NickDG

>>Technically that was an inversion although they both kind of look the same. It would be called one though. Most Mae Wests were created by line overs.

"Catastrophic Airframe Divergence" Really means: "Your shit blowed up" NickD

>>I suppose if we were still jumping rounds we might even call it an Anna Nicole Smith these days.

It somewhat depends on how experienced Pops was when he took the big wuffocation . . . Back in the day experienced jumpers would just dust off their gear and go jump. In fact if they did ask how to go about it, someone usually retorted, "You do it like this. Shut up and get on the plane." But then some years ago my pal Pat Works, after a long lay off, wrote a PARACHUTIST article about re-entering the sport intelligently. And ever since then that's the way everybody is supposed to do it. And today that's the way it is because people worry less about killing themselves and more about getting whacked by someone else. If Pops took a powder in 1988 (20 years ago) and only had a hundred jumps, or less, then of course, he'd pretty much have to start over. On the other hand let's time trip a bit and say Pops had a few thousand jumps, and now suddenly finds himself in the Otter. What a shocker that would be . . . "No thanks, never wear one [seatbelt's]." "Holy shit, that's really two parachutes in there?" "Why's everybody wearing fishbowls on their heads?" "Jesus, half the plane is tandems. They didn't ban those?" "Sure are a lot of new rig types," [Looking at mudflaps]. "There's Billy and Joey rigs, Mary and Sandra rigs . . ." The biggest shocker though would come when Pops got to the door where he'd naturally stick his head out to check the spot. When everyone behind him starts screaming, "Go, Go, Go!!!!" He'd think, "How nice of them, everybody is cheering me on." NickD

Yes, that's what they look like . . . I had a student in the early 80s that had one, except he got a little confused and was telling everyone he had a Dolly Parton . . . NickD

Yes, I got that.

>>Skydiving is my goal, my dream, and something I want to work hard at and become good at as time goes by.

Josh, I just read about the tandem jump you did in Chambersburg which you posted here: http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=3274853;page=unread#unread That tandem went fine and you landed happy. Maybe there is just something about the DZ in San Diego and you that isn't clicking. It doesn't mean anyone is doing anything wrong, it just happens sometimes. You mentioned wanting to retake the FJC, even if you had to pay for it. So why not make a clean break of it and travel the 2 hours north to either the DZ in Lake Elsinore or Perris Valley. It's very possible either place may let you sit their FJC at a reduced rate, or maybe even gratis, if you explain what's going on with you. At first I thought your re-taking the FJC was kind of silly, but the fact you remember so little about everything is scaring me a little bit. I took my FJC almost 34 years ago and I remember almost every word of it. And I remember exactly how my first jump went like it was yesterday. You don't yet realize how fortunate you are to have two world class DZs within easy driving range. Go take advantage of it . . . NickD

Somehow people got the idea that old Eiffel Tower film from PATHE Newsreels depicts a wingsuit flight and landing attempt. It's not. The fellow who died on that jump built a large framework he wore around his body. He then draped a parachute over the framework After he jumped the parachute was supposed to lift off the framework cleanly and inflate. And, oh well . . . If anything this guy, whose name was Franz Reichelt, is the missing link between when parachutes were packed into externally mounted metal or wooden containers on balloons, and later airplanes, and when they were actually worn by the jumper in a backpack . . . The link to Pathe Newsreels is: http://www.britishpathe.com/thumbnails.php?id=64453&searchword=%20Eiffel%20Tower%20jump&searchword=%20Eiffel%20Tower%20jump NickD

>>How about the Iranian backed and supplied explosives that killed over 200 American Marines ... or is that a freedom fighter to you??

To filter out inflation, deflation, and stagflation I always equate jump ticket prices to the price of a six pack of domestic beer. When I started jumping a six pack of Budweiser was three dollars and change. And a trip to 12,500-feet was about two six packs. Nowadays, a six pack of Bud is about six dollars, but a lot of jump tickets are four and five times that. Something is seriously out of whack . . . NickD

It's hard to read some of the real posts after some vids. I just saw one the other day about a Hasidic Jewish boy, of nine years old, who got trapped in an elevator on the 7th floor of a New York Project Building. He somehow got the door open and tried to jump down to the floor below, but he lost his balance and fell backwards into the shaft. The first comment was, "So why are joos living in the Projects and sucking off public monies?" Then there are the skydiving and BASE vids where someone always says, "I hope they die!" I try hard not to believe some people really feel that way, or are that stupid, but I'm afraid they are. All you have to do is watch the call in portion of CSPAN's Washington Journal to know how scary it is out there . . . NickD

