ninjaswooper

It seems like the USPA is bordering on becoming a trade organization who gets away with collecting most of its revenues from people who have no interest in it other than to purchase the products (jumps). Those who seem to be left out of the picture are individual fun jumpers and those who make up instructional/video/packing staff. Honestly, the USPA may well be incapable of addressing the needs of these three separate and sometimes conflicting groups. The DZOs might have more reason to be at the PIA. The USPA should fall back into the hands of jumpers (however lets not forget that we did vote the DZOs into office) and as for the staffers, maybe a union is appropriate.

I think you've hit the nail on the head Canuck... i understand the jump-jitters subsiding, but, for the original poster in the thread, you should be scared as hell. This is not safe, and definitely not boring. Maybe you'd get a better "buzz" by tying a plastic bag over your head? Now that's scary shit.

Naw naw naw, see heah now... we just have to outlast these mighty storms, use more fossil fuels, and eventually global warming will melt the polar ice caps. Said melting will eventually alter the warm water currents which feed these monsters and we will have prevailed! The Bush admin's energy policy is simply taking the fight to the hurricanes, just like invading Iraq is taking the fight to the terrorists. It's quite impressive strategery, even if I do say so myself.

I'd like to congratulate everyone from my area on the strong showing by the southeastern boys, Chuck and Jimmy in particular.

Completely off subject, but how you been man? where ya at now that you're racking up the jumps so quick?

Chris, you may or may not have anything to gain from the demise of ASC/skyride. I know for a fact that many attendees of the roaming dz boogies were weaned off student status at ASC. As far as the end justifies the means attitude, I agree that it sucks but not only is it "not new on the east coast", it's not new anywhere. The principle dictates the function of the world as a whole. The question is overall, who gets hurt and who wins if the whole thing goes under? I personally know a few people who would be devastated (owners not withstanding). So how about this, someone make an offer... to those employed or jumping at ASC, pennridge, pell city, give us a place to go, where we won't have to leave our families or friends, yet we'll still be able to make a living at what we love, skydiving. That's all I'm looking for, and the only reason I ever worked at ASC was the opportunity to stay alive doing something I loved.

Thanks for correcting my errant spelling. Point is, many of the people who decry Ben and Cary have personal stakes in the outcome. And many pretend to be perfect little angels. Sorry, most of this isn't directed to benforde. Like I said, I wasn't intedning to defend skyride, asc, ben, cary, etc. with my most recent posts. Just to point out that the extremes to which some take it: "burn them", "send them to jail for life"... puh-lease, Burn the ceo of Exxon-mobil, burn the Saudi royal family, burn Ken Lay... You people act as if B&C are the biggest villains in the world, when in fact this is small potatoes. Rather than sending your money to help Skydive Arizona (a business) sue Skyride (another business), how about you send money to people who need it, like skydivers affected by hurricane Katrina, or anything else for that matter.

First of all, I must apologize to the original poster in this thread. I did not intend to imply that he was obsessed. As for the bigger dive, bigger turn, etc... At some point won't the canopy and pilot reach a terminal velocity, after which any bigger turn or dive will result in no or little speed gains? At this point the canopy which can stay parallel to the ground for the longest amount of time following such a "terminal turn" will go the distance. Like I said, I'm just learning, but my intuition leads me to believe that with an accurately performed high-degree turn at which little or no input is required for the canopy to plane-out, the canopy with the flatter glide ratio will prevail. I guess I'm repeating myself now, just trying to hash out and understand myself the physics of the swoop so that I may improve myself.

no defense intended here, but we as a society can't even punish Ken Lay, nor the people who have us in a stranglehold with $3 a gallon gas. I guess the skyride thing may strike closer to home with us but I seriously doubt many of you are nearly as voceriferous in attacking those who have done much greater harm

