Eule

Skydive Radio show #54. "Conversation with ear, nose, and throat Specialist, Dr. Stuart Selkin." Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

The 19% figure I posted had nothing to do with education or lack thereof. It had to do with the probability that somebody would have (or have access to) a computer with an Internet connection. Having a computer or access to one is becoming much more common, but I still think it's true that everything else being equal, younger people are more likely to have such access than older people. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

Hey, it's Oklahoma... you want booze on Sunday, you gotta make it yourself. :) I wear those boots every day, including on every jump I've been on so far. Several years ago I acquired a preference for high-top shoes, wearing Converse All-Stars (when they were still made in the USA) and high-top work boots. After a while I just wore the work boots all the time. Last spring, right before I started jumping, my then-current pair of boots were worn out and I knew that shoes with hooks were a bad idea for jumping. The kid at the work-clothing store understood steel-toe vs regular, high-top vs low, waterproof vs not, but "no hooks, I'm going to jump out of an airplane with them" sort of threw him for a loop. Eventually he worked it out and I bought some boots. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

Nah, just a drama princess. I'm about the third or forth assistant understudy to the real drama queens; it will take many years of hard work before I can get a drama-queen job with, say, a TV news station. How about ambulance chasers? (attachment) I bet these posts don't, either. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

This appears to be a known problem for at least four months or so, but it has not yet been fixed. See this post. They aren't gone; they just haven't been indexed for the search function. If you know what forum a post was made in, you can go there and start looking through the old index pages for likely thread titles. Alternatively, do an advanced search at Google and fill in dropzone.com under Domain - this may not be exact but it will let you get a little closer. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

I think I've said this here before, but I think this would be an *excellent* demo for Cessna to do with some of the new 182s at an airshow or something. I don't know if it could be financially justified - it's not like it would help sell brand new 182s to DZs - but it would just be cool as hell. They could save a little money by using ones that are about 90% of the way down the production line - you don't _need_ an interior or the full glass cockpit to jump with... Assuming 182s, that would be 60 jumpers, right? I can see four or five camera flyers in addition to those in the formation, but it still sounds like they might have had one or two "spare" planes. Having driven old cars before, I well understand the idea that if you're going to drive an old car, you've got to have two of them, so as to increase the chances that one of them will run at any given moment. The advanced version of this theory is to have two of the _same_ car, so you can swap stuff back and forth. So, if you invite 20 Cessnas and a couple of A&Ps to the boogie, you ought to be able to come up with at least 15 good ones at any given moment. (Yes, I realize you'd have to get all 20 owners, the mechanics, and the FAA on board with this, which would be, uh, "non-trivial"). You could even call the whole thing a Redundant Array of Inexpensive Planes, but that leads to an unfortunate acronym. Trying to get vaguely back on topic, my point was that requiring more than about a four-way for a license means that a lot of jumpers will need to go to another DZ or wait for a boogie to fill in some of their license requirements. I don't know how appropriate it is to consider "can you do that out of a Cessna" when deciding if something should be a license requirement or not, but I think it should count for something. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

A good search phrase is "grand saut" (big jump). Thread 1 Thread 2 Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

