Grogs

No beef with you Chronistin, but I get really annoyed when I hear this type of statement. The fact you're alive does not mean you did everything right. It means you didn't do everything wrong. A person can do everything they're supposed to do, make all the right decisions, and still end up dead (Jan Davis comes to mind here). On the other hand, a person can do all sorts of stupid things like pull the cutaway handle instead of the BOC handle, roll on their back flailing, and have the Cypres deploy their reserve and save them. I have a hard time thinking that a Cypres save is 'doing everything right.' Personally, I'd rather hear something like ''You did ok there, but let's talk about what you could have done better' or even 'You're really lucky to be alive, let's talk about what you could have been better' Dead men tell no tales, but a person who's survived a successful cutaway and/or reserve deployment can and we need to all take advantage of that opportunity.

I wouldn't trust any of the canopy manufacturers' questions about canopy pack volume because they all have different ways of measuring it. Most likely, you'll need a J-3 to hold a ZP 170 canopy like the Hornet (it's rated for 150 max ZP size), but talk to your local rigger or call Sunpath or your nearest Javelin retailer and put the question to them just to make sure.

Talk to your riggers and/or packers. They do that all the time, so they have to be at least reasonably fast. Other than that, the only real way to get faster is through practice. Break the packing down into pieces (setting the brakes and walking up the lines; flaking the canopy; bagging the canopy; stowing the lines; closing the container) and repeat each step several times in a row (rather than doing the whole chute at once) and you'll start to learn your own shortcuts, recognize lines by feel, find the best method for getting the canopy in the bag, etc.

Bad boy! Always lie to the doctors and say you fell down the stairs, slipped in the bathtub, or some other lame-ass whuffo excuse unless you have no other choice (i.e. the Life Flight helo picks you up on the DZ). You never know when your insurance company is going to get stupid and decide not to cover you because you were skydiving, getting ready to skydive, or even having a dream about skydiving. Scuba diving with sharks = Covered; Riding a BMX bike down Mount Everest = covered; Skydiving = High risk activity, not always covered.

For me my RW started clicking in the 30's or 40's. My canopy work really took off after 100 though. I hit 100, then the next weekend I visited a different dropzone (Louisa, aka Orange for those of you who remember ). I think I was trying to show off a bit at the new DZ, and I was cranking front riser turns and really playing with my canopy and having a great time, landing right where I wanted each time, etc. Ever since then I've really been enjoying my canopy rides rather than just trying to get down so I could freefall again.

This isn't *quite* true. There is a canopy control course at Deland and (I believe) Perris Valley. From what I have heard it is very good and they can train you for any level from the very basics to doing a super canopy swoop with your VX-79. I'd love to go through myself, but the $$ and getting the time off are always a problem. Maybe after I win the lottery. A couple of things you might consider doing if you're really having problems: Wear a radio again for a few jumps. Fly in normally and just have the person with the radio talk to you if you're getting into trouble. Than talk to the person with the radio afterwards and get him to debrief you on why he gave you corrections. -OR- Have someone film your pattern and landings from the ground, then get a JM or other experienced jumper to watch the tape with you and debrief you on what exactly you did. What you see from the ground is usually far different from what you see when you're under canopy. -OR- This is probably the hardest one to do. Get a very experienced canopy pilot, preferably a CRW type to jump with you and fly a similarly loaded canopy, then you play follow the leader and follow him through the landing pattern and he debriefs you at the end. Flying the canopy is really *the* weakest point of the current training methods. We really should be doing these sorts of things anyway rather than you having to go and ask people to help you out. Until then, be proactive and go ask for the help if you need it. Blue Skies, Grogs

This is pretty funny. I'm actually pondering the same question myself. I won a certificate for 35% off an Icarus canopy this weekend, so I know who's going to be making my next canopy.

I'd have to agree with Schumacher on this one. For comparison's sake, we had a guy who just got his rig in on Saturday. It was a brand new Javelin J-3 fully articulated with stainless rings, Spectre 170, PD Reserve, and Cypress for $4050. I don't know how much the shipping would be to Israel, but I'd bet it would come out about the same as your configuration (and if you got a Hornet in the container it would be even cheaper than with a Spectre). I'm not trying to sell you on a Javelin, just giving you something to think about. There are lots of good containers out there. A couple of other things to keep in mind too: If the Naro is designed to be a student rig, it probably isn't very freefly friendly. You may or may not want to do that, but it's better that you don't freefly because you don't choose to rather than because you can't with your equipment. What's the resellability of the Naro? In the US it probably wouldn't be too much since most people are looking for Javelins, Vectors, Dolphins, etc. It may be different where you are. This is a bit off the subject, but do you feel comfortable flying a 150 at your experience level? I have your exact dimensions, 5'11" 165lbs and I was still flying a PD-230 at that level (although I changed to a 170 not long after). Most people would consider loading a canopy at 1.25 with 60 jumps to be pretty aggressive. I know some people who've flown even more heavily loaded canopies at that level, so it just depends on what you're comfortable with. Blue Skies, Grogs

Congrats. Learning to pack is fun, eh? That's pretty tough learning to pack on a tandem. Those things still kick my ass sometimes (especially the Icarus tandem, Ick!). You'll find it much easier to learn on a mid-sized F-111 like a PD-170 or so. It's smaller, much easier to get in the bag, and has a lot fewer steps than packing a tandem. Anyway, congrats again and I'm sure your DZ will thank you for the beer.

