Darminion

ok, I want to clarify one thing. This is not in regards to me. Not I am not on radio anymore. My canopy skills were good enough from the start that I actually told him to stop talking to me unless I was doing something really stupid cause he was screwing me up. The question at hand here is whether or not an instructor should put his personal enjoyment in front of the students safety when there is a designated swooping area which is the only place where they want people to swoop and it's too far from the student area to give accurate canopy control and landing advice. Anvile Brother #59

this is very similar to what I was talking about. I would say it's about 150 yards from the swoop course to the student landing area. And he nearly put me into a fence on one jump which I used my better judgement and flar turned it just enough to avoid it. and his perception of our altitude is way off as well. There were at least two times that he told me to start my landing pattern and I was still around 1500 feet. Another girl said he told her the same thing and she was still at 2000 feet. Anvile Brother #59

Yes, I meant should the instructor land in the student area. and yes the instructor begins talking us down as soon as he lands. If you look in the picture, he usually lands right around the far left side of the red box, and students are told to land in the square at the end of the runway. Anvile Brother #59

There has been a problem lately of the AFP instructor always swooping on a jump with a student which places him very far off from the student landing area. Myself as well as other students have had complaints that his perception of where we are as well as his perception of obstacles is caused from him being so far away from us when we land. I had a different instructor for my level 4 jump and he did land in the student landing area which I found a huge difference in the things I was hearing over the radio. Now before I get hammered for relying on the radio for landing, yes I know that each person is responsible for flying their own canopy, but this is a concern more along the lines of the one who are on their low level jumps who do need that assistance. Please see the attached arial pic to get a better perspective of what I'm talking about. Any comments are welcome. Anvile Brother #59

Thanks yall, feels great to be out there by myself now. Freefall seems so much longer. Anvile Brother #59

Hey, feeling good today. I just finished my last two levels of AFP at New Orleans Skydiving Center. I'm so happy to be a part of the sport. I'm loving the freedom of the sky. Still working on some control issues on exit but overall I did well. My canopy skills are really good. I can't wait till tomorrow. Anvile Brother #59

The Skyvan has arrived!!!!!!!!! Anvile Brother #59

Well I would have to admit that I fit into this category. My last girlfriend actually had doubts of whether or not I was gay. Probably because I taught her most of what she knows about how to dress and put on makeup. I surely have a lot of "bathroom products" laying around. Question is though. Since freeflyers tend to be characterized by how much they care about how they look in the air. Wouldn't that pretty much fit them into this catagory as well? Just my 2cents

I don't know how it compares to others but for pure heat I like "The hottest F'ing sauce" (seriously, that's the name) one drop will heat up about a 24 ounce bowl of gumbo. One drop on my tongue made that spot go numb for about 30 minutes. Anvile Brother #59

No, thankfully the winds were out of the west and the spot was over the marsh rather than the highway. Some hunter will probably find it. Anvile Brother #59

I had my first AFP jump today and had this happen. After pulling at 5500 I checked checked which direction I was going and I was going upwind, I did my controlability check and then looked down and saw I was in my holding area which was generally over a large radio tower. so I stayed facing into the wind but then realized I was getting no penetration into the wind. This was around 4000. by 2000 I had backtracked about a half mile from where I started. I kept into the wind and knew that I wouldn't make it back to the landing target so i picked an open sugar cane field ( thankfully harvest season is over and it's just empty rows ) to land in. This was around 1000 feet where I finally got below the higher winds and started some forward motion. I flared a little too high and came down kinda hard and did a PLF and I was fine. On top of these conditions, which I believed changed after we were in freefall. The radio that they strapped to me so they could talk me through canopy control ripped on my chest strap during freefall so I had to do everything on my own. Once I realized the radio was gone everything from ground school and everything I've been reading here on DZ.com for the past three weeks started clicking in my head about what to do and what not to do. My instructor seemed quite proud of how I handled it. Anvile Brother #59