All of the smarts should be on the server sides. In other words, it must work with everything - Firefox, Safari, Lynx - legacy browsers too. 99% of the fields should be optional. You may want to have a page that comes up that says "hey, you didn't fill in fields X, Y, and Z; you don't _have_ to fill those in but if you wanted to, now's the time." People can then either fill those in or just go on to the next page. If it asks for an email address, I just assume I'm going to get spammed. You'll be amazed at how many jumpers have the email address uce@ftc.gov , I think. :) If the URL ends in "exe", "asp", or "aspx", I _know_ the data is not secure. If it ends in "cgi" or "php", it's _probably_ not secure. Other URLs are on a case-by-case basis. This is kind of hard to capture, but you might try to see if people have had layoffs of over a certain duration or not. It seems to be somewhat common that somebody gets started jumping, then stops for a while due to spouse/kids/money/whatever, then starts up again. Or, they are a static line military jumper, get out of the military, and don't take up sport skydiving until a few years later. Along those lines, you might ask if people have had military, sport, or both kinds of training. Need to include "organization" as well. You might consider having more than one; for instance it's apparently fairly common for Canadian jumpers to have both CSPA and USPA licenses. As you can see, you hit a nerve with this one and you haven't even started the survey yet. IMHO, leave this one off the survey if you don't want to throw off the rest of the answers. Some things are simple; asking for a postal code and only accepting 00000-99999 is one of the more obvious silly moves. For the less-obvious things, you might look at the sites of the various national skydiving organizations; I know USPA asks a couple of survey questions on their renewal application and other organizations might have online renewal applications with their survey questions. Also, the "how to get started" material usually found on such sites might clue you in to differences in basic training. You might include a counter at the bottom of each page: "about 10 questions left to go" or whatever. This goes along with the feedback you've been getting that 30 minutes is too long for people to spend on the survey. I also like the idea of letting people do a little at a time, but then you need some kind of login/password which will inevitably confuse some users. Unless you have a paper version of the survey, you're also going to get some selection bias. Ferinstance, this is what USPA published in their 2005 membership survey for members' ages: From that, I'd say that you're only _guaranteed_ that about 19% of the population (0-29) has the ability to fill out a Web-based survey. The chances are fairly good that an additional 30% (30-39) and maybe another 13% (half of 40-49) can do it. Over that your chances are low. Now, I know that everyone will quickly object to this and say that their 89-year-old grandma has a MySpace site and a webcam. But I think it's true, in general, that the older jumpers might not be up to speed on the Intarweb yet. A related but lesser effect is that some people will happliy fill out a paper survey (and stick it in a Business Reply Mail envelope or SASE or equal) but will clam up if asked to type things into a computer - even if they know how to run a computer already. The paper is less threatening, because it is going to be read by a human, but they _know_ that whatever they type into the computer is going to instantly be transmitted to the FBI, the USPA, the FAA, the police, the health department, and the dog catcher. The head-shrinker types have done a good bit of research into "how to do a survey"; some time in the library might be beneficial. I hope this helps! Eule (edit: speeling misteak) PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

This is me, in about my 20th second of freefall ever. I am told I have relaxed some since then. :) Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

That's a shitload of Cessnas! Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

I've met a guy with an amputated leg who is a fairly regular jumper. I don't know if he was jumping before the amputation or if he learned after; I suspect if he was jumping before the amputation it was military static line and/or round sport parachutes. I can't remember for sure but I _think_ it's an above-the-knee amputation. Anyway, he has a special prosthetic leg that he uses for jumping - it's a telescoping aluminum stick with a round plate and rubber pad on the end. Apparently the cup/straps that hold it onto his leg are just like the ones for a realistic prosthetic leg, but the rest of it is made for sports. Collapsed, the leg is about 8" (20 cm) long; extended it is long enough for him to walk on. He actually collapses it for the ride up in the plane (182) and extends it right before we go on jump run. He has a regular jump suit with one leg trimmed short; he wears the prosthetic leg outside of his jump suit. Most of the time, he jumps accuracy, so he's got something soft to land on, but I know he's done demos into stadiums so I think he can land on the ground like any other jumper. (When he jumps accuracy, he hits the target pad with his good foot.) As far as I know there isn't any "give" in the metal part of the leg - there might be some foam where the cup fits over his real leg but I don't know for sure. I once asked him if the weight/drag imbalance made him spin. He said that when he was first jumping with the prosthetic leg, he tended to spin, until he learned to counteract it. I hope this helps! Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

What I want to know is, have any babies ever been _conceived_ in free fall? Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

Drinking lots of beer will kill off the weaker cells, allowing the stronger ones to survive and multiply. Beer is also an all-natural renewable resource that actually reduces the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Plus, the waste products of beer are 100% biodegradable. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

