mircan

I was thinking more of what looks like an end cell closure and slider staying up at the half of the lines too long... There were lots of slack in the brake lines (bow like shape) on factory settings. I had to pull down about 8+ inches to get brake lines close to straight (wihout distorting trailing edge). bad old habit. I jumped old f-111 7 cell accuracy canopy whose slider always stayed at the half of the lines. Unstowing the brakes and pumping them to get the slider down after opening was routine on every jump... If you say these openings are ok, I`ll go with it. dudeist skydiver #42

Hi, can anyone look at this video and tell me if these are OK openings or what is wrong with them? Those are first jumps with my new safire 2. 139sqft and I load it 1.55 to 1.6 depending on gear that I wear. I have shortened break lines a bit after this but it still openes the same. Thanks. dudeist skydiver #42

One possibility is that mice are going to dissect our brains in order to get the ultimate question. (because we already know the answer). read more Here Search for "race of hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings"

Just couple more thing to add... - I find that knees, apart from the hands obviously, are most helpful. - See here also. Couple of good tips that I used afterwards. - get friends with local packer/rigger. I did, and he shown me couple of tricks: where to press with my hand, where to press with my knee, etc. - as above, all is in technique (those little tricks), and nothing is in the force ( ). The more you sweat, the harder it gets. - don`t allow canopy to breathe. always constrain it with something. hand, knee, forhead, chin... Those were about stuffing it in the bag, BC i think that is the biggest pain in the ars (trust me, I just got brand new safire 2). Also, as mentioned above, pack at home anytime you can. It`s all practice. cu dudeist skydiver #42

Sh*t. So they are starting... But I could tell them what it is (the answer to the ultimate question). They just need to ask. ...You know what will happen to us once they are finished? dudeist skydiver #42

I`ll post a pic of me. Maybe... I knew I`ll find ideas here. Thanks Douglas.

...Not even for a sh*t loads of bananas... As for infant tights, it may work even better that the multiple rubber bands. Though, I may end up looking like a complete idiot. Right now I only look like a half of an idiot. We`ll see. (I got nick name "Borg" last weekend when they saw me in new FTP setup). *** Also: When Steven Seagal kills a ninja, he only takes its hide. When Chuck Norris kills a ninja, he uses every part. Source here dudeist skydiver #42

If I cut my hair: - I`ll have to order a new liner because of all the extra space. - Having long hair makes me look at least 5 years younger than I am. - Besides, when I cut this bush on my head, i`m off to the "baldland", so I`ll wait just a little more. As It seems that excess hair does not have much influence on the safety side, I`ll go with the multiple rubber bands. Quick and dirty. Thank you all. P.S. Chuck Norris is stronger that Steven Seagal. I wear my beard to look like Chuck Norris

I may try something like that method. Biggest concern for me, and the reason why i ask is that hair don`t stuck somewhere in the back area of the helmet (hinge...). Somebody proposed hair-net or swimming cap, but that is waaaay uncool. Maybe I will make a braid and be like Heidi or something (little less uncool). Or combined with my beard i can look like some viking. dudeist skydiver #42

Naaaaah... It`s so yesterday. It was in fashion a couple of years ago. Plus, don`t have nice head shape for it. dudeist skydiver #42

A question for all of you who have long hair and jump Bonehead FTP. What do you do in order to tame your hair (pony-tail) when jump? dudeist skydiver #42

It was similar scenario because we were landing out, so that can maybe be considered as "wow-we-are-safe-now-because-we-found-this-nice-little-field-to-land" moment. Two other guys didn`t notice little Skeletor signs until they were next to me on the road. dudeist skydiver #42

I thought that Airvan carry more people than 206, so that is the reason why someone would get the Airvan. Correct me if I`m wrong. Also, what would be negative sides of a PAC 750? dudeist skydiver #42

No, you are not silly. It was one of those situations with a lot of assumptions (...and we all know that assumption is mother of all f*ckups). - The event was organized by military back in a day when there was no Google Earth, so we were informed about the LZ via military map. The info was something like: "LZ is the size of a soccer field, with no obstacles in the vicinity, so it`s piece of cake for you guys." - It was some church opening event with lots of people so we assumed that there are no mines. - No one from the civilian people told the army guys that there are minefields near. They assumed that army already know and Army didn`t know... One might think that the land mines are layed everywhere in the country like Bosnia, but that is not the case. Mines are usually layed in the areas where there was frontline as an insurance between trenches etc. So you usually don`t consider mines as a threat. No one told us that frontline was just next field to LZ. Plus, if we forget the mines, the whole situation was bad. Jumping into terrain which we were not familiar. Setting our altimeters on a low flyby. Very small wind indicator. Very bad target mark... I think that all of the above qualifies this jump for this thread (STUPID!). OTOH we were lucky! And we didn`t do sh*t like that again. I once more jumped in the minefield vicinity. It was in Croatia. Bad spot and strong winds made our canopies fly backwards. We were all landing out, so I picked a spot on the dirt road and landed. One guy landed to my right, and the other one to my left, not on the road, but in the field. Do I need to say that both fields on my left and right were mine fields. You can tell by those little signs with skeleton head. But, then again, they are putting those signs everywhere where they assume that can be mines. So, nothing happened. We were sooo far from the DZ that no one even consider that this is going to be an issue. It can get interesting in these parts of the world... dudeist skydiver #42

