pilotdave

At work, the only thing on my mousepad is someone elses crusty disgustingness. I was eyeing an intern's fancy mousepad with integrated gel wrist rest on her last day. Well after she left, I found this gross, dusty, discolored old mousepad just like it on my desk. The guy next to me actually took the intern's mousepad, left mine on her desk, and gave me his old nasty one. And he pretended he had given me her nice new one and did me this big favor. Oh well, at least I have a fancy gel thing now. At home I have a Boeing Helicopter mousepad. Had to pick up a souvenir when I was there on a bidness trip (they wouldn't let me bring home a V-22). Dave

http://www.skydivingmovies.com/ver2/pafiledb.php?action=file&id=1799 Dave

I dont see why not (though I dont know for sure), but I can't imagine you'd want to do that. If you have a major structural failure or serious fire and really need to bail out, do you want a 25 lb rig on your back? I'd want the thinnest, lightest rig I could get. Dave

One of my favorites from college... a question on an exam started off with "a 10 pound mass hangs on a string..." or something like that. Some people misread it as 10 pound-mass (why lbs are ever used for mass never made sense to me either) and multiplied it by g to get the weight. Talk about reading too far into something. Dave

How much force it would take to move it depends on a couple of things. F=ma. The force needed to accelerate it depends on its mass. Mass hasn't changed. But then there's friction. Friction (at least between some surfaces in this case) is a function of weight, not mass. So some of the friction might be reduced (though some probably wouldn't change since you're not trying to drag the locked wheels over the ground). If it was a big box you were trying to push over the ground (to simplify things), and the surface of the moon was the same as the surface of earth, it'd be easier to push it on the moon because the weight is lower so the frictional force you need to overcome is lower. But if you went to the extreme case of a frictionless surface, it would take the same force to get it moving. Dave

What you're saying comes as a huge surprise to me, only because I see you jump at skydive chicago under a much more advanced canopy at a much higher wingloading than most students learn under. Listening to some people, it sounds like skydive chicago students come off student status and start jumping stilletos... but it's ok because they give much much better canopy training to their students than most DZs (yes I'm exaggerating). I guess you can't exactly compare your training to anyone elses so maybe it really is better (but not what you hoped for), but it sure doesn't sound impressive to me. Edit: But don't worry too much about not learning everything about canopy control in 10 jumps. I don't have any clue what a couple things on your list mean, and I didn't do my first full stalls until I had over 200 jumps. Those things you mentioned are not things that have been traditionally taught to students. Doesn't mean they shouldn't be, but you still might be getting much better canopy training than students of the past. Dave

Yeah, I tend to filter out what sponsored people say, but filter in what manufacturers say. Make em different colors! Dave

Snopes agrees with ya: http://www.snopes.com/science/coriolis.htm Dave

I've got somewhere in the area of 200 jumps on my Sabre2 and no hard openings. That isn't to say I don't have other opening problems, but almost every opening is soft. I've had some firmer openings, but nothing like a typical opening on my old PD 9-cell. And it doesn't seem to matter how sloppy I pack it either. Maybe I'll get smacked on my next jump, but hard openings are just not something the sabre2 is known for. Dave

If a British astronaut went to the moon, would he weigh the same thing that he does on earth? Dave

I've seen a skydiving video or two... My observation is that music and editing are important, but content is critical. Good videography makes up for bad editing any day. But my favorite videos are the ones that draw my attention in and keep it in. 20 minutes of 2-way sitflying does nothing for me, no matter how it's edited. What keeps my attention is seeing things I haven't ever seen before. Interesting angles, unusual jumps, amazing moves, hilarious mess-ups. I like seeing skydivers doing things I can't even dream of doing myself... whether it is the videographer or the jumpers being filmed doing the amazing things. Editing is definitely important. Selecting music that fits (but unique enough that not everybody would have ever thought of choosing that music), cutting scenes at a pace that matches the content and the music, not doing annoying things like showing exits in reverse over and over and over (yeah it gets old) and too many special effects screwing up the picture. But I really think the most boring skydive in the world (is there such a thing?) can be turned into an awesome video by a skilled videographer, not by a skilled editor. Dave

