yoink

Why not? They've never done anything meaningful in the past when we've been killing ourselves. Again, for clarity. I think the video should be in the public realm. We shouldn't hide stuff because we're historically not that great about forcing changes to the sport. It's good that it's in the open and we have to react to it. I just think the hysteria from skydivers about how this is going to be the end of the world is a bit ridiculous. It won't be. Tandems will keep coming just the same. The FAA will almost certainly write a strongly worded letter and do nothing else. The tar and feather brigade on here will be baying for blood while the conservatives will be screaming about freedom to choose whatever they want to do in the air. It's just another episode of As The Prop Turns...

Oh jesus. Seriously? Who gives a crap what the public thinks about the whys of it when they're not going to understand it anyway? If you want to haul the guy over the coals do it where it will make a difference. At a USPA convened board, and show that stupidity won't be tolerated by yanking the guy's license. Leave the whuffos to go 'oooh ahh' over the video. Don't hide anything, but don't go airing dirty laundry in public just for the hell of it.

Nope. The only people who give a shit about this are skydivers. The same way that the only people who care about not being portrayed as suicidal adrenaline junkies are skydivers. The world at large doesn't care. Whuffos have no idea of why that jump was any scarier than any other. They just get reminded that a skydive is on their bucket list and are more likely to make one in the long run... Don't get me wrong, the jump was a mess. But the hysteria coming from skydivers is almost as cringe-worthy.

I tried reading your earlier posts, but my brain didn't like it at all. Question - what's big, hairy, lives under bridges and eats Billy Goats?

I love the dude in the background in the first one - he's got a huge tripod mounted camera set up next to him, and he's videoing it on his smartphone!

That looked much less violent than I was expecting it to be! Huge props to Gary!

1) Get a job - it doesn't have to be skydiving related. 2) Save money. Exactly the same way that everyone else buys stuff that lets them do things they want to do. Sorry - there's no easy answer. Welcome to life.

This is one of those ones that doesn't need armchair quarterbacking - particularly when the video was posted here to deliberately get a rise. We know NOTHING about the situation. IF the mentor is very experienced, and IF they gave a good briefing before hand then to my mind, it's all good. Sure, there's a little more risk involved than not doing it, but at least it's managed. On the other hand, you could assume that there was no briefing, that the CRW plot only has 20 jumps himself and hell, why not, say they're both wearing cameras too while you're at it - now you can start the witchhunt. Not knowing anything about the video, and how far away it's filmed, I prefer not to assume anything.

Awesome. I love it.

Nope. It's a bad thing. But it works the other way too. It SUCKS to be on the side of trying to give advice that you know will keep people safe, only to have it ignored because of ego, time and time and time again. I've said before that this place has crushed my will to try and help other skydivers... How it THAT a good thing? I've survived a while doing this. I want to help others do that. but still... sometimes it's hard... But for some reason, some of us keep trying. Because for all the bad advice, for all the bullshit, and all the ego, there are occasionally times when you might help someone or keep someone from making a mistake based on bad information. and that's worthwhile. We MAY make a positive difference. And that bad advice doesn't just come from the boards here - there's bad advice on the DZs. The difference is that here you're openly posting advice for a thousand people to see, dissect and reply to. You're not giving one-on-one advice around a beer, so you'd better be able to justify your advice - something people DON'T often do in the bar... it takes balls, courage and knowledge to do that. I've seen people talk shit about this place because they've been called out and made to feel foolish - you know what? They probably shouldn't have been giving that advice in the first place.... There's also a bias to the questions asked, which necessarily leads to a negative view of the advice given. If (as an example) 95% of all questions asked on this site were 'should I do this dangerous thing', and you only got 5 people replying to each of those posts, then soon the perception is that this place pretty much ONLY gives negative advice. There are a LOT of daft questions asked here... and it's far easier to criticize a bad decision, than to give a useful answer to a good one, leading to a weighting bias. I guess what I'm saying is that there is information on here that is worth paying attention to, but it's not a place to get every answer you ever wanted. If you're asking a genuine question, you'll get many (and often conflicting) answers, but at least you'll have more knowledge than you did to start with to make a decision about. If you hang around for a while, you'll learn who you can ignore, and who's worth listening to more. If you expect this site just to validate everything you think about skydiving, whether you have 10 jumps or 10,000, you're wrong. Society doesn't work that way. It's not for everyone, that's for sure!

