dorbie

As I understand it the lawsuits primary complaint was never about childproofing guns. You can't sell a cup of hot coffee in the USA without safety labels but you can sell a gun where if some dumbass removes the clip he can't obviously see that he has a round chambered, and he can still discharge the weapon. None of this has anything to do with childproofing guns. And before you start in on me, I'm not even making the case just highlighting the points they'd have made to 12 of your intelligent peers.

No, the vehicles are very different. A better analogy is does the motorcyclist that drives fast w/ a helmet, but within their risk/benefit maximum witha helmet. I don't think a helmet is comparable to an AAD since it is a lot less likely to fail to operate than an AAD. Your attention to wheel count is admirable but hardly the point of the analogy. Just as it's understood there's an increased risk of head trauma in motorcycle accidents, it's understood that there's an increased risk of being knocked unconscious with certain skydiving disciplines. If you're an experienced coach and perceive there's that very significantly increased risk of going in with a no-pull that's your personal business. Ignoring that increased risk w.r.t. the best device to mitigate it seems foolhardy, maybe even unjustifiable. I couldn't disagree more on the reliability of helmets w.r.t. performing their function (namely saving your brain in an accident) but that's hardly the point. My sole reason for posting this was to illustrate how futile resorting to analogies about red light runners are and offer a compelling counterpoint. I'll leave you to figure out the merits of air bags vs helmets vs AADs.

No it's more like my motorcyclist analogy. Still no answer on my motorcycle question?

I'm not actually disagreeing with you. The toy gun comment was merely polemic to convey what the mindset of 12 random people vetted for their unfamiliarity with firearms might be after listening to a cynical legal team for a few days. Yup different model, different company. And once again difference two whom? See my first post in this thread. Who is the indicator for? The person who owns and operates the firearm. In this case the person who assumed they left an unloaded firearm lying around when tragically the weapon had a chambered round.

Looks deceptively like a toy gun, no wonder the kid picked it up.

It doesn't matter what I understand, I wouldn't have been on the jury. Other products available with the missing safety features is a double edged sword that raises an obvious question. A Jury might have seen removing the clip as one way (however flawed in this instance) of disarming a weapon. The spinelessness was on the part of the insurance company who can walk away when the dust settles.

The indicator is for the dumbass parent who removed the clip but left one in the chamber. If a DEA agent can do it then Joe Schmoe is capable and the gun companies know this. So do you. It's a 100% iron clad certainty that gun owners will continue to leave rounds chambered in guns with a removed clip. The only way to prevent this from happening is the design of the weapons (chambered round indicator and/or clip trigger interlock). It is virtually impossible to prevent this with public education. When you're selling a product that has easily correctable life saving modifications that have been in use for years and someone requires lifelong medical care because you don't make those modifications then you have a product liability problem. Not that I approve of the lawsuit or the settlement. The dumbass owner of the gun who is largely at fault and the frigging idiot kid that pointed a weapon at someone and pulled the trigger, but the insurance company can settle this and doesn't have to even cover S&W next year. I doubt S&W would have settled given the choice, they'll get saddled with the premiums and the future lawsuits.

Why would anyone debate an issue on the pejorative terms of one side of the issue? Is a motorcyclist who won't ride a bike without a helmet but will drive a car without one exercising good judgement? If you're reasoning by analogy then pick better analogies. Or better yet don't resort to analogies that only serve to cloud the real issues, you might escape the next 1000 posts going round in circles.

It was you who started this thread with an appeal to not have your words twisted into something you didn't say.

Dude, I wouldn't let anyone lick crap of MY toes for 4 jump tickets never mind the other way around. As for your buddy with the camera, he has even bigger issues than you do. Anyone who pays some rent-boy 4 jump tickets to lick shit of his toes is a bigger freak than the licker.

There are similarities with the keyhole and worldwind stuff but the products are not the same. Image quality is significantly affected by content and the NASA viewer tends to have Blue Marble (MODIS visible spectrum satellite composite) with Landsat-7 as their higher resolution insets, that limits the useful ground resolution to about 15m where they have the landsat coverage. This is probably not a technical limitation, it's just the data they're rendering with. The keyhole stuff has a 15m base image everywhere in the USA to which they add AirPhotoUSA data that's anywhere from 2m to 3 inch resolution (about 4ft & 2ft is typical). If you want to see something impressive check out the strip in Las Vegas or downtown San Diego in the keyhole viewer. The absolute best data in the keyhole stuff is just North of the VAB in Cape Canaveral rolling into the building, you can see individual tiles on the Shuttle and that data is about an inch in resolution (Sourced from a NASA image taken from the roof of the VAB). It depends how close you want to look over your DZ, but if you want to recognize detailed features you'll need good resolution data.

Google only has 15m over zhills but the downloadable client had much better data, I can't upload a large attachment but here is a crop from the larger image. This data is sourced from Airphoto USA they can sell you an image of the area if that's all you need or you can just download the keyhole client yourself.

