readable. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

Did you see the ambulances load anyone or stay longer than 10 minutes? A couple weekends ago we got an ambulance _and_ a fire truck because a whufffo saw a cutaway main go in. A separate question: how long do you wait before you expect to see an incident posted? Does that vary with the cause, type, severity, or spectacularity of the incident? -=-=-=-=- Pull.

How can a sheet of fabric be concave (i.e. convex) toward one side? Won't the fabric tend to be convex toward whichever way the wind blows it? -=-=-=-=- Pull.

My experience is that rigs without hip rings don't flex nearly as well in the plane or on the ground. That's my big point of preference for hip rings. While I admit I haven't tried a custom-fitted-to-me rig without hip rings, I assume it still won't be as free-moving in the plane or on the ground as one with hip rings. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

What size canopy are you jumping now? Have your instructors recommended you make several jumps on each size of canopy between what you're currently jumping and the 150 to help you adjust? Sabre2s are fine canopies and my experience matches the "complaints" you found in the reviews. Once I managed to open my 150 (at 1.5:1) with lots of line twists down behind my neck and it flew great. I think that was my first real quantity of flying facing backwards in my harness. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

I _think_ I've heard of this before on dropzone.com but without any pictures it's hard to be sure.

Do a nice, easy, stable poised exit hop-and-pop. With your eyes closed from poised to canopy inflation. (Climbing out with eyes closed is more advanced.) -=-=-=-=- Pull.

No, not always! It might even make the problem worse. Check with the manufacturer. /D Yeah, this guy I talked to, who should be knowledgeable about canopy design, says when trying to slider-tame a hard-opening canopy you want to increase the chord of the slider but not the span. The slider for the next size canopy up might have a larger span... -=-=-=-=- Pull.

I recall seeing posted here before that at some point in the Hornet production lifespan the manufacturer started sending them out with a larger slider. (I hope I'm not wrong about this.) What was the date of manufacture on his Hornet? My Hornet always opened 95% soft(ish), 5% hard. Once I went to ensuring the slider was hard up against the stops and controlling that part of the pack job so it stayed that way into the bag, the hard openings disappeared. I must also assume my Hornet came with the bigger slider, because I'm not that great of a packer. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

Suggestion: get video the first time you try it.

Um, yeah. I guess if I had thought about this more, I would have realized that it's the same in the planes I've been in while students are SLed out. Durrr. -=-=-=-=- Pull.

Isn't the static line supposed to be routed above/over the student's shoulder when they exit, to reduce the possibility of an acrobatic entanglement? And if so, wouldn't having the ring on the floor make it more difficult to achieve this? -=-=-=-=- Pull.

On rounds with little to no flare, this makes sense, but I'm having difficulty with this as far as ram-air canopies are concerned. As your feet get wet haven't you just about reached the full flare point, with your hands in your crotch? In order to execute the breakaway you are going to have to let go of both toggles in order to get to your handle, and if the canopy has any forward speed left, surely it will surge forward, complicating matters? You also run the risk of not releasing the toggles evenly with the resultant rapid turn one way or the other? I think the "wet" description is a way of telling people NOT to cutaway before they touch the water. I don't think this wording is intended to try and get people to cut away in the one second after they touch the water and before they are completely immersed. (Swoopers may have a lot more time. ) I agree that cutting away mid-swoop while dragging a toe could complicate things if the water is not deep and clear. That's why they say to flare for the top of the water or use half-brakes: in case the water is shallow or there's something big and tough in it that you don't want to hit at full-flight speed. In deep water or with stronger wind, results could vary. In high wind I once dropped my toggles immediately after touchdown and pulled my cutaway very quickly and it was a soft, stand-up landing. (Well, not for my canopy. ) I don't see myself trying to land all fancy-like in the event of an unplanned water landing. P.S. *cough*RSL*cough* -=-=-=-=- Pull.