I jumped demo. We jumped from helicopter. Mi-8. We flew from 100 kilometers away, Helicopter did a low fly-by over LZ to allow us to zero our altimeters (approx). When heli reached 1000 meters we jumped. We landed in a planned area. When we landed everyone congratulated us on superb and accurate jump. They said that we were the best because we had the skill to miss the mine field. What mine field we asked? Well you know, the "mine field". Even the chopper missed it. It appears that no one informed us of any minefield, and that we were happy that our heli pilots missed the little buggers when they landed. That`s all. It comes with the territory when you live in Bosnia... I guess. dudeist skydiver #42

dudeist skydiver #42

Jim my friend, it was fun to jump with you. And very educational. cu l8r

I noticed that mechanic was working something on the engines after every flight (maybe it`s not related, though). Not to mention long prep before the first flight... dudeist skydiver #42

I know. That`s why I did a lot of searching here considering exits, especially for vidiots. Well, right now the only choice in this country, besides that Queen Air, is AN-2 (which has soooo much more cabin space). On a warm day AN-2 takes up to 40 (yes, forty) minutes to 10k feet. So in this situation, Queen Air is sprinter as it took only 22 minutes to 12k feet. I usually take my helmet off after we reach 1500 feet. In QA I put it back on pretty fast.

Last weekend I jumped from the Queen Air (QA) for the first time. I was a bit concerned after reading some posts here about this plane because I jump camera. But I also found some study that basically says that "as long as you do not jump UP from King Air, you`ll miss the tail" I was holding on to door frame, positioning myself very low. Both tandem and me were well clear off the stabilizer. In my opinion, QA has issues that require attention, but nothing dramatic (especially if you don`t have a choice in terms of choosing airplanes). OTOH, my experience in this area is tiny. just my 2c dudeist skydiver #42

Yes. The whole former Eastern Block jumped and still jumps the AN-2. There were kazillions of them produced. They climb slow and to altitude of 3500 meters max (at least that is commercially and time-consuming reasonable). We still jump the AN. Although, nowdays there is a shift to LET-410 (aka. Turbolet). But Turbolet can`t get nowhere near AN-2 in production numbers. Greetings from Balkans Jim! dudeist skydiver #42

I never had a problem with where did I wake up. I just often can`t remember how did I get there? With who? Or when? Or what did I do before it? Oh wait, maybe waking in a small wooden attic sleeping folded in my main canopy. (But that is not strange...) dudeist skydiver #42

There are two more things I remembered which I find rather interesting... First: Considering war crimes during Bosnia war. I must admit that during that time we lived in total denial. Something like: we are RIGHT, We are the good boys and we can`t be wrong. Justice is on our side. War crimes stories done by us were all enemy propaganda lies. Then when war ended, and the real story behind things started to surface... That was about time I switched my mindset to this way of thinking that I tried to explain you here. It was like waking up. Second: Canuck mentioned that great wars were started in this region before (WWI). Two-three days ago Russian spokesman in the NATO said that if NATO starts to behave outside their mandate on Kosovo Russia will use ARMED FORCE against them. Although Russian statements sometimes tend to be overstatements, that sent chills down my spine... I know there is very little probability of that to happen, but diplomats on such high position don`t say easy stuff like. Again, I hope cooler heads will prevail. Blue ones! dudeist skydiver #42

This thread is already heavily hijacked... What I wanted to say is that there is always (at least) 2 sides in conflict. And that there is never a black-white situation. When you said Serbs did what they did, I`m not saying that they didn`t (although I disagree with numbers) I`m just saying you are very wrong when you think that Serbs was the ones killing, and everybody else were victimized. 1. Search the net for numbers of Serbs fleeing Croatia at the end of war. I think it will average some 500.000 (and believe me I personally saw endless refugee lines). How many stayed in Croatia? Maybe 1%, of which half was killed right then and there. Is it called ethnic cleansing? Genocide? I don`t think so. Right now there are trials for Croatian generals in Hague held for that, but it`s not "hype" any more to report about this on the news. We have "war on terror" now. 2. My grandparents fled their home in 1995. when Muslim army came and burn their village, killing everybody that left (including one paralyzed old woman and her son that stayed). I even saw video footage of Muslim army freeing this part of the territory... (closely resembling Iraq videos of killing prisoners). Trials are held for that now, but it`s no in the breaking news anywhere... 3. Do a search on Albanian crimes against Serb minority on Kosovo during the 1999. war. Trials are held for that too. Maybe search Kosovo events from march 2004... I mentioned trials so you don`t think I`m making that up. My point is not to justify crimes saying "well the other side did it too." My point is that you must see that everybody did terrible things. Media often don`t report from both sides. Or when they do, it is not breaking news any more. Most of the people like clean situations. They make up their mind and stick to that. Very seldom they change their opinion. Point is: always try to see situation from different angles. It IS a gray world out there. Come on, you are fighting even in this thread about who blasted more people with bombs, or who gassed more in death camps. Can`t you see that everybody do the shit, but we do tend to justify shit done by our side, and magnify shit done by the other. dudeist skydiver #42

From your comment I can only understand that if the situation was the other way around (Serbia accepting Texas independence, * like that would ever happen) you would be one of the crowd burning Serbian embassy in Washington. Although I`m sad to read it here... Man, I lived in Croatia just before the war, was in the Bosnia during the shit, and witnessed shitless bombing of Serbia after it. Please don`t talk to me about things that, as you clearly stated here, don`t know anything about. I guess you build your opinion based on CNN (and alike) TV reports. And as far as the Clinton go, can you say: "Monica Lewinsky". It is sad that if you are a president of a big country, you can bomb another country just to cover up your lies about getting a blow job. That country being Sudan or Serbia is of no importance. dudeist skydiver #42