Google purchased Keyhole last year. The images on the google maps are derived from the same technology but the resolution and data coverage is different between the web product and the downloadable client (I think mainly the Airphoto USA images aren't on the web but the web's 15m image is better). Typically the downloadable keyhole client has much better resolution, it also has 3D terrain information, the terrain 3D resolution varies independently from the images. A great DZ to check out with imagery and 3D terain using the Keyhole client software is Skydive San Diego at Otay Lakes. This shows what can be done with the right data. High resolution coverage is just a matter of luck, urban areas tend to have the high resolution data. The US is in at 15 m everywhere with higher resolution in many places. Resolution and coverage will get better with time but high res good data is expensive and tends to get flown where there are customers for the data. For source data of the quality in keyhole try here: http://www.airphotousa.com/ But rural coverage won't be much better than Keyhole's stuff. They will sell you a print though if you do find your area, and they have a map showing coverage. Other interesting sources: http://www.spaceimaging.com/ http://www.digitalglobe.com/ http://www.orbimage.com/ The satellite providers tend to have higher resolution available in rural areas because they orbit instead of flying and buying an image chip for something the size of a DZ can be affordable depending on your application. Unlike the aerial sources they are limited to a useful resolution of about 1m with their current birds and can have cloud cover (depends on the product). Another online tool & image source to help you find data you're looking for: http://www.globexplorer.com/

The attached image is an illustration of this technique in action. Apologies to M. Brunson for the (ab)use of his image.

If this question is directed at me...that is one of the best laughs I have had all day! Thanks for that! Not really it was merely illustrative and lifted straight from the poll as quoted in your own post. It seems like a question anyone could answer at any time.

Yes, but that is not the question that was asked, and validating my point

It isn't a matter of whether one can answer the questions, it is a matter of are the following questions applicable once a person has answered yes to having taken a course. e.g."Do you feel a canopy control class would make your piloting safer?" I understand that, and I interpreted this to refer to a future course is all I was saying. If you've been on a CC course I can still ask you if you think a course in future would improve your skill/safety.

Yea ignore what you've actually done in this thread. Just attack in non specific ways with no facts. You keep pointing to jump numbers and I'll point to you jumping in without even considering the facts in this thread, both feet firmly lodged in your mouth. It's undeniable that your attack in this thread was totally unjustified and unwarranted. Now when that's made clear you cover your error with another attack. Your resentment is manifest and I'm not the jumper or the poster your fantasy and malicious assault paints me as. Your reaction in this thread is absolutely typical. You claimed I was saying I know it all when I was saying the opposite, you were just too damned lazy to figure that out before attacking. You always have the opportunity to take issue in the threads where you disagree with me, that would be fair instead of your gutless and baseless personal attack here. I became anonymous after the guy got fired for posting on this site. I used to have my details up here until someone became the victim of another mean spirited attack.

Look at the survey. The questions we were referring to are along the lines of "Do you want or plan on taking a canopy control class??" To which I answered "yes", or "Do you feel a canopy control class would make piloting your canopy safer??" again "yes". So all I said was I can answer questions about my own opinion and intentions in a survey and already being on a course doesn't make a question like that irrelevant. You attacked based on some grudge and assumptions without even considering the facts or context. Unless you can explain how I don't know what my own intentions or view that training can help me you'll have a job resting any case. All you're doing is making your personal animosity and hostility obvious. There's absolutely nothing wrong with my post. The underlying more subtle message of my post was, that even if you've been on a CC course there's more to learn and you can benefit from more. Almost the exact opposite of what you're accusing me of. Too bad couldn't bother understanding the thread before you went on the attack. If you look at my posts and yours in this thread and still think your'e justified then I feel sorry for you Sparky. You need to lose that chip on your shoulder, seriously.

I've taken more than one CC course. I can still answer the other questions. But you seem to have the answers to all the questions anyway. Sparky Sigh. Totally uncalled for. This was a simple thread about questions in a poll. Take issue where you disagree and we can have it out instead of unsupported general attacks. I don't offer answers where I have none. Any opinions where they differ from yours are supported by reasoned arguments. Me offering a different opinion from you in a couple of threads (canopy nannying and avbsolutely reasonable observations w.r.t. AADs) doesn't mean I have all the answers or claim to. I'm entitled to my opinion you obviously have a chip on your shoulder over that. I view incidents as an opportunity to learn not berate and lecture from a position of smug superiority.

I jump with a reserve and AAD does that count?

I've taken more than one CC course. I can still answer the other questions.

Rears alter the chord of the wing over the entire aerofoil which is more analogous to the purpose of flaps on a rigid wing, but it's a deformable wing on lines hence the lack of an ideal analogy. Bottom line a rear riser stall will be more stable and the entire canopy tends to stall more evenly and remain rectangular collapsing on itself front against back, toggles on the other hand tend to horseshoe the canopy folding the tail in on itself making it behave more chaotically.

Yup, Scott Miller advises some jumpers not to do this if their canopy is unsuitable. He also imposes height restrictions on this (2000 ft from memory). On the course I was on he suggested some jumpers upsized to large docile student canopies so they could safely attempt some of the exercises. From memory he also warned about unevenly releasing the toggles. On the jump immediately preceeding the stalls (on the course I was on) one of the exercises was to hold the canopy in brakes then let up a toggle (among other exercises) and report how the canopy responded. These exercises need to be viewed in context, it's not a case of just telling jumpers to go up and stall their canopy.

I think you miss the point of what I said. There are two things you need to do. That is you all by yourself, not your nanny. If you choose to jump with an AAD that is your decision. But you should have learned from the recent incident if you want to play the odds game, go to Vegas. Sparky My decision to jump with an AAD is not a reliance on it. Jumping without an AAD is betting against the house with your life when you don't need to. It makes no sense to suggest the jumper with the AAD is the gambler unless they rely on it, in fact the analogy turns logic on it's head. "nanny", ho ho very droll.