mdrejhon

On the second thought... I can wait a month or two, just so I can get some good skiing weather. Okay, maybe I am not *that* selfish. As for Orlando, let's just say that I am kicking myself for not reserving twice as much tunnel time...

BASE jump? *runs away for cover* (Okay, I admit I will try Bridge Day in a few years...)

I had some of the worst ear pain after my first jump or two. It was one of the only reasons I was afraid of getting skydiving lessons. Now ear pain doesn't register, although I had a brief bout with it during a high altitude jump. Equallizing may help but I heard something about it not being recommended to equallize on your way UP (don't hold your nose and blow while climbing to altitude). I hearrd that's only supposed to be done on the way down (i.e. landing), not the way up (i.e. climbing to altitude).

I'm still a massive slowpoke when it comes to packing. I'm almost always the LAST guy of the load to finish packing - and that includes newbie jumpers with less jumps than I. Then again, people are calling my Sabre 170 "big" (1.1 WL ain't too big). And I'm cramming it into a bag sized for a 150. I know packers who hate my rig now. People with those self-packing X-braced mini-parachutes will have to wait until I can swoop, before I downsize and get a somewhat less-docile Sabre2 150 (or similiar). It'll be heaven to pack, compared to this. When I'm ready, of course. Then I'll be able to beat some of you packers while still having a more neatly packed rig. I'm not going to hurry my packing. Go ahead, do the sunset load without me. I'll jump tomorrow instead or wait for the night jump load

Thanks! 130 skydives is a lot for 7 months for most Canadians, among people who don't work at dropzones! Considering that we only get the turbine aircraft only three times a year (miraculously, I jumped almost 50 times solely on those three weekends alone - 12, 17 and 18 times respectively.) You're USPA? That does make things easier, yes -- a few coached jumps should be easy to do. Wonder if they find it funny that you are a USPA license holder training at a Canadian dropzone. (Gananoque is right near the border and provides dual USPA/CSPA certified instructors). What was that?I was not meticulous at recording my A-milestone accomplishments in my logbook at first, so I had to do some re-jumps. Also, I developed a nasty dearch and backslide habit for a few dozen jumps, so getting the five "2-way" jumps out of the way took time. Please remember, I am CSPA and you are USPA even though we share the same home dropzone. (We must be one of the few dropzones in the world that support training towards parachuting licenses from two different countries with dual USPA/CSPA certified instructors.) Being a dropzone of a border town... I'd like to joke that we're an (unofficial) USPA dropzone located in Canada because we attract a lot of people from down south, and that it seems that USPA licenses are more frequently done than CSPA licenses. Nothing. I ran out of time before I got that cleared up. So I may have been taking the risk... Then again, I'm somewhat overinsured as is (I have double health/dental/medication insurance, having duplicate coverage from two insurance companies, and really techically should cancel the one I am paying for and stick to the one supplied by my business). I need to clear this up soon, to free up funds. The effects of having been a consultant that turned into an employee gaining free health benefits, but not cancelling my former health insurance. (Partially because I wasn't sure how they would cover my skydiving. This will be cleared up soon.) Definitely. Tunnel time will do you a lot of good. I did 15 minutes in Florida, and I regretted not pyaing for 30 minutes at a time. Try to pay for 30 minutes at a time. It will cost you a pretty penny ($375 USD for 30 minutes!), but will definitely make you more RW-friendly, which may accelerate your ability to get your A and B licenses. If you must skimp, don't buy less than 15 minutes of windtunnel time.

When I did my first tandem in 1997, I had to wear one of those frap hats with a rainbow on it. Yeah, that was gay. Those "gay biker" hats you see at dropzones. (But as if, that would make a difference in my case. Duh.) Here's some history about the association between rainbows and gays, on the Wikipedia Encyclopedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_flag