You're basing your feedback on the way YOU behave so there's an unintentional bias to the way you think communication should be done. There is no need for confrontation because you seem responsive to earlier, more friendly feedback. Awesome. I wish everyone was like you. You're asking people to communicate differently based on YOUR experience, but now you put yourself in the shoes of someone else; an experienced jumper. You've SEEN people crater in. You've had friends killed though the idiocy of others and you've felt the impacts that the deaths have had on your dz. You're sick to death of people dying year after year from the same causes in ways that are entirely avoidable. Now - you see someone doing something that you KNOW will likely kill them. You approach them and say 'hey dude, can we have a chat? What you just did was really dangerous - here's why'. The response you get back is 'Don't worry about it. It's cool. I know what I'm doing'. You bite your lip and move on. You see the same behaviour again and try again at a later date. 'Hey. Keep flying like that and you're a crater waiting to happen. Try asking x, y or z if you don't believe me...' The reply is 'You don't know me!' or 'Whatever dude.' The point is that eventually you have to be more direct. You can't give passive instruction forever. To do nothing or to continue to try and communicate in a way that is DEMONSTRABLY not working for that person isn't being a decent person or even an effective communicator. It's you not taking every step possible for your own safety and that of people around you. You say you've been around internet forums for a while - same here. You know as well as I do that inflection and tone don't carry over in a forum setting, so you could say exactly the same thing as is typed, but give a very different message or at least soften the blow slightly. Maybe people who take offense easily need to understand that on forums not everyone is a communications expert and it's less about how things are said, than the message it's giving. FWIW, I think the thread that sparked this one lost its way when people were posting facebook details and going looking for videos and the like. All the communication right up to that point was fine.

This thread has devolved in to people being pussies if they can't take critisism, or bullies if they give it. YAWN. Chad - to get this topic back on thread, and I suspect to lay to rest this argument that is now nothing about you, I have one question: Were you serious about hanging up the Velo and what will you be jumping instead? As you've been on the receiving end of all this, what's YOUR opinion on the way it's developed? That would be honestly useful feedback for those of us that try to encourage safer behaviour.... Obviously you didn't think upsizing was an option when you were spoken to in person at the time, but was it the fact that it was made public, or the tone that convinced you to alter your canopy choice? Could anything have been done differently to have the same result?

The 600 Monster is a great bike. I always wanted the 749 Dark. *drools - It plays to my memories of StreetHawk. Fuck it - I still want one.

You want an entire forum deleted because of a couple of threads? Even if only one in a thousand accidents are reported, posted and discussed honestly, that's one more than would otherwise be the case. Speculation may be discouraged, but open discussion about POSSIBILITIES is more valuable than cut-and-dry facts. It gets people thinking. The problem isn't with the forum, it's with the people using it. The incidents forum is the best thing about this website.

That's a big part of it. My requirements aren't over the top of any decent system from a vendor, but I much prefer knowing the quality of all the bits that go in it, and that it's set up the way I want... and don't get me started on the preinstalled crap that comes with some setups! GRR! cheers folks. I'll give newegg a go.

I'm thinking of building a new desktop PC and wondered if you guys would recommend any particular vendors for components? I'm assuming it's like back in the UK and they'll be much cheaper online?

eh?

