Trae

At a recent event a fellow wingsuiter was grounded after experiencing some exit instability. This mature gentleman was a super keen flyer and experienced skydiver that had some physical limitations given his two artificial hips. He approached a BMI for advice and ended up being grounded. This was inexplicable at the time as the guy had been flying for a couple of days with no problems and lots of fun.....just an occasional flip on exit . Instead of working on the exit problem with the guy the BMI grounded him. This caused a few of us to seriously loose respect for that particular BMI. At the same time this BMI guy was introducing low jump number women into his little flock. From the outside it was obvious what was going on. Somehow this BMI guy was managing to sideline experienced skydivers while at the same time introducing girls to his harem. The same BMI also had a few tricks at the manifest as a few of us other blokes found we were being dropped off loads at the last moment without explanation. machiavellian wingsuiting ego trippers..............has BMI gone to the dogs or what??????? PUKEWORTHY.

in reply to "but I started BM with 200 jumps in 2 years... There are many that do. Its about accepted and percieved risk. the the father and her accepted the risk... nugh said... " .................... yeah sure go for it . Its getting way dangerous out here with that attitude. Dodging inexperienced (often female) wingsuiters and their highly protective in-tow blokes has become a large part of my perceived risk analysis.

inreply to "do you realize the poster above is her father? " .............. yep and I think he should know better given his jump numbers. .

in reply to " Im sorry guys, fun police here. Am I the only one thinking that 200 jumps and a PHI is a bad mix?? " ........................ No you're not the only one freeflyguy. It's hardly uncommon for the sugar daddies out there to push their little girls too far too fast. These friendly santa claus 'you can do that ' type guys mustn't get to see what happens in their turbulent wake. I wonder if a real nice fast parachute has gone along with the fireboid. hope there'e no tears with this one.

in reply to "At present, the Guy (excuse the bonfire night pun!) has said he's going to keep setting stuff on fire 'cos he likes to! FINE." ............................................. Some-one should give this burner guy a job . If he likes lighting fires and is good at it then he'd be right at home as an Aussie firelighter ... er I mean firefighter. The Rural fire brigades in the OZ bush are responsible for more hectares burnt due to back burning than a natural fire could ever accomplish. Big bad fires over here are usually lit by pyro cattlemen or well meaning firebrigades.... or by payback from last years fires. Your incarcerated pyro dude would fit right in.

inreply to "if you can recover from a shitty situation you don't really need to be able to do a barrel roll or acrobatics perfectly." ....................................... Sure .............sounds good. The emphasis on 'if you can recover'. We can learn by falling over occassionally. None of us are perfect and spins can & DO happen accidently especially when trying newish things. Students in flat spins they can't stop apart from being amusing to watch can be very dangerous. A spin in a wingsuit is gonna be much more radical than any spin in a standard jumpsuit. If you are spinning accidently in your wingsuit on a regular basis even while attempting aerobatics then there are at least some flying tips required . Another solution may be to go to another more forgiving wingsuit while you learn the basics. Not a put off here...GO FOR IT ... spin those suits......but recovering easily is nice too.

inreply to TomAiello's "At one point they were wearing stuff that looked kind of like tracking suits" ..................... Perhaps ski-jumps placed at key locations could be used for BASE launches. What to do with the ski's after take-off could be an issue. If the ski's were integrated some-how they could be used to land with as well. Dream dream..

in reply to "I have shot both, and I have been in combat. The .45 acp will stop ANYONE faster than a 9mm." ................................................ Ahh the truth of the matter. Of course you're right. 9mm is more of a comfort thing ... more like fun than hard work. The little beggars can be kinda comforting though. I aint been in the sort of combat you're talking but I've had many a bullet go past my ears and learnt that rather than calibre it's just as much about cover and even running away .(Live to fight another day). I learnt to carry the biggest most powerful thing I could happily tolerate and not be shy in using it. No-one was protecting me or showing me how to do it. This whole arg is a bit like the .223 v's .30 . After shooting both and loving the mini's for their high capacity low recoil it was the .30 that got to live by my side. Not having to worry much about carry over due to good sized hills these larger rounds work better at shooing ornery claim jumpers. You're so right about women shooting better than most men. Something to do with their breathe control and basic killer instincts. My ladyfriend puts me to shame even after I've been practising. Something needs shootin' and she's around .............. I suppose most people in cities wouldn't be needing to consider a rifle so much . In the country it can be a lot different. No police nearby, psycho genes prevalent and long dark lonely nights. Haven't been shot at now properly for a couple of years. Mostly I don't even get to see who they are...although the shifty fearful looks at the nearest town sometimes give me some clues. 9mm or .45 ???? there was a time just any gun would have been good.

