NickDG

Okay, first make sure you have the free Adobe Reader installed on your computer, you probably do, but if not you'll need it to read PDF files, you can get it here: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html Also these are rather large files so if you are on a slow internet connection it may seem the computer froze when it's really downloading the file. Try this; Right click your mouse on the file name and in the box that pops up left click on "save target as" another file box will pop up (make a note of the file name and which directory it's being saved to) and click ok. You should then see a box that lets you know the file is actually downloading. If you are on a slow connection, like a modem, and not high speed cable, go make a pot of coffee and clean the bathroom, when you come back it will be done. If you are on a cable just give it more time. Also at the library there many be some type of blocking software in place. NickD

Jo, I'm sure you've seen these, but for others following along, or new to it, here are the FBI files on the case . . . There an interesting narrative by the guy who hoaxed he was D.B. Cooper. He told his story to newspaper reporter and got $30,000 for it. http://foia.fbi.gov/foiaindex/dbcooper.htm NickD

Thanks for coming everyone - A good time with great friends . . . ! ! ! NickD

>>and I will try my best to behave myself this time

Anybody in the So Cal area tomorrow night (March 24th) Saturday is invited to my house for dinner. There's a bunch of cool people coming . . . Bring your rig. PM for directions . . . Or, base194@verizon.net NickD

All I know is I jumped on the very first prototype FOX that Anne built and I've never looked back . . . I think if you could remember when there were no "BASE" canopies than you'd know anything from any BASE manufactuer is smoking cool. I started BASE on Para-Flite Cruislite. I used to think a near miss on an object was on-heading . . . NickD

I wish you were right. It's what makes it so hard to figure out. I'd like to be able to say the silver lining is as we add to List we are actually doing better . . . But I don’t think you are correct. I should have said the ratio between life and death seems unchanging. The number of increasing deaths is shadowing the increasing number of jumpers. NickD

Those are all good points, and I've always thought in a similar way. I've tried to analyze the Fatality List in all kinds of ways looking for a common denominator. Something where I could say, "Hey guys, just stop doing [this, that, or whatever] and you'll live longer." But I can't find anything other than, and it sounds ridiculously simplistic, but the more you jump the more chance you stand to be killed. It's why for years I've been preaching the only thing that makes sense to me. And that's for people to slow down, that it's not a numbers game, and that Carl Boenish was correct almost thirty years ago when he said, "BASE jumps are not meant to be gulped down like skydives." One thing about the List that can be said is it's certainly weighted toward the side of "experienced" jumpers. Almost no one dies on their very first BASE jump, or even the first few, as those are maybe 4 or 5 out of the 110 listed deaths. As for gear or instructional innovation saving us, I'm not so sure. I believe even if we could build 100 percent foolproof gear along with bombproof instruction we'd still find ways of killing ourselves. It's the death wave. That part of us that is always hanging out there just a little bit past the line of what's possible. Let's look at BASE gear in relation to skydiving gear. When I started skydiving in the mid-1970s it was on military surplus gear and that gear was very complicated. By the 1980s "sport" parachuting gear was moving toward being simple. Gone where the main ripcords, the multiple pins and cones, and the two and even three step cutaway systems. Nowadays skydiving gear has moved back to complicated again with collapsible PCs, AADs, RSLs and Skyhooks. But the end result of all that back and forth is nil as the fatality rate seems about the same. BASE rigs, in contrast, began with the idea simple is better and that worked pretty well for us throughout the 1980s. So we added aerials, wing suits, and all the rest which made the sport more attractive to new participants. We also upgraded our instructional methods from none when I started, to mentorship, to the real courses we have now. But we are dying faster than ever. So it doesn't seem to me any innovation in either of those mentioned areas will do the trick as it never has before. Now let's look at that double edged sword called currency vs safety. For years we've tried to find the perfect mix between the two. Are you safer making a few BASE jumps a year or 50 BASE jumps a year? I don’t know the answer to that as we are all different. Some listen to their inner man, and know when to back off, while some others don’t even know they have an inner man. All this leads me to one conclusion and it's the same one I started with. It would be easiest to state the position as this: If you have 1000 BASE jumps in your logbook call it a career, and go find a comfortable rocking chair to sit in. But I also know that doesn't work as we humans never, "get there." As we reach a certain level we always feel we can do better, we know there is more to learn, and more to do. It's natural to feel that way. But as I get older I don't feel so much that way anymore. I feel like I've perfected the type of jump I do the most and that's the garden variety 3 and 4 second delay off the Flatiron Building in the middle of the night. I really don't feel I could get any better at doing that and if anything I'm probably going the other way as my body and mind slows down with age. But what does all that really mean to my own chances of being killed? I don’t know, so I tend to look at it like this. Forget our increasing numbers, forget the gear equations, and forget currency vs experience. A certain percentage of us will somehow always be selected for death. What that mechanism of selection is I don’t know. Some may be doomed to it from their very first jump, or it may just be a matter of one night you turned left at some particular corner while driving downtown instead of turning right. And I know we fool ourselves a bit. BASE jumping is a very cool thing, it's a shit load of fun, and a great social lifestyle, but like every unusual endeavor there is a price to be paid. When I add someone to the Fatality List I always feel the price we all owe is being extracted. Its why when I broke both my legs and spent a year in plaster I often feel I paid something in advance and somehow fate will be kinder to me. It's sort of my way of looking at Tom Aiello's luck bucket. But I know, even as it makes me feel better, the real truth is probably closer to what Ernie Gann wrote so many years ago, "Fate is the hunter." And to that I'll add, "And it's blind as a bat too . . ." NickD