I think it's all in the person's attitude. Are they just out to do one tandem so they can check it off their 'things to do before I die list?' or are they planning to do it more and they want to get everything they can out of it. I think probably 95%+ of all tandems are just passengers ('hauling beef' is the expression around our DZ) and they just want to jump out, enjoy the ride, and not be burdened by things like the mechanics of a Ram-Air parachute or how to turn and land it. On the other hand, a person who thinks they might want to do more than one jump and wants to learn and experience as much about skydiving as possible during the jump is a student.

He might have been referring to the shin/knee guards people wear in some sports (actually spelled gaiters I believe). We wore gaiters in orienteering to protect our lower legs from sticker bushes, branches, etc. as we ran around in the woods.

I don't know what type of characteristics you'd look for in a canopy for skysurfing, but I'll agree about the openings. The only person I know who jumps a Safire packs it with the nose fully exposed (not pushed back, rolled, etc.) and still gets great soft openings. After packing the sabre for 100 jumps and all the pickiness that you usually have to do packing it to keep it from snapping you on opening you'll love the Safire.

Hi Andrea: I think you'll do fine on the Hornet 190. You should have no problem flying and landing a canopy at 1:1 safely, and personally I think you're actually better off being around 1:1 rather than being far below that because the canopy will be more stable. At our DZ we've actually been known to put 1st jump students out on a Hornet 170 because with the high gusty winds we seem to have most weekends at our DZ they'd be getting tossed around and being blown backwards on a giant 288 sq foot manta. Just make sure to open nice and high and practice your flare and all the control surfaces so you'll know how it will react when you go to land it and be ready to PLF in case you get it wrong.

I don't think I've ever looked at a racer rig up close, but isn't there a similar system on a Vector tandem rig? I know there is a small piece of rope (for lack of a better word) running from one the left set of risers to the right. I asked my rigger about it and he told me it was so that the RSL would still work on a cutaway even if the risers on the RSL side broke.

I packed myself a nice little mal back in January. I took my rig home show my parents. I pulled the main out of the bag to show them, then I repacked it. When I was repacking it, I broke something like 3-4 rubber bands and I didn't have any spares with me, so I closed the bag a put all the extra lines inside the container and closed it up. When I got back to my place, I opened the container, pulled the bag out, replaced the broken rubber bands, and closed it back up. Unfortunately, somewhere in the process I flipped the bag through some lines so that when it opened my lines were twisted up and I had no steering control and had to cutaway. I learned a very important lesson from that pack job. I'm pretty paranoid now about stopping a pack job between putting the chute in the bag and closing the container, and if for some reason I had to walk away from a pack job at that point, I'd pull it out back out and start over to make sure the lines hadn't been wrapped while I was gone. My first suggestion for what to do is get back up in the air, assuming you haven't already. If you sit around for a long time before you jump again you may lose your nerve and may end up not ever jumping again. In my case, I rented a rig that same day and made another (very careful) jump. After I got the jitters out on the first jump after the cutaway, most of the fear went away. As for the packing, I'd suggest you have a rigger or some other very competent packer watch you pack a couple of times and make sure you're not doing anything stupid. My take on packing is there are really only a few thing you HAVE to do, and the other 90% is just a matter of personal preference that makes it easiest to get the parachute into the bag, keep it from opening too hard, etc. Learning to pack can be quite a daunting task, but as long as you know the things you HAVE to do (such as checking line continuity, pushing the slider up, clearing the tail, and keeping the lines in the center when you pro-pack) even if it's not the prettiest thing in the world going into the bag, it'll still open fine.

Well, you shouldn't need any equipment to start out. Most DZ's will provide all the equipment for your training jumps, and in fact most will REQUIRE you to use theirs while you're a student. Once you've got a few jumps under your belt and have an idea what you need you can start considering equipment. As for how to get started, call up the closest dropzone and sign up for a course and what type of training they offer. Take a look at http://www.uspa.org/GroupMembership/drop_zones.htm for a list of dropzones to find the closest. The only problem I see is that since you're 17, very few DZ's in the US will allow you to jump unless you're 18 for liability reasons (you didn't say where you lived). I can't say what the age requirements are in other (less lawsuit-happy) countries.