I've done it a couple times now. First one was with video. The instructor left the decision completely up to the video guy, who had no problem with it. The instructor just told me to stay off to the side and he'd signal me if it was ok to dock. I never got a signal, so I just hung out next to em. Second one was with a friend of mine on his first jump and no video, so I got to dock head-on with him. I can definitely see how tandem video could be fun to do for a while...

Ok I went ahead and completely copied sangiro's new method for selecting the top 10 DZs using a true Bayesian estimate formula. I applied the formula to the skydivingmovies.com video ratings. You can see the top rated videos HERE. You can also sort any particular category by ratings with the little drop down sort selection at the bottom of every list of videos. Sangiro's explanation is HERE if ya missed it (and care!). Thanks sangiro! Dave

The grounding might not help with altitude awareness, but the threat of a grounding might. The DZ has chosen to raise awareness about the seriousness of a cypres fire. Maybe they observed that newer jumpers don't have the same feelings about cypres fires that the older skydivers have always had, so they decided to start doing something about it. They have taken the stance that they don't take cypres fires lightly. Have one, you're grounded. You're not just going to get a quick repack and hop back on the plane. You will know that what you did was extremely serious and you are not welcome in the air over that DZ for a while. Now you are absolutely right. This does not mean it won't happen again. Retraining is the next step. But the threat of grounding sets a tone on the DZ that cypres fires are unnaceptable. It's a start. Dave

To sum up what he just said in my own words: Mirages are for metrosexuals (fancy boys). Especially purple ones. No offense to the fancy boys mirage owners reading this.

It's mental overload. Your brain just can't react to EVERYTHING all at once. Keep jumping... it gets easier, and you'll start to get much more aware of whats going on around you. Only gets funner from here! Sounds like you did great to me. Pulled, landed, didn't cut away for no reason, and didn't fly yourself into power lines. A+ Dave

Yep...the president has a huge FRZ and TFR around DC. I think he should be shackled in the center of it. Dave

Any fairly new container (about 1996 or later) will probably be safe and freefly friendly. Just gotta find something that fits the canopies you want and is sized about right for you. You can get a harness resized if you really cant find anything that fits you but will fit the canopies. Don't focus too hard on particular brands....those two are popular but not necessarily better than many other brands out there. Just make sure whatever you get doesn't have velcro on the flaps/riser covers. Dave

That last link should be: http://www.skydivingmovies.com/ver2/pafiledb.php?action=file&id=1793 Dave

I posted this before, but in case anyone missed it, HERE'S a 1968 technical paper on the history and applications of the parafoil. Gives a bit more background into where the ram air canopy came from in the first place, before developing into accuracy canopies and everything else we jump today. Dave

One heads-up for the future: www.skydivegear.com (I don't see a need to make it clicky) seems to be an online gear store in development. It's registered to the same guy as Skyride. When/if it opens, be aware of where your money might be going. Now of course I have no idea who actually owns the gear store or how they might be affiliated with skyride. But I'd sure want to find out before buying something from them. Dave

1-800-skydive is clearly more ethical than skyride, but I don't consider them all that different in some ways. They only represent participating dropzones. So they may send you many miles out of your way, passing multiple other dropzones, to make your jump. Now they don't misrepresent themselves, but they don't give all the facts either. Again, skyride is in a whole different league, but I don't like 1800skydive either. Dave

Shut off the winXP firewall on the computer you can't get into. I ran into that problem last weekend. The firewall had an exception set up for file/printer sharing, but it still wasn't working. Dave

http://www.tridenthc.com/ It's an updated Reflex. Dave

Just delays the inevitable. I say go drag it through the mud and quit worrying about keeping it white. Dave