robinheid

I was doing RW in the 70’s and never got kicked off a dropzone. http://i397.photobucket.com/albums/pp55/mjosparky/Skydiving/FirstrigElsinore.jpg I was doing CRW in the 70's and 80's and never got kicked off a dropzone. http://i397.photobucket.com/albums/pp55/mjosparky/Skydiving/4stack.jpg The only base jumping I did was in the early 80's and never got kicked off a dropzone. http://i397.photobucket.com/albums/pp55/mjosparky/Skydiving/ElCap.jpg It must have been my boyish good looks and charming personality. Ya think?

For Pete's sake, people, can't you be a little more creative with your whining and sniveling about new things with which you are unfamiliar and/or uninformed? In the 1970s, I was kicked off drop zones for doing relative work by people who said it was too dangerous and not to be done with the equipment of the day. In the 1980s, I was kicked off drop zones for doing CRW for the same reasons. In the 1970s and 1980s, I was kicked off drop zones for BASE jumping because I was obviously crazy with a death wish and malevolent intent toward the health, sanctity and public perception of "the sport." And now y'all are whining and sniveling and threatening people who dare to even dance near the edge of an envelope, much less step outside of it. So get over it. The equipment is overbuilt, as it has always been, and the skillsets are far outstripping the ability of old farts and noobs alike to even comprehend (watching last year's freefly national champs did that to ME), and so, what say y'all pipe down and LEARN a little bit before you go shooting off your mouths on subjects about which you have no knowledge but many uninformed opinions? Jamie's Mum did a great job of whacking y'all upside your punkin haids and it was particularly hilarious that none of you whiners and snivelers even considered the notion that it might indeed be a special case... y'all were apparently too busy projecting your own mentality on the actions of the TI and everyone else associated with Jamie's jump. And really, if you'd just watched the video and accepted what you SAW instead of putting layer upon layer upon layer of your own opinion veneers on it, it would have been clear (as it was to a couple of posters) that both TI and Jamie were very accomplished freeflyers and performed a flawless specialty parachute jump. What they did should be appreciated, not bad-mouthed. Maybe we need a new forum.... Whiners, Snivelers and Poseurs. In the meantime, well done, Jamie and TI and especially Jamie's Mum. He's a lucky lad to have a mum like you, and it was fascinating to hear the story behind their jump. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

No. No. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

OOOOPS. Your analogy just collided with your non sequitur. Let me make it even simpler: Q: What will do I do to improve canopy safety? A: Try to remember every moment that parachuting is very dangerous because each moment I forget that fact exponentially increases the chance of death or grievous bodily injury to myself or others. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

Mind my own business and don't hit anybody or get in anybody's way. Interesting; not one response to a succinct common sense solution. I guess that "mind your own business" part doesn't compute with today's politically correct parachutists. Or maybe it's too hard to understand "don't hit anybody or get in anybody's way" when you're dreaming up rules that ignore the laws of physics and human nature in a quixotic quest to make an inherently dangerous sport inherently safe. LOL SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

Don't. Riggerrob didn't specify a time frame. It seems to me that the only real doubt here is whether oil will become so expensive (due to the refusal of certain US politicians to allow exploration and drilling inside the US or just offshore) that petrochemical-derived parachute equipment will become too expensive to buy. I wonder if there's such a thing as ZP silk? SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

Mind my own business and don't hit anybody or get in anybody's way. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

+1 SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

Just to clarify further for people who have never been to Perris and have trouble comprehending the size of its landing area, check out the attached photos, with to-scale football fields superimposed over the ground. Look at the "perris landing area..." photo first. The "grass landing area" is immediately to the right of the word "skydive" on the runway. As you can see, it is about 500 feet x 100 feet. Next to it is a football field at the same scale, which is (counting endzones) 360 feet x 120 feet. The square white hangar building north of the grass landing area is 100 x 100 feet, and the area north of it is the North LZ. As you can see, the portion visible in this photo is more than 23 football fields n size. To the southeast of the grass landing area is the student LZ and other "non-grass" landing areas... more than 30 football fields in size. To the southwest, an out area, the visible portion of which is ten football fields in size. To the northwest is another out area, the visible portion of which is 6-7 football fields in size, for a total of almost 70 football fields worth of alternative landing zones in addition to the FMD-governed football-field-sized primary grass landing area. Now check out the "big picture..." photo and you will see that there are another 50-60 football fields worth of wide open landing areas (at least) in the area bounded by Case Road on the north, the irrigation ditech on the east-southeast, Mapes Road on the south, and Goetz Road on the north. This is why FMD for the grass area only is not an issue at Perris despite all the hysterical and mostly uniformed pontificating to the contrary. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