Not disparaging either system, but it may be useful to know the only BASE jumper (I know of) that used a Sorcerer in an actual emergency was killed. He cutaway a spinning main canopy and the reserve deployed with line twists that didn't clear before he reached the ground. This was on a big wall BASE jump in 1994 so the initial opening altitude wasn't as low as on more modern BASE jumps. On the other hand Sorcerers have been, and still are, successfully used for funaways . . . The above jumper is number #31 on the BASE Fatality List. http://www.basefatalities.info/ NickD

Actually, bleeding like hell, Don crawled far enough away as to not burn our tower . . . Classic hero stuff in the BASE community. NickD

Drat . . . NickD

BASE is the thing that would make that thing click. Otherwise, it's just another pretty view. And there's thousands of those . . . A hundred and fifty thousand people don't come to Bridge Day to walk across the bridge and look at a river! Played right, this could be the Acapulco Cliff Divers of North American and last a hundred years. Employment for all . . . NickD

I guess it's the nature of the jumps I mostly do. But I usually find myself behind where I could pull high before I even launch. I just try to fit in a deployment, after I leave, and before I hit the ground. Isn't that what everyone else is doing? NickD

I read the UK BASE Board almost every day. Those guys are so cool I'm almost thinking of moving there . . . NickD

Go ahead and open a beer, this is a long one . . . As I've written before, I was at Elsinore when this happened and the Flatbed Ten, and I knew them all, were not BASE jumpers. They were skydivers and what they did must be looked at in that context. They were skydivers out for a lark, a once in a lifetime (to them) jump, and they went about it like you'd expect skydivers would do any extraordinary jump like a night, balloon, or water jump. It was all about the fun and light on anything else. And I'm not slamming them. They didn't violate any BASE ethics because there weren't any BASE ethnics at the time. As for how publicity has personally effected me, well in more than a couple of instances in the last two years when turning a corner looking for a stairwell in a dark building under construction I've run into security guards and the old excuses that always worked before don't work so well anymore. "I'm homeless and looking for safe place to sleep," or, "I'm a photographer just trying to get some night shots of the city," just don’t fly. "Your one of those parashooters, aren't you," is what you're more likely to hear now. After the last time that happened, we were driving away, kinda being quiet, but we died laughing, when a skydiver from Perris, who was ground crewing us, broke the silence with, "Man, you guys got YouTubed . . . " That may not seem like too big a deal but I see it in terms of past experiences like the time a police officer actually helped Jakey and me hide out while every other cop in town was looking for my blue Jeep. That kind of thing is never going to happen again. Another thing is we are confusing certain issues. I don't buy if we had kept BASE more on the down low it would have stifled progress. We BASE jumpers have always had a well oiled grapevine that way predates the internet. And when these internet boards first started in the 80s we certainly thought about the consequences of talking about BASE openly but really without thinking much about it we wrote to each other in a kind of code. "We did three DBs from Big Willy last night," wasn't giving much away and wouldn't be really understood by those outside the sport. And in the very beginning the conversations were light in tone, and we were just having fun with a new toy. Good info was life and speeding up that info saved lives. In those days it was less, "Here's how to do this," and more, "Holy shit, don’t do this!" We were learning by making mistakes. And the internet could disseminate that info to more people faster than any other way. Before the internet boards started most new BASE jumpers got their info directly from a BASE jumper they met at the DZ, over the phone, and from the various BASE magazines that existed and were circulated in-house. (The internet is was what killed the BASE magazines). Now here's where it gets complicated. When this board (The BASE Zone) started most of us were over on Mick's BASE Board. By that time the affliction, that infected most internet forums by that time, had us at each other's throats. In contrast, there was little anonymity in earlier days as the BASE community was too small to hide behind a fake name. And it kept things honest. Sure, there was unrest in