I don't know if any of you have heard of this, but there's something I think they call "Lucid Dreaming." I read a book about it some years ago. And the idea is to get to the point where you know full well you're dreaming but you can control it somewhat. One of the exercises the book suggests is before falling asleep you tell yourself that if you later realize you are dreaming you try to look at your hand. If you can master that then you can make other things happen in your dreams. I actually got as far as looking at my hand, even to the point I awoke a few times and remembered doing it. But ever since then I've been over reaching and trying to get that girl to . . . NickD

I've never been a fan boy of Donald Trump, but he said something once about Condi Rice that was right on the money. "She waves, and gets on the plane. The plane lands, she gets off, and she waves. Then she gets back on the plane to leave, and she waves, then the planes returns, and she gets off, and she waves." "But she never makes a deal!" With all the Neocon knuckleheads getting everybody worked up about Iran's nuclear prowess and the Russian's recent actions everybody really needs to take a breath. Go to a library and look at newspapers from days gone by. There's always some kind of dire crisis going on and mostly they all pass in time. So it's how you react at the time that counts. I know there is a fine line between isolationism and standing up for everyone else in the world. But the Russians will only continue what they are doing until the Russian people get fed up with it. It happened before in Afghanistan. When the Afghani resistance got organized and started kicking Russian ass all the mothers and fathers in Russia began raising hell about why they were losing their sons for pointless reasons. The same thing will happen this time unless some idiot in Washington decides this is their big moment in history. Besides, what happened to walk softly and carry a big stick? Russia's nuclear footing is in disarray and disrepair. And both they and the Iranians know if they cross the line to the point we seriously start worrying about a "real" impending threat to America, we'd turn them into a smoking hole in the ground. And while some argue radical Muslims will commit suicide for the cause, that's only the small fish, not the boys at the top. All they want to do is stay in power. Most every war begins with an over reaction on someone's part. And right now in Washington we have a group consisting of the mother's of all over reactors . . . And that's something to be really worried about. NickD