Freefly? What is freefly? I've done a few 20-way attempts... Plenty of fun. Although I docked on several of those, most formations did not complete (there were 4 other low jumpers like me). I intend to keep being a bellyflyer until I manage to break some minor record (or maybe the Canadian Formation Record. Knock on wood. ha ha!) I will stick 4-ways through 20 ways for now, that's my current skill limit, and what my present flat-tracking skills very reasonably allow for. I'm not what you call a good bellyflyer yet, but my skills are sufficient enough to be part of several 10+ ways now (in either the base, and by flying freely to my slot). I almost don't remember my last bellyfly SOLO anymore -- almost all my solos have been tracking jumps (I think the last 10 out of 12 solo freefalls were tracking jumps to pratice my tracking!) I think that on the last 40 jumps in the last two months they have all been 50-60% RW now (and about 25% of the last two months have been 6+ ways, though that's skewed somewhat by Deaf World Record) So... what is this newfangled freefly thing? Maybe you can teach me. What is a headdown? (just kidding. Yes, I intend to do a headdown sometime -- but not in a big hurry to do so. But I have to eventually, I'll need to sitfly before I can become a vidiot which isn't out of realm of possibility if my skills are ready for it. Who knows... But you can bet I will be a bad freeflyer at first, as I was a bellyflopper of a bellyflyer. Can easily fly to my quadrant even on the opposite side of a formation. But still a little shaky at docking on a fast-falling base though. Argh! I'm told I am getting close to nailing 20-ways reliably, thanks to a bunch of consecutive biggish-way jumps in Florida. I learned a lot about the science of burble already. And the frustration of getting low sometimes, and cupping like hell while avoiding going underneath formations. Dodging bellyflyer traffic while not impeding their progress to the base. And the excitement of a successful dock in a biggish-way. Never wrecked a formation thankfully, even though I ended up burbling myself away from the formation a couple of times in other unsuccessful dock attempts. Quite a learning experience beyond the 6-way and 7-way jumps I already did at Gananoque. At least I tracked much better than a few of them did! My tracking solos are paying off...)

Hurry up, will ya! I need a place to pig out on nearly a megawatt electric power all just to myself for my own selfish needs. (Right?)

Heya, nice to hear from you! I am hoping to make it to Gananoque one last time before winter sets in. Unfortunately, I'm moving between two apartments, so I have to hope that Gananoque is open for the first weekend of November (brrrr -- skydiving below freezing at altitude, anyone?) Make sure you have an A license before you do so -- That gives you the passport to visit other dropzones. Hopefully you've already read CSPA's A license requirements and filled them out in your logbook... I got both my CSPA A and B licenses in less than one month (Sept 9th and 27th respectively) -- partly because I was pretty slow at getting a couple of A license requirements out of the way (jump #78), but I had pre-emptively done quite a bunch of B license requirements in advance. The hardest one is the five 2-way jumps. I had CSPA Expresspost me the B license, since I needed to bring it to show I could meet the minimum entry requirements of joining 20-way formation skydive attempts at Deaf World Record (although they had to remove a few people, myself included, before doing a 16-way successfully). Other than the 5 jumps exercising 2-way skills, all the A license requirements are otherwise pretty easy, except for the need to study the PIM 2A for the A license exam.

That's weird... I was wearing my gray-tinted sorz goggles from sometime around the 40th jump or so. However, I wouldn't wear regular sunglasses, but these tinted Sorz were very good. I even did some sunset jumps with them, as soon as I made certain I was able to pull them downwards while wearing a helmet. Which I did under canopy, so they wouldn't darken my vision when landing shortly after sunset. Now I have a full face helmet, so this is all moot. And, please be careful of using glass glasses of any kind, in a naked manner (without covering them up with goggles or a full face). I have jumped with someone (I was in the same formation skydive!) who had a reserve ride because his glass glasses fogged up when briefly going through a cloud, and resulted in him doing a pull that was low enough that he snivelled to Cypres altitude (and cutaway the main)... Glass glasses aren't as fog resistant as plastic sunglasses and goggles are. I am pretty certain that goggles and full faced helmets are safer.

An electric toothbrush during my last skydiving trip. And, um, a couple of pullup cords. Knock on wood. I hope I don't lose something valuable.

I know, I'm just kidding.

PET in all capitals? As in acronyms. I've got three P.E.T.'s: http://www.vintage-computer.com/images/pet8032.jpg (The Commodore PET) http://www.ethlife.ethz.ch/images/pet-l.jpg (PET Scanner) http://www.packaging-technology.com/projects/wimm-bill/images/wimm_bill5.jpg (PET Plastic) Which kind of P.E.T. do you want? Oh you mean a pet. As in the word "pet". Duh.