the BASE community prior to that. I remember how disgusted we all were when Mark kicked the living shit out of John Hoover. Up until that time we'd only had "bonehead" fights. One BASE jumper called another BASE jumper a fucking bonehead, then they'd meet at Bridge Day and one, or the other, got a bloody nose, later both would be dead drunk with their arms around each in brotherhood. It was then we saw this place, and when I first read the thread description, "If you plan to try your hand at BASE jumping make sure you know what you're getting into. BASE jumping is extremely dangerous and you should clearly understand the risks before you think about it, whether you're a skydiver or not!" I thought cool - because the BASE Fatality List was passing through number 70 I thought maybe we can save a life or two. And that alone would be worth it. I actually first thought posts here would be more on the order of: Hi, I'm Bob, I live in Putzville, and I'm interested in BASE. And the reply would be: Hi Bob, See Pete at DZ x-ray, he lives near Putzville. I also thought this place being moderated would keep the BS to a minimum. It didn't exactly work out that way, and Tom deserves more than the gray hairs he's getting from trying. But the point I'm dancing around is some have said this board and our posting to it is a form of "glory hounding" that is also blowing our cover. And that's right. But maybe not for the same reasons you might think. There are tens of thousands of forums on the internet. And I believe we tend to think we are so "special" that everybody else is paying attention to what's written here. Don’t kid yourself. In a larger sense no one is paying attention to this. While there maybe the odd "Tool" who comes here for Intel on what we are doing, so what, he already knows what we are doing. But the average web surfer doesn't have The BASE Zone on his Favorites List. But at the same time millions of people check in to see what's going on with You Tube. So blowing our cover there in nothing like just talking about BASE here. You can see the impact this board has right on this board. How many times have you seen threads up-board asking what people read here and how many skydivers say they never read the BASE Zone? There's more than a few of those. So I'm saying the good this board does is it gives those willing to delve deep enough a good idea of what's going on, who to go see, and how to go about it. And at the same time, despite our trying to do otherwise, we probably sound like blathering idiots and turn people off. Fine, not the most elegant way to do it, but I'll call that another limb, or possibly, even a life saved . . . I also hear some saying, "Well, this is the internet and it's not real." But no, this is not "virtual reality." This is not a video game or simulation. It may seem like that sometimes and only because I don’t know anymore who I'm talking with. It used to be I knew I was writing to and reading posts from Mike Allen, Andy West, Bill Grim, or Rick Payne, etc. It was "real reality" and we talked to each other like we would face to face. But now I tend to think of all of you as one. Because so many use fake names I run into BASE jumpers in the field who say, "Nick, why are you busting my balls on the board?" And my answer is it's because, "You asshole, I didn't know it was you." Seriously, I can't tell the Miltons, from the Slambos, from the Sabre210s, so I (and it's my bad) tend to lump you all together as the collective YOU. One thing we could fix, and in these days of legal BASE, it wouldn't be that big of a deal - is post under our real names. What are we afraid of? I've been doing it for over twenty years and they haven't come for me yet. (Yes, I know there would be exceptions to that, but I also know most use the privilege to stir the pot and nothing else.) I think if we did post under our real names we would self moderate a bit what we said to each other. But I also know I'm pissing in the wind with that idea. My active BASE career is in its waning days. My judgment and reflexes aren't what they were even five years ago and I find myself walking way from more jumps than I'm making. I'm not a wingsuiter, an aerialist, or a gear guru. The only thing I can bring to the table anymore is a helping hand and some perspective because I've been around so long. If that's not useful to the majority of you guys just say so outright and sooner or later I’ll bail out altogether. But meanwhile this place is very "real" to me. People I connect with here come to my house; they eat my food, drink my beer, and ogle my girlfriend. We even jump together sometimes. And it doesn't get any realer than that . . . NickD