If you have something like a big state park near you, you might be able to try this out on the ground. Mark the parking lot as the waypoint, then stick the GPS in your pocket and don't look at it. Hike a mile or two away, then pull out the GPS and try to navigate back to the "home" waypoint. Of course this is easier because you have a defined path to follow, but it might help show you what the display on the screen looks like relative to which direction you are walking. Like Billvon said, the GPS may or may not get a good signal on the ride up in the airplane. Having it somewhere where it can see lots of the sky is good. Note that plastic airplane windows should also be transparent to the GPS, but aluminum is most definitely not. If you can't arrange for a good sky view from the passenger space, you might talk to the pilot and see if he will put it on top of the glare shield for you (or similar) on the ride up, then hand it back when you're ready to exit. From listening to general aviation pilots, the consensus seems to be that below around 4000-5000' AGL or so, you have a decent shot at getting a signal. Above that it gets spotty. These particular pilots are mostly flying airplanes quite a bit like the canonical 182 jump plane. Some of them have said that when AMPS (analog cellular) first became popular in the late 1980s and early 1990s, it seemed to be easier to get a signal while airborne, but as AMPS evolved and the various digital services came along, it got harder. Some of them cited the same directional antennae at the cell sites that Mr17Hz mentioned. I can guarantee, though, that Billvon knows more about this than anyone else in this thread. I have a ham radio license and someday I want to try a similar stunt. Version 0 is to take a hand-held radio with me and see how far I can talk; version 1 is to take a small repeater up with me and see how far two other people on the ground can talk if they each bounce their signal off of me. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

There is an unofficial summary of the results at the event site, and official results for accuracy, style, and overall from FAI. These are all normal Web pages and not a spreadsheet file. Eule (not a participant in the meet, just posting links) PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

Yes, you can. I've done all my jumps (and an hour of tunnel time) while wearing glasses. You might look at this thread from a couple of months ago (my post in that thread) for more info. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

The "one in El Paso and 2 in the Houston area" are dead plans, too, or still in process, or ? I can think of some DZs that would be pretty happy with that, but I think the tunnel owners would tend to lose their shirts. The land would be cheap, but I don't think you'd get enough local business nor tourism to make a go of it. Besides, like I said, if there was a tunnel a couple of hours from me, I'd probably end up being glad that there are lots of bridges on the turnpike to sleep under. :) Will do. Hopefully the next time I see her, I'll be jumping again. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

CAUTION: Student with low jump numbers, never been on a cross-country, but did land off (2 miles north and 1/2 mile west of the exit, which was over the south end of the runway) once. This might be stating the obvious, but: You might want to inquire about Farmer McNastys and/or bad landing spots that are a little further out than normal. In general it seems like Farmer McNastys tend to be right next door to the DZ, but there may be one that lives close enough for the DZ to be aware of him, but far enough away that it's not usually a problem. Five miles from the DZ, there might be an alligator farm, or a prison, or a radio tower that normally you don't care about but now you do. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

I can't help but like somebody that has longer hair than I do. :) I hear he went on a big-way out of town someplace, too. Wow! When I jumped there in fall 2005, I understood that they did this for tandems (another tandem for $99) and maybe for AFF L1s (your L2 for $99) but after that it was 'list price'. My understanding could be wrong, though. I recall a banner hanging up above the student check-in window that mentioned the $99 price, and I think I remember some TMs pointing it out to their students after they landed. I could be way off base here, but my understanding is that the DZO down there has a "day-time job" as well - in other words he doesn't _have_ to make money on the dropzone to buy groceries. Nobody likes to lose money all the time, but somebody who's got money coming from another source can afford to do it for a little longer before deciding to do something different. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