Rich is relative. A 3rd world country resident would agree. However, a friend of mine who started skydiving while he was in university, would disagree with you. Sure, he had to work at the dropzone packing parachutes to pay for some of it, but he managed. Also, remember if you get a license and your own rig, you can jump 10 times for the same price as 1 tandem. Sometimes all in one day! (Approx $20 USD per jump) Instead of $200 for a tandem, you would pay only $20 for a jump. Assuming you have your own rig and a license. Yes, getting through AFF ($$) and a rig ($$$) is expensive -- but some people buy sailboats, or scuba gear, or an ATV, or a dirt bike. You just have to focus on it. Then jumps are much cheaper after getting the license and a rig, and manageable for a student at 50 jumps per year... (approximately $1000) plus a little gear maintenance, repacks, and USPA membership (~$300 more). What, that's the price of 6 tandems? I don't have a car and I live in an apartment, but I've managed to direct a fair bit of this year's funds into skydiving. Yeah, in real life, most of us end up buying more gear and jumping more often... But anything's possible even at less than $2000 per year (Even the first year, including AFF and rig, if you work at the dropzone packing parachutes as a weekend part time job). It is easier with more money, but I've seen people enter the skydiving hobby at well under $2K "out of pocket" per year if they were determined to do so...

Get one and bring it to CSS for Thanksgiving. I'm not 100% sure I can make the CSS roadtrip, my home dropzone is planning that CSS roadtrip, but I already took a skydiving vacation to Florida (Deaf World Record) just a few days ago. So it's gonna be a bit hard to get the funds and days off, but I haven't written it off just yet - just a matter of finding someone who's willing to drive down on a Friday and driving back home on a Monday, and this may just push me over the edge to going to CSS

Check out www.deafskydivers.org and ask these people. I'm a deaf skydiver. As I did not do the same common sign language, I used a laptop for communicating back and fourth between me and the instructor during ground class. A small notepad can be used in the airplane. For freefall, there's standard "AFF" sign language for things like pull, arch, etc. You're probably already familiar with this. Instead of radio, a rotating arrow was used on the ground for landing. I was put on a light wingloading at 0.65:1 and I did the flare timing entirely on my own (flare at approximately person height, and resist the temptation to flare too early or you'll get hurt. And if you forget to flare, you get hurt too). Stood up my first landing as a result. I did flare pratice during a tandem, which helped. At least two tandems before AFF is strongly recommended for a deaf guy -- I had to do four (a Skydive Gananoque requirement). This is excellent for flare timing pratice, and an arrow on the ground can be used during tandem for arrow-following rehearsals. My dropzone used a piece of white plywood with a fluorescent cloth arrow, sitting on a rotating creeper tripod. Was easy to see from over 2000 feet, and discernable from about 3000-4000 feet. Also, we recently had a Deaf World Record event in Lake Wales. It was sorta my incentive to jump more than 100 times this year. Although I was not part of the biggest all-deaf formation skydive, I was part of several of these attempts and I got my first night jump down there too! Search my early posts and you'll see my questions in this forum wondering how to train myself as a deaf skydiver. I managed to do it -- and even without an interpretor! (Though one is recommended) Check the "Skydivers with Disabilities" forum and you will see a lot of deaf related threads too. A bunch of dropzone.com people are around here including BVASkydive, deaffreeflyer, skycurlycat, mx757 and mdrejhon (myself). Many of us are also listed in the Profiles Section of www.deafskydivers.org as well.

Hello Trevor, Thanks for letting me know. Unfortunately I probably won't be able to make it this weekend -- a small cold and also an upcoming move between two apartments. But if you do the jump, let me know your results. I am sure it will land fine at your wingloadings (not as likely to suddenly collapse during the middle of a flare)

Once. Clouds scuttled a 20-way formation skydive attempt.

Keep updated on news at www.BlackBerryForums.com ... The maker of the BlackBerry actually already set aside the money (half a billion dollars) to settle if they failed. Newer BlackBerries also now support MMS -- such as the new Sprint/Nextel 7100i (new) and 8700 series (Nov 1 at Cingular, Nov 15 at Rogers). The new models have gorgeous screens and behave more like real pocket computers, unlike older BlackBerries.