It's hard to qualify everything I say, or said another way, over explain everything, as it makes for bad writing, and I hate that. But I'll try. Ian (Sabre210) asks, what is a glory hound? And fair enough. First though, I'll take exception to his saying I'm all about, "it was better in the old days." Do I pine for times passed? Yes. Do I recall a time we were more tight knit? Yes. Do I recall when BASE was more about experiment, invention and discovery rather than just getting educated? Yes. Is BASE light years ahead of where it was, in terms of safety and technique, since I started? Yes. I'll also forgive you using the insinuation that my being around longer means I don't understand certain things. That's the classic young/old argument and I know you can't help feeling that way. I did the same when I was younger and now regret it, and someday you'll do the same. My definition of glory hound started before there was the phrase glory hound. And over the years it has changed, and it now means different things to me depending on context. But you asked who gets a pass, and who doesn't and again that is a fair question. My baseline definition of glory hound is this – someone who uses the sport to further their own goals. I wish I could leave it at that, I mean, I wish everyone could understand what that means, but I know some people won't so here goes. The early guys, like Carl, et el, do get a pass. They didn't know they had a tiger by the tail. They had no way to see into the future, and especially in Carl's case, yes he made films, that's what he did, and in his case the camera came before the jump. If not for the camera he would never have done the El Cap loads in the first place. In those days nobody was doing "urban" jumps and no one had any reason to hide the deed, or expect fixed object jumping wouldn't be totally accepted as just another cool thing human beings were capable of doing. Now let's balance Carl's transgressions with what he gave back to the sport. Besides naming the sport, he gave us the first BASE "magazine" in order to spread the word on safety. He gave us the BASE award. And he also gave us an underlying feeling that BASE was special in a Zen sort of way, that admittedly, most of us didn’t understand at the time. Carl set the tone for the following decade of jumping. I'll put Tommy Sanders almost in the same category as Carl. I've known Tommy since he first started shooting static line first jump photos. He was also a camera man before he got involved with BASE. It was his job. And he always portrayed BASE in a good light with a eye toward its history and a peak into its future. If you look at both Carl's and Tommy's work it can said, and this is important when defining a glory hound, it wasn't about them, it was about the sport. The gear manufacturers also get a pass. Marta, Anne, etc, and the rest are (or were) promoting their gear businesses and they also put way more back into the sport than they took away. And don’t think they are getting rich either. They are all struggling to this day. And if someone like Todd Shoebotham can get a decent check from Hollywood he more than deserves it. (Are you starting to see where this is going?) Here's how you can tell a glory hound in five seconds. They use the "I" word a lot. As in I made this jump, I made that jump, I was first, I was fastest, I went furthest, and so on. When you listen to interviews with some of these guys you think they invented the whole damn sport. It's almost like in desperation some of these guys sat down with the idea, "Man, I gotta get famous, and I gotta do it fast, what's an available vehicle?" I know that's simplistic but it's how it seems to me. Look again at the list of jumpers you mentioned, I won’t as some are dead, but measure what they put into the pot versus what they took out of the pot. It doesn't pencil out . . . Let's compare Tom A. and Felix B. - which one is the glory hound? That's a freaking no brainer. In the big scheme of things who is Felix helping except himself? Which one is "using" the sport? Which one is putting in more than he's taking out? Even Dwain understood these things before he died. He came to me once and we talked for hours about the history of BASE. He wanted to know everything I knew about Carl and the old days and I'll never forget his saying to me, "You know what, Mate, we are standing on the shoulders of giants." Sure, that may sound self serving, but its serving not one particular individual, but serving the sport itself. And in that case we could use a few more "positive" glory hounds. Where is today's Carl Boenish? Who's out there explaining the sport in positive terms? Why do we only get, "I only do it for the rush, I like to push myself, I like being on the edge." It's easy to say it's because that's what sells. But it's really because that's all these guys have for sale. Now in my own case, have I put enough into the pot that I deserve a rant? I think so. I know how much tougher it is to get way with urban jumps today than it was twenty years ago. I know if the cop who nabs me has been exposed to some positive BASE information he might let me go. I know if his exposure to BASE is (just for instance) listening to someone like John A. or even worse John V., my goose is cooked. I know the judge I'm standing in front of isn't going to buy any of my jive concerning, the beauty, the human achievement, or any higher purpose, if he happened to have seen a video where bicycles go crashing down the sides of antenna towers. A lot of people, jumpers included, are starting to lump BASE jumping into all the other new sports that have come along lately. But it doesn't, and never will, seem that way to me . . . NickD