It seems that you believe the velo to be more forgiving of an imperfect swoop. I really don't know but this may be true. I've seen lots of people swoop velos and they stay in a dive that with no further input would put them into the ground, yet if they pull it out at just the right moment they seem to go forever. The icarus canopies i've seen (and personally fly, though not x-braced) seem to have a more natural tendency to come out of that dive and fly almost parallel to the ground with little input. I guess if you don't have your turned dialed in the ability to sustain the dive till the "oh shit factor" makes you pull it out could be a beneficial thing?? Anyway, as for the "mine is better than yours argument", sports which are dependent on equipment always see these little duels... Trek has won the Tour de France for the past several years, does that mean Trek is the best bike ever, or Lance Armstrong is badass.? Same for motorcycling, yamaha, suzuki, honda, whatever. The truth of the matter is yes, gear does make a difference, but without talent the best gear in the world will do absolutely jack for you. And, that said, gear is constantly changing. Who knows which company will come out with the next breakthrough innovation. For those of you jumping on the velo bandwagon, I'm sure you know that the factory team jumps hma linesets not available to you retail. So, get over your obsession with what canopy will make you fly better and learn how to fly! Sorry for the rant. I know I don't have much experience but certain things hold true regardless of their application.

yep, even if the UK poster mistaken noted dollars rather than pounds, sounds too good to be true at 600, unless of course it's stolen.

Which is why the best scenario is one, which is known to be functional, plus a dytter (ever seen a dytter "stick"?) Not much room for second guessing there.

Just a note, no matter if you do SL or AFF, or IAF for that matter, you are still a student until at least 25 jumps (that is the minimum if you have met all the other requirements for the A license by 25 jumps). I'm sorry you had a frightening AFF jump but are you gonna feel more comfortable chunking yourself out of a plane on "self-supervision" after 12 "jump and dumps" or 14 minutes of freefall with in-air feedback with regards to your body position?

No, not on a night jump there isn't. If they don't agree, the low reading is the correct one. I'd say you're better off with one (plus an audible), both of which you are confident in the accuracy thereof. The low reading is the correct one rule might keep you from smacking the ground, but vertical separation of groups in freefall and under canopy is a key to safe night jumps. If staggered deployments are used and you go by the low reading "rule" you could put yourself in an adverse situation (i.e., the low reading alti is the errant one, you pull, you don't smack ground, until jumper from above smacks you and you both smack ground).

How Quickly you forget about there brown floater comment Mark Frank, I remember your comment about fishing and not catching a damn thing.

I've seen him swoop as well. Tell you what, if you can take a Navigator 220 a 150ft down a swoop course and make it look easy, then you can badmouth him. What impresses me about Scott Miller is his consistancy, everytime the same way and it doesn't seem to matter what he's jumping, a nice swoop happens. But I'm sure with 400 jumps you're a MUCH better swooper then he is anyways. Umm, yeah, never seen him swoop in person... wish the website here would let me delete the post made by someone who happened to hijack my account after i left without logging off at a public computer. My apologies. From everything I've heard Scott Miller is pretty badass.

Particularly a computer at the dz... nuff said.

Could you post the stats on the competition. Events, Course Lengths, and Competitor performance. Helps to size up the competition. Times and overall distances.

I saw hima swoop a couple of times.... wasn't too impressed.

Ok guys.... I was allowed to run the Carbone Zone through this last winter. The deal was.... I pay scotty a percentage. Unfortunately I didn't make ANY money because it was winter. Now the owner says I owe him $800 bucks... even though I didn't make anything. What should I do?

Speed Skydiving...

what is that? Umm, like, the DZ up there in colorado is like, well, really high... so like the air is thin, like not dense. Are those simple enough terms for you Shimmy?

Sounds to me that in the interest of safety it might be wise for pilots who are not used to such low density altitudes to get out there at least a week early and get things dialed in before going big in the comp...

Of course they are... the majority of people that jump may be from out of county but they are still generating tax revenue... through eating in the area, buying fuel (both Jet-A, and Auto fuel), not to mention the property/any other business related taxes paid by the two DZs w/in the county... My thoughts exactly, and generally speaking for someone analyzing the economic impact of a locality, it's better to get revenues from out of towners... That way the government gets the money, but in most cases shells out very little to nothing in the way of services for those out of towners.

Like I said, only once in the past 2 years... after the once, we took matters into our own hands... I mean, who wants to see a girl hanging in a tree for a few hours on national TV?