I'd written about it here before but I can never find anything specific with the search function on this site. But that's okay as I'm sure I tell it better every time I take a swing at it. So here it goes again . . . It was in the 1980s and I was working at a DZ in San Diego. There were several jumpers on the DZ who wanted to make a balloon jump so a group of us arranged for one up in Riverside County. When we arrived 5:00 AM it was us and several other groups from Perris and Elsinore. The balloon was going to 5000-feet on each load and we'd all follow along in our vehicles as the wind pushed the balloon landings further south. The basket would carry three jumpers and the pilot and we are on the fifth or sixth load. When it was our turn the balloon pilot told us to hurry and get aboard as the winds were coming up and he still had three or four loads to go. On the load was myself, my then girlfriend Karen, and another jumper we'll call Manny, as he's still jumping today and I don't want to embarrass him. I had probably a thousand skydives, plus I was already making some B.A.S.E. jumps at that time, Karen had around 400 skydives, and Manny had just recently done his hundredth jump, and it was a first balloon jump for all three of us. We took off all giggly nervous and singing some Wizard of Oz song. At about 500-feet Manny mentioned the houses and terrain below us didn't look all that great for landing, but I said we'd be passed all that by the time we got to altitude. For gear we were all wearing state of the art stuff for the early-1980s. Wonderhog rigs (the forerunner to the Vector) with seven cell square mains and round reserves. And of course no one had an AAD (which were called AODs in those days.) In hindsight, and because I've made plenty of other balloon jumps since, I didn't realize how fast we were going up. Usually it's not really noticeable, but we could feel it in our knees and the pilot was continuously running the burner with only very short breaks in between. We didn’t have a chance for gear checks on the ground so I was doing them now. And I couldn't help notice Manny was getting visibly nervous. I suppose we all were, but you know as you get more experienced you can just hide it better. I'd previously practiced with Karen for her making a stable type B.A.S.E. launch as she was using this as a rehearsal for her very first B.A.S.E. jump. I hadn’t had a chance to work with Manny at all. And at about 1200-feet Manny dropped all pretence of being brave and said, "So how the fuck are we gonna do this?" I then made a very bad mistake considering what was about to happen. I told him, "Just sit up on the edge of the basket and push off. After about 8 to 10 seconds it will feel just like a normal skydive." "What's it gonna feel like before that?" he then asked way too seriously. So I tried to lighten him up with some humor and said, "It'll feel like falling down an elevator shaft." And everybody laughed except Manny. We figured out an exit order with ladies going first, then Manny, and me going last. By now we were making good progress toward a large open field and we could see the chase vehicles below snaking along the dirt roads trying to keep up. I mentioned the wind direction to everyone as being out of the north, "So keep that in mind for landing." But with the burner going full blast it was hard to talk and hear each other. (I've since always worn ear plugs on every balloon jump). Right then everything went south. I'd just looked at my altimeter and at the other one mounted in the balloon. That one was set to MSL and I was doing the math in my head. Mine said 1700-feet and pilot's said something like 3200-feet. I looked below us at the rolling hills and was about to mention something about it all when we all heard a most horrible sound. The top of a balloon, what we'd call a crown or an apex, balloonists oddly enough call the parachute. And it's actually held in place with Velcro, and there's a rope attached to it so on landing the pilot can rip it loose to spill air from the balloon. But the Velcro had let go on its own all the way around and we are all just staring up at it. The pilot grabbed his hand held radio and announced, "We've got an in-flight emergency!" Which, at the time, I thought was weird as was someone going to send us a ladder or something? We started coming down. I looked and could see my altimeter starting to unwind and feel it too. "You guys gotta get out right now," the pilot yelled. I told Karen to go now and without a word she just dove straight over the side of the basket did about five seconds and opened her main. She was tumbling when she deployed but she did wait until the business side of her rig was up. "Now you Manny!" But he was a mess. "I can't, I can't, you go, you go first, oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck!" I looked again and we were going through 1200-feet and picking up speed. "Manny, you gotta go right now or I'm gonna leave you here!" But now he's really freaking. And all the time the pilot is screaming, "Get out, get out, get out now!" I thought about trying to throw him out, but didn’t want to get into that fight, but my instinct as a jumpmaster was telling me not to leave him. I decided to do what you do on AFF when you and your student get low but you can’t get to them. You open in their line of sight and just hope they follow suit. "Follow me, Manny, you can do it!" And over I went as we were going through a grand. I delayed a bit and saddled out about 700-feet. I know some of you are wondering why we didn't all use our reserves, but in those days we didn't have snively mains, and you only used your reserve just before the light were about to go out. I looked up and could see the balloon above me and coming my way. I pulled down on the front risers trying to get out from underneath it as I knew, or hoped really, that Manny was coming. I looked down for a second to decide where to land and picked someone's back yard. I then looked back over my shoulder. The balloon was still a couple of hundred feet above me and all of a sudden I see Manny go over the side. He passes me in freefall at about 500-feet, on his back kicking and flailing. I watched him get way below me and I'm expecting the exploding dust ring any second. And I'm yelling, "Get something out, Manny!" But I later realized my bad advice was coming into play. Manny was waiting for it to start feeling like a skydive. At the last possible moment he did throw out a pilot chute, but it was his main, and he just made it. I only saw his canopy stay inflated for a very few seconds. Manny landed first, then me, and then Karen. And now here comes the balloon. The pilot, of course wasn't wearing a parachute, and he had the burner going full blast. The balloon envelope wasn't a complete streamer but it was very close. And it crashed into the ground with a wallop. We all ran over expecting the worst, but not only was the pilot alive, except for some bleeding from cuts and some big bruises, he was awake and talking. And I could hear sirens in the distance. I talked to the pilot a bit later, and when I asked him, he said thank god you guys were jumpers, as if it would have happened with wuffos onboard, like he usually takes up, the extra weight in the basket would have probably killed everyone. He also admitted he was over-temping the balloon with the burner, in order to get in all the loads before it got too windy to fly the balloon. And that's what made the Velcro let go. He also became a great believer in parachutes, and while I don't think he wore one when he had regular passengers on board, he purchased two pilot rigs that he and his wife used when they flew together, and he always wore one when he took jumpers up. And that's what happened over a field in Riverside County some 25 years ago . . . Enjoy your first balloon jump!!! NickD

>>are they ALL burned?

Someone PM'd me an advance copy of the pay structure and some other changes . . . NickD

I'm not going to debate when someone should start down a distinct discipline path, but I know, even with students, there is no psychological block to trying almost anything new. Around the time freeflying was first gaining momentum at Perris Steve Clark and I were getting an AFF student ready for his level six jump. We had examples of all the AFF levels on video tape and we showed them to students as part of the briefing. But instead of showing him AFF level six we showed him someone doing Vrw, sitflying, and so on. After the tape ended I said, "Have you got that, or do you want to see it again?" And he said, "Sure, I got it, but we're gonna practice that on the ground a little bit aren't we?" NickD

>>how high would you flare with 500 foot lines?

I used to have something like a Clear Pass, only we called it a United States Passport, but it doesn't work anymore! NickD

I've had lots of different ones over the years but there's always one constant in almost every one. When I throw my pilot chute it just stays there in mid-air beside me. And when I do finally get under canopy my suspension lines are like 500 feet long . . . NickD

I should talk, I fixed it now, but I spelled it iterary! NickD

Bush is well read, so I'm sure there will be a room full of all the great literary works . . . NickD

>>This thread has reiterated that indeed I'm not allowed to comment on anything bar the occasional bonfire thread till I got 1000's of jumps I'm out.

>>Glad to hear that you saved yourself a repack.