In response to the PMs, sheesh, you guys - yes I know times are changing as I've been watching them change longer than most of you. My point was I recall when there were no references to "BASE jumping" at all outside the sport itself. Then slowly wuffo writers started using it as a frame of reference as in, "It's not as crazy as BASE jumping, but [enter some new sport here] is, blah, blah, blah." And nowadays BASE is everywhere. If you just started within the last ten years you'll miss the point of how "weird" that seems to those around for a while longer. NickD

SNL has pretty much blown chunks since it was really good in the mid-1970s, but last night's opening brought the funny . . . http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RlVtsAvKfs&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Elaist%2Ecom%2Farchives%2F2007%2F03%2F18%2Fchris%5Frocks%5Fopening%5Fmonologue%5Fon%5Fsnl%5Flast%5Fnight%2Ephp NickD

Things were so much better years ago. Look halfway down the page on the following link. http://laist.com/ Thanks be to all the glory hounds . . . NickD

Bill Booth originally called it, "hand deploy" and it made sense to us because, earlier, we had been hand deploying our front mounted reserves. It only became "throw out" as a means of differentiating it from the "pull out" when that became popular on the Racer. It's like the term "cutaway" and all the confusion it causes especially in the press. But like the above poster says, who'd want to be watching someone not dealing with a malfunction while screaming, "Mechanically release it! Mechanically release it! . . . Some years ago the USPA suggested we dumb down skydiving terminology, so we'd be better understood by the public at large. It raised a firestorm of protest from some old timers but they did manage to get some things changed. It's why "RW" is now "Formation Flying" and I remember a blistering letter they got from me that ended with, "Do whatever you want. But while you knuckleheads are in the designated flat surface rehearsing area, I'll still be dirt diving." In fact I think we should mount a reverse campaign and rename some newer terms to reflect their true meaning. "Tandem Jump" should be "Sissy Jump" "Coach" should be "Not-good-enough-to-be-a-Jumpmaster" "Safety Day" should be "Winter Beer Bust" "Skyhook" should be "Can't pull two handles in a timely fashion" "Skydiver of the Year" should be "Let's make up silly awards and give them to ourselves" NickD

Sweet dreams, Danny . . . NickD BASE 194

But, keeps his sense of humor . . . http://home.online.no/~chainly/JFKGround.mp3 Airport diagram so you can follow along – if you can! http://204.108.4.16/d-tpp/0703/00610AD.PDF NickD

The last time I saw her, the day before her accident, she was laughing . . . I'm sure she still is . . . NickD

Gee, you'd think they'd send us a letter or something. Anyway, thanks for the link. Just updated my A&P and Rigger's ticket and finally had my SSN removed. However, when my BASE number card requires a photo ID I'm quitting for good . . . NickD

Most put ripcords inside their jumpsuits, or just stuck them back in its pocket. Putting it over the wrist, as some said, was a bad idea, and broke a lot of wrists on landing . . . Then there were, "ripcord stops." these allowed you to pull the ripcord far enough to clear the pins, but not far enough for the ripcord to come completely out of the housing. That worked until people started getting killed when during emergency procedures the "floating" and "attached" ripcord fouled on something else. Ripcord stops made a brief re-appearance when cheap newbie DZOs placed bungee cords on tandem student handles so the student couldn't drop and lose them. The way they were configured was even more dangerous then the original idea. They lasted until enough old timers convinced them how dangerous it was. Ripcords were cool, and probably (at least the metal handle part) are on there way out as more free flyers move to soft handles. Maybe in a few more years the only place you'll see metal ripcord handles will be on pilot's rigs. Too bad too. That sixties TV show about jumpers probably wouldn’t have been so popular if it was called, "Pud." NickD