Because that's worked brilliantly so far. (!) John, you let your natural bias against any sort of rules colour your thinking IMO, and it's beginning to show in all your posts which detracts from any real useful message you could get across from your experience. Chances are if the rules are reasonably leinient they'll be no problem to 95% of normal people like you - but they'll catch the nutters out there. Unreasonable rules either don't pass inspection, or simple wipe themselves out over a short period of being implemented. You can't assume everyone is rational and right-thinking. To the OP; I'm not in favour of having canopy sizes simply dictated by jump numbers and wing loading. It's too complex a series of variables for that. If you have to have that sort of hard and fast rule, it needs to be a 'at no time will anyone, ever, exceed these numbers', and then it just becomes arbitrary - why 1200 jumps for a crossbraced canopy? What happens on that magic jump after 1199 that suddenly makes someone 'ready' for a crossbraced wing? I don't think there's a simple answer that you can apply in broad strokes to everyone. We have to change the overall skydiving culture of small canopies being cool, of people having access to buying them when they shouldn't, and a united front from the dropzone operators on each individual - no regulation works if some DZs are more lax than others. The impetus has to come from the jumpers, not the national bodies. Coaches and instructors who refuse to jump with people who are unsafe. Regular jumpers who refuse to get on a plane with the 200 jump wonder who's just bought a 99. Downsizing is about jump numbers and weight. It's also about aptitude, practice, time spent flying, physique, intelligence, reaction to instruction and a thousand other things. Maybe people shouldn't be able to buy their own canopies... maybe they need to have counter signitures from instructors, coaches or Operators to say 'yup, I agree this guy is ready for this next canopy'... at the very least, it would force the jumper in question to vet their choice through at least one other individual. (And no. I know this wouldn't work in the states because everyone would sue each other...We really need a rolling eyes smilie... )

You answer your own question as far as I can see. You admit Coaches aren't trained to do anything in deploying for a student, so there's nothing they can do except deploy themselves. Any other action only introduces more risk into the scenario. There's no new EP, or alteration to any existing EP that I can see which would change this. The only way a coach could help in this situation is to deploy for the student, which, as we've already ascertained, they're neither trained for nor allowed to do. Yes, it'd suck bailing on someone who's having trouble, but it'd suck worse killing them because you're tying to be a hero. I'd follow my training and rely on the students EPs to kick in or at worse an AAD save.

The right of way thing concerns me - I agree with your scenario, but not with telling students that Tandems have the right of way. For me, an instructor should (barring exceptional circumstances), be able to stay out of the way of a student. A new student has enough to think about, without trying to avoid tandems. Maybe it's just me, but when I was in the air with students I always imagined a giant red danger bubble around them and stayed out of it. If I found myself in a level with then in that bubble, I'd screwed up, not them, and I'd get out of it as fasat as possible, even if it blew my landing pattern. Granted, I didn't have a little old lady on my front though...

Whaaa? Students should have right of way. Always. I can't think of a single exception to that rule. A professional skydiver should be able to see the problem developing and mitigate it before it becomes an issue. Students do crazy things even when they're not trying to dogde tandems. Don't ask them to do that. Certainly don't ask them to take an off landing in order to dodge a tandem! Who's better equipped to land off? A tandem with a pilot with thousands of landings behind them, or a student, with less than 10?

f. It into an impromptu 2-stack?

Work through it in your head. You've got 44 jumps, so you understand the components of a parachute system and basically how they work.... What do you think would happen? You pull out your PC to full arm stretch and hold onto it. What do you think is happening to the bridle that is connecting the PC to the pin? It's not sitting quietly in on your back, nor is it streaming cleanly above you - it's rattling around in your burble providing a massive snag hazard! While it's doing that a loop wraps around your foot.... Now what? How would you deal with this situation? Remember, you're at deployment altitude and still in full freefall with a PC in your right hand... Even worse a loop wraps around your foot, you don't notice and you release the PC. Now what? How do you deal with THIS? Even WORSE, you do all of the above, kick your leg to try and disentangle yourself, dislodge the pin holding your container closed but still have the wrap on your leg... You've now got a SERIOUS problem. Think and try to visualise exactly how you would deal with each of these scenarios - it's great practice! Then work like hell to make sure you're never in that situation in the first place. Seriously - this is one of the worst malfunctions I can imagine. If you pull out the PC, throw it authoratively. Do NOT hold onto it.

Sounds like someone missed the part on how to deal with a downplane in the FJC. Hint: the answer isn't 'fly it back up'...

and massive amounts of match fixing. Test matches tend to be more strategic. One dayers are a good excuse to drink beer!