Not likely. Yes. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

If you wear a suit to jury duty, the defense will usually try to have you dismissed for cause, so whether you wear one or not depends on whether you want to get out of jury duty or not. But come on yourself, Wendy, go ahead and tell me that TrollPops doesn't have a burr under his saddle, a bee in his bonnet, and his panties in a twist over either Perris itself and/or people associated therewith. Really, no one answers an OP for a few hours so he uses it as an excuse to throw **** at the fan DZ and its people... first time I've ever heard "wit" such as that described as "rapier-like." SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

I still can't quite figure out what all your hostility is about, and why YOU are so insistent on trolling and misdirecting the thread. NO ONE responded to his lame question which had been repeatedly answered in the previous threads, so you just had to jump in and say: Which is, I might add, "put(ting) words in peoples' mouths" because it seems to me that this little kerfuffle is about a question he asked, not the "correct" opinion he offered disguised as a coda thereto. So are you hostile to Perris generally, the Conatser family, Dan BC, Bill von, Paul Q, me -- or all of us? Please man up and come clean, TrollPops, because it's patently obvious from the hostility YOU incited on this thread, and onto which YOU repeatedly threw more gasoline, that you really have a personal problem with either the DZ and/or some or many people associated therewith. P.S. And Beachbum, if you were really sincere in your question, and you really didn't understand through the repeated postings from Perris jumpers that the air traffic environment there is in fact quite orderly, organized and safe the vast majority of the time, then I apologize for misunderstanding your post. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

I suppose I must spend hours doing searches from every conceiveable angle about something to be absolutely certain that a question is "original" before posting a query from now on. I'm so terribly sorry to have inconvenienced you by forcing you to sit in front of your pc and making you read what was a genuine question... ...but that you felt had too little merit to bother with a response. Funny, you don't seem to mind making the supreme sacrifice of your time by responding to give someone grief though. Just goes to show you how lame your "genuine question" really was, doesn't it? LOL SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

Well, duh! I imagine the people who "run" Perris have other things to do, yes. It's the Perris local jumpers who have been posting by far and away. Didn't take long to respond to me, though. It got a response for the OP. Thanks. Another *whoosh* for you, POPS... guess it never occurred to you that no one thought the OP merited a response because, guess what? There is nothing "original" in it. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

It's rare that anyone would do that and I totally missed the intent. My apologies, please. I was off-base and got picked off. +1 That's been spelled out several times over several threads by several people.....even young jumpers see and understand it . true, but you're the only one who seems really hostile toward the people who support it, even in part. ....and that's one of the points spelled out over and over again. I just see numbers piling up at Perris and can't help but wonder, "why is it business as usual there?" What you think you see doesn't mean that's the way it is and, when you get right down to it, the hysteria over Perris Valley's FMD reminds me a lot of the hysteria that surrounded Perris Valley's missing Russian. There were all these wild assertions that the entire system needed to be thrown out in order to avoid that one-in-10-million chance that someone might get hurt and end up being overlooked at the end of the jump day. Then with the Russian, as now after Pat and Chris, there is casual and/or even formal revisitation of the best practices that can minimize the chances of either event happening again, but it's systemically psychotic to demand system overhauls every time there's a statistically insignificant hiccup in the system. Which, to be clear, is not saying that any individual death is insignificant. In the case which sparked this thread, Patrick was a friend of almost 20 years and his loss leaves a big hole for me personally. But at times like this, it's vital to put aside personal feelings that cloud better judgment when it comes to radically changing systems based on anecdotal, perceived or flat-out incorrect data. Bill's assertions are not excuses; they are FACTS: There are almost no DZs in the world that do more jumps per year than Perris, and I don't think there are any DZs anywhere in the world that do as many big-way events per year attended by hundreds of people from all over the world. Despite this and its often-gnarly wind and density altitude challenges, Perris definitely has a good and arguably has a stellar safety record. And please don't forget another fact: Sometimes at Perris during the last two decades, there have been 2- and 3-year gaps between fatalities of any kind, and even longer gaps between "traffic-related" fatalities, yet the "off-year" kudos are inversely proportional to the "on-year" brickbats. So maybe instead of hyperventilating hyperbole, it might serve everyone better to just kinda cool it and remember that we're doing something very dangerous that we do by choice not necessity and if you don't like the complex air traffic environment at large DZs, then quit jumping or find a place that flies one Cessna and you won't have to worry about it. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