Well, I hope for your *hypothetical* friend's sake he's a he and not a she at 225 OTD. Personally, I'd recommend the Silhouette. I am a bit biased because I've been jumping a Silhouette 170 at about 1.15:1 for the last 100 jumps or so and I've only jumped a Sabre 3 or 4 times, but here are my experiences. It seems to turn nicely using either toggles or front risers. Generally, the turns start slowly, but after 45 degrees or so they really pick up speed, so you can really have some fun with it. Also, it comes out of the turns nicely, which is nice if you make a calculation near the ground and need to stop a turn in a hurry. It also seems to land pretty well, and you can choose to either pick up a bit of speed and land it 2-stage fashion, or do a straight-in approach and land with a conventional flare. One thing the Silhouette will definitely beat the Sabre on is packing though. Since it's a hybrid instead of a full ZP, it packs smaller and easier. Also, the Silhouette opens very softly. I've yet to have a hard opening on it and I do absolutely nothing (other than quartering the slider) to slow it down. From what I've seen, a sloppy pack job on a Sabre will result in a bad opening, while a sloppy pack job on a Silhouette (I've done a few

Nah, you'll do fine. In general, the smaller the canopy, the easier it is to pack. You already have a ZP main, so that won't be too difficult for you. The only problem with Sabres is they like to snap you every once in a while (Triathlon's do too from what I've heard). Just get someone to show you how to roll the nose to prevent that and you'll have no problem.

Sweet deal Brandon. I'm glad you can get people to go jump with you. I can't get any of the lamers from my work to do a jump, even though I've tried. I had a couple of girls who were a bit interested, but they didn't think it was worth $179. If they were cute and unattached, I might think about financing that, but they've both got bf's, so I gave up on them. Maybe some day I'll get one of them to go and experience the joy of falling

Right-O. If you look at a freebag, you'll notice it has a really long (10-15') bridle, and it's about 2" wide. The theory is that if the reserve pilot chute gets caught around your leg or other body part, there will be enough drag on the bridle to pull the reserve out of the bag, and, since it's not attached to the parachute, you don't get a horseshoe. So the danger of losing the freebag is far outweighed by the decreased possibility of a horshoe malfunction on the reserve.

I tried chasing a main one time, 'tried' being the operative word. I kept trying to figure out where it was going to land, but because of the forward speed of my canopy it looked like it was blowing all over the place. At about 1000' I gave up and set down in a back yard near where I thought it would land, which wasn't too bad until I noticed the trees in the yard at about 50'. Fortunately I was able to steer clear and land safely. The canopy landed in the field next to the back yard. I decided not to hop over the barbed wire fence to get it, mainly because I had a demo canopy and didn't feel like paying $$$ to get it patched. By the time I got over to it, the DZ manager was already there gathering it up. Unfortunately, we never did find find his freebag. We also had a cutaway this past weekend from one of our CRW guys, and one of the other guys swooped the main. He caught it on his legs, flew his canopy in, and then on final kicked it off and landed fine. It looked really cool, but I have to think it was a very risky maneuver, and definitely not something I'd recommend. He could have easily fouled his own main and had to cutaway himself.

Cool deal. Glad to hear it went well. Don't worry too much about having to repeat the level though. It happens to most people somewhere along the line, and I'm sure you'll do better on the next jump.

It's all in the jumpsuit. Talk to whoever sells jumpsuits at your DZ (if you have a person there who does that) and get measured for a jumpsuit. You'll want to get one that's baggy and has non-slick material on the front to slow you down. You could even have swoop cords installed if you're an extreme faller. Talk to some jump suit manufacturers too. I've heard at least one manufacturer (Tony Suits?) can take your height, weight, and measurements, throw them into a computer, and determine your natural fall rate and the type of jumpsuit you need to slow you down to an exact freefall speed (109 or 120).

The US Military does the breast enlargement thing as well. I saw a story on the news about female sailors at Norfolk Naval Base getting the breast enlargement thing done a few months ago. I find this pretty annoying from a taxpayer/former military perspective, but not particularly surprising.

We like to do one called a 'memory dive' If you have the Blocking Together book laying around your DZ (it's really useful, it's full of formations from 2 to 20-ways), it has 9 different 2-way formations in it. Try and do each one of them. Since they don't necessarily go in any certain order, it requires quite a bit of thinking to keep all the points straight, and also requires a good bit of flying to accomplish all of them. A couple of other dives I like to do are: 1. Start in a star, then one person flys around the other one, doing a sidebody, a cat, the other sidebody, then back to the star. After the first person finishes, the second one moves around and does the same moves. 2. Launch a compressed accordian, then one person back out, side slides over, and forms a compressed accordian on the opposite side. Then the 2nd person does the same thing. If you really want to have fun, you can pop up and slide over the person and do a vertical transition instead of backing up.