Congratulations! CAUTION: I am a student with a low number of jumps. I am not a tandem instructor. Tandem rigs are different in some ways than regular solo-jumper rigs. If you go on to become a student, listen to what your instructors tell you about the rig you will be jumping, instead of some random things you read on the Internet. Having said all that... On a "regular" rig, when the main parachute is packed, the fabric is folded into a little bag. The pilot chute is attached to the bag with a nylon strap, and the bag is attached to the fabric of the main parachute with a nylon strap. During deployment, the pilot chute pulls the bag off of the main parachute, and the air inflates the main parachute. The pilot chute and bag are still connected to the main parachute, and tend to hang off of the top rear edge of the main parachute - you might have seen this on your second ride, or maybe when other jumpers were landing. The reserve parachute works almost the same way. The pilot chute is attached to the bag with a nylon strap, but the bag is NOT attached to the fabric of the reserve parachute at all. During deployment, the pilot chute pulls the bag off of the reserve parachute, and the air inflates the reserve parachute. Since the bag is not attached to the reserve parachute, the bag (and the pilot chute attached to the bag) are now free to fall to the ground. This is most likely what you saw falling. My understanding is that the reason why the bag is not attached to the reserve parachute fabric is that this makes for a slightly more reliable deployment of the reserve parachute. The reasons that the bag *is* attached to the main parachute are 1) it "usually" works just fine that way and 2) since it's attached, you don't have to go look for it on the ground and/or install a new one after every jump. Like I said, I am inexperienced, and will gladly defer to just about anybody with more experience on this explanation. I just thought it might help explain what you saw on your first jump. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

From people I know that have lived and worked in Chicago, that isn't even the start of it. As I understand it, to estimate the cost of building a tunnel (or anything) in Chicago proper, one would need to first find the cost (minus the land) of a comparable design that has already been built elsewhere. You would then multiply that cost by 1.5 to 2, to account for all the weird building codes, union pay scales, and bribes that it takes to do business in Chicago. (It costs a lot of money to drive all those dead people to three or four voting booths each!) _Then_ you get to add on the cost of the land. Just looking at the US population, it does seem a little odd that there isn't a tunnel anywhere between Denver and the close pair of Flyaway Pigeon Forge and L1/AAC. I took a map of population density I found here, turned the lowest two levels white and the third level a very light gray, and plotted the approximate location of current tunnels on it. Just going by this, it would have made more sense to build a tunnel in the Chicago area before Denver, and the "next" tunnel "should" go somewhere around Chicago, or possibly somewhere around Dallas or Houston, or (long shot?) Minneapolis/St. Paul. But besides the problems with Chicago, it's been noted that "tourist density" is probably more important than "population density", which means Denver is a little better spot. I'd vote for putting the "next" tunnel in Texas somewhere, as that's a lot closer to me than Chicago. On the other hand, if the tunnels remain far away from me, I won't have to eat Ramen noodles as often. :) Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

Suggestion: Go ahead and make the reservation for yourself. If somebody comes with you, bonus, but don't count on it. :) I have been jumping for less than a year, but from talking to tandem students at the dropzone, it seems to be VERY common that they will have a party of three or four people planning to come out on Saturday, but starting about Tuesday, the others will gradually bow out with various excuses, leaving just the one person to come out. Your friend that has jumped before is more likely than most to do it again, but don't count on it. This isn't meant as a knock on your friends, just letting you know about a pattern I have seen a few times. Of course, I could be full of it, and you'll get six friends to come with you and jump. :) Either way, have fun! Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

Me too. The server is sending a zero-length file for both of http://www.dropzone.com/safety/Canopy_Control/index.shtml and http://www.dropzone.com/safety/Canopy_Control/ . I *think* the ".shtml" extension indicates a server-parsed page, so my *guess* would be that there is some error on the source page that is causing it to not parse correctly. The source page is not viewable or fixable by mortals; probably only the Head Honcho can fix it. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

Anybody ever see "Fantasia"? Remember the "Sorcerer's Apprentice" scene with Mickey Mouse? Sangiro runs 2 websites. Skyride runs approximately 8,367, at least today. I really hope the time Sangiro spends filtering those 8,367 sites out of the Google ads is more than paid for by whatever revenue the legitimate Google ads bring in. I also hope that Skyride only creates no more than, say, 100 new websites a week, so the ongoing effort to block ads isn't too bad. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

I don't have an answer for you, other than to note that this is along the same lines as this request that was posted a month ago. The problem that underlies that request and your request is that the classifieds search function (at least for non-Premier members) is not very good, IMHO. When you place an ad, you can specify lots of details for your gear in a structured way, but there's not a good way for prospective buyers to search those details. Eule PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.