The closest I've seen anybody to landing a wingsuit is Loic's mountain swoop. He actually achieved zero relative velocity in distance between him and the sloping ground (ski slope surface), only a few feet above the actual ski slope! http://www.skydivingmovies.com/ver2/pafiledb.php?action=file&id=352 Coincidentially, it has been reported that people have broken the 150mph barrier on downhill skiis before, and thus this is within wingsuit flight speeds. Why not test the following instead, in a scientific manner: Crazy ideas (probably pie in the sky) 1. (air test) Test aerodynamics of wingsuit flying with downhill skiis (but cutaway the skiis before deploying parachute). Both horizontal windtunnel and telemetry measuring in the air. Figure out if wingsuit remains controllable and the angle of skiis can still safely be adjusted with feet while flying wingsuit. May need custom designed skiis and boots. Experiment with different ski designs that does not interfere much with wingsuit flight (or even actually helps a bit with the flight). Skiis would be pointed upwards towards the face, much like a ski jumper. Figure out ideal angle of skiis and angle of wingsuit, and whether it is easy for skiier's feet to adjust the angle safely. Do several test jumps and a safe ski cutaway mechanism (non-landing tests)? And do computer simulations to verify ground-effect issues between ground and a low-flying wingsuit flyer wearing skiis. 2. (ground-only test) Test a really high speed ski run for stability on skiis. Pick the speeds up, 60mph, 80mph, 100mph on the downhill skiis. 3. (ground-only test) Pratice ski jumping. This will hone skills for safely setting down skiis after a freefall. Start wearing a wingsuit during olympic-style ski jumps. This further hone the skill of wingsuit control while skiing. Also tests whether wingsuit actually is pratical during skiing. 4. (ground-only) Research high speed wipeouts, and other safety considerations. How thick and thin the soft snow layer needs to be. Ideal landing angles that's within the abilities of the wingsuit flyer wearing skiis, as tested in earlier aerodynamic tests. Artifical snow vs natural snow, for ideal landing surface. 5. If all variables are good, rehearse the wingsuit landing using skiis at higher altitude and use high precision GPS to measure trajectory. 6. If all is good, attempt the actual wingsuit landing using skiis. A high speed wipeout would be extremely dangerous, but people have survived 80+ mph wipeouts. Someone should do research whether this is safer than that proposed custom 5 million dollar structure that is not nearly as big as a well-selected ski slope? Of course, all these may be crazy ideas, but I'm not sure anyone has ever done aerodynamic wingsuit-skiis testing at altitude to figure out whether or not it's still pratical? Don't believe it's possible -- see this video and re-read this post again. I'm now beginning to think, maybe, just maybe... It's outlandish, indeed... But so is this video!

Try downloading Microsoft Antispyware. It's a free download and actually relatively good (for a Microsoft product) www.microsoft.com/antispyware It may clean some of the mess up....I'd recommend a virus scanner too.

Well, let's just say... 15 minutes is NOT DAMN ENOUGH time for windtunnel. Next time I am near a tunnel, I'll buy more tunnel time.

You mean only for an intentional cutaway... This was the original idea, but I am now leaning towareds a demo jump of a reserve as a main - and I am sure that was what my dropzone would recommend when the time comes for me to ask for a test jump of a reserve. It was my understanding that if the reserve has a main bridle attachment point (PD Demo Reserves), I can test jump it as a main parachute. And I would be able to cutaway it normally. Thus, no tertiary needed -- I continue using my existing reserve as the reserve. Please correct me if I am wrong. This just backs up my concern. There are reports that landing a Micro Raven safely is possible, but that there are actual reports by people I know in person (including you, not just you that I met in Lake Wales - you being one of the organizers of Deaf World Record) who mention a friend or somebody having a horror story with a Raven Micro. This goes well beyond "online forum horror stories". It sounds like I may be rolling my dice with a Raven Micro -- even if I am now pre-informed with important information about its narrow flare band at higher wingloadings. I realize it will likely save my life anyway, but it may not keep me injury free in situations where a PD Reserve would.

There are people who just say "Don't worry, the Raven Micro will save your life, and besides you may never use it!". And that it's possible to land a Raven 150 at wingload 1.25 standing up, if I flare carefully. I'm overreacting. But, other people legitimately suggest gear fear may cause me to do stupid things instead of going to reserve. Worse of all, people have been injured under a Raven Micro before. Get the safest reserve my container will fit. Then I'm not overreacting, it's my life after all. Gear fear may cause people to do stupid things such as keep fixing severe spinning linetwists down to a dangerously low altitude, for example, or trying to use a hook knife on a lineover below harddeck. Maybe only minor, but may cause someone to hesistate long enough to work on a problem for 500 feet more, well into dangerously into low-cutaway territory where people have been killed. I hope I avoid any hesistation - but I never know in a panicky brain-overload situation (never had a cutaway before, and no, I don't believe in jinxes) - better safe than sorry. So I feel that I got to make a test jump eventually -- even if it has to be my existing Raven Micro 150 (ulp...I've heard 150's sometimes suddenly bowtie-stall on landing at wingloading 1.3 and I'm dangerously close to that) or a PD143R/PD160R (no problem... I feel comfortable and ready to try a well preplanned jump on these). I'm definitely leaning towards the latter.

Micro Raven. But the forum software wouldn't let me select that, so I had to choose something. But hey, I just figured out how to manually edit it via the "Other" option. Fixed. Now my profile says Raven Micro. Good point -- it's the same manufacturer, after all -- although I'm not sure how PD measures their older Sabre's.