+1. That is in fact what a lot of jumpers do at Perris, especially during the really gnarly months when it's hot, thermally, dust-devilly, and ridiculously changeable al at the same time. Contrary to one poster on this thread who says he doesn't jump at Perris but claims to know everything about the landing conditions there, the winds often change continuously throughout the day, not only from load to load, but from the time you open to the time you land -- and sometimes blow different directions at opposite ends of the the grass landing area. For that reason, a LOT of Perris jumpers will park it at various times during a "jumpable" day to avoid that very dilemma. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

*whoosh* Sorry POPS, that "whoosh" is for YOU... guess it didn't occur to you that I appreciate a well-delivered riposte even if I'm its well-deserved target. And now, as long as I'm here again, I'm really wondering what's with your hostility toward the "FMD camp." FMD is one of several workable solutions to traffic issues and, so far, has proven to be the best solution at Perris due to its wind conditions and wide-open alternative landing areas for people who choose not to follow FMD. At Perris, it's really REALLY simple: If you want to land on the grass, follow FMD. If you don't like FMD's choice, land the way you want at one of the alternate landing sites a couple of hundred yards away or more -- and wait for the DZ taxi service to come get you. The only caveat: Have enough common sense to understand that landing "just east of the grass" or anywhere else inside the grass traffic pattern envelope is a lawyerly technical distinction, not an operational boundary. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

+1 SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

Tell Bob Holler that. It takes 2 to have a collision but only one to cause it. Sparky You're half right: It takes 2 to have a collision but only one to cause it when both parties aren't looking. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

Not a valid reason, but I think that FMD advocates think that way because they are excessively worried about having to do a down- or cross-wind landing in the event that the wind changes between boarding and landing. If that is the case then a little education and practice on landing other directions that into the wind might be a better answer than FMD. After all, when landing out there may be no option. If that fear is taken away then a pre-determined landing direction makes perfect sense. Setting a pre-determined landing direction before takeoff. Great idea: Look how much money DZs would save not having to have buy and maintain those pesky windsocks and tetahedrons. Jumpsuit and rig repair companies would also benefit, not to mention the ambulance companies. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

All this talk about ego and arrogance and here we go... Oh the irony of it all. [/] +1 SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

Your assumptions are unwarranted and intensely disrespectful of Chris. Did it ever occur to you that maybe he just didn't see Pat either -- that he did, in fact, carefully check his airspace before doing his entry turn and just missed the little canopy below him? What I find intriguing here is why you are so compelled to attribute essentially all landing/collision fatalties to moral failure instead of human error. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

You apparently haven't jumped much at Perris, where windsocks on opposite ends of the 100-yard grass landing area can point opposite directions -- and the ones in the middle point somewhere else. FMD works at Perris because there is a large off-grass landing area for everyone who doesn't want to comply with FMD. I've done it myself: FMD goes one way and either the wind changes or the FMD choice doesn't match my own, so I land the way I want out where that it permissible. It's true that FMD does not necessarily work everywhere, but it's the best solution at Perris with its routinely high-variability wind directions and enormous secondary and tertiary landing areas. On the other hand, the "flaws" you list are not legitimate; they are straw men in the vernacular of propaganda arguments and, your canopygod obfuscation aside, share the same, ahem, flaw: They are irrelevant. FMD = FMD regardless of how s/he gets there. Next! SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

This to me sums up pretty much every HP landing/collision fatality. Then you haven't done your homework. As Professor Kallend likes to say, it takes two to collide but only one to avoid. Or as my father said to me when he was teaching me how to drive: There are no "accidents." We have all been in this spot, whether under canopy, in freefall, on the highway or the bike path: Sometimes we avoid a collision because we're looking out when someone else isn't. Sometimes a collision is avoided because the other guy was was looking when we weren't. Collisions happen on those rare occasions when both parties aren't looking. "Ego" is is certainly a component on some landing and/or collision fatalities, but you need to get out from behind your keyboard a little more before making such a summary declaration. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

IIRC, I'm EC #45... September 1979. This was one month after I made my first BASE jump with Carl, Dave Blattel and John Noak at the Royal Gorge Bridge. Carl organized the El Cap trip, with Mike Burt, me, Jeff Fisher, Jim Wallace, John Noak and a junior high music teacher whuffo to "ground crew." Then Carl couldn't go, but the rest of us went anyway. Someone tipped off the rangers, and they swooped in just before we were going to jump, pinning us up against the edge with nowhere to go (LOL). I was the only one geared up, so I bid the "gentlemen" to "have a nice day" and off I went. Got caught later on at the bottom and spent a night in the John Muir Hotel, then hitchhiked home with Jim after Mike Burt was re-arrested for (allegedly) stealing his own gear from the evidence room... or something like that. SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.) "The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."