Have you had a car accident driving to a dz?/ .................. Yep, got hit from the side just after dark in the rain on a friday by a drunk who turned onto the highway without looking . My brakes were gone, steering with one wheel and I was pushed into oncoming traffic. No head -ons but I don't know how. Took a while to stop . My car had the left front wheel all bung. steering arm broken and the guard crumpled. His car had the whole right side opened like with a can opener from the end piece of my rear bumper which had scraped down his side . And then it turned to shyte afterwards. I couldn't drive away at first but he could . After the traffic dropped a bit I managed to wobble the car to the nearest servo about half a mile away. Drunk driver turned up with his mates . Servo operators came out with baseball bats as the drunk had previously dropped in there to call his friends. Avoided a bashing with the help of my new friends. Much more went on but I got away all fixed the next morning after paying a carton and $10 to some Christian bikies who magically arrived to help. The skydiving that weekend was less memorabe. Thank you Christian bikies you guys are excellent.

in reply to ' I also like the idea of having a profession long jump snow skier were a wingsuit. ' ................................ It's hard to believe no-one has tried this yet. Do the rules of ski-jumping forbid the use of wings??? If not then whoever does it first is gonna set a huge new record. As for landing the current wingsuits.................. I agree that some form of inflatable wing would be much more likely to achieve a repeatable landing. Inflatable kites kick ass ... and I see no reason why inflatable wingsuits wouldn't do the same if designed well. What we need is an aeronautical engineer or threee to make it his/her /their pet project. Current efforts though wonderful are still relatively amateurish . This wingsuitin' landin' trip needs a quantum leap. Overcoming the 'fabric only ' crew and getting into some truly modern materials and attitudes will also give the whole thang a boost. In the meantime small improvements to the same basic design will have to do.

You wouldn't want to be touched by either of them. This arg is as old as them denuded hills. The Brits got it down long ago. "Little powder , much lead , hits hard , kills dead " Spray n pray or aim for fame. PS whoever told you the 9mm got no stopping power has never heard of a hollar point.

That's already happening in Iraq.....so perhaps we could just send every war-mongering social violence- supporting drongo over there and pay them to kill each other. The tactic of sitting back and picking up the pieces is what's got us into this mess. Once prodded it's typical of the 'wannabe as tough as the yanks' Oz police to just lash out and get anyone in range. The real perps'll be sitting back laughing untouched as usual.

If you've been having these problems in your home area for years now then how pathetic is that. It seems like ozzie police are more interested in harrassing harmless people than getting in there and sorting out the REAL problems as you described. Have they run out of hippies and greenies to annoy.? Now you've got lebbo's and wogs and Ities and all the rest of the wanna be ozzie world. Other more rural parts of Australia have solved similar problems by not polarising the issues but realising we are all here in this multicultural world however imperfectly. Australia used to be considered a tolerant society due to the many hardships our forebears endured. Australians used to help each other as they co-operated to build a decent strong society. Now they compete for limited resources and beat each other out of a desire to be richer and more powerful than their fellows. The current government trades on spreading fear and loathing. These Sydney based riots are simply a reflection of the current NEW Australian consciousness. We've got our uncurrent leaders to thank for not being up to actually leading Australia out of its bigoted mindset. You can keep your little beach ................it stinks.

Bootie hangups are not all that uncommon. We've got the original bootie designers to thank for this as the design provides a built-in snag in an out of sight position under the foot. All for the sake of slip on convenience. Now some wingsuits have a similar built in Bootie. There was one a while ago were the pilot just couldn't shake the victim off and no knife on board . As the fuel ran down their options reduced to landing with the person still connected. The pilot considered flying low over a lake to dislodge the jumper on water contact. A gravel rash touch down was another option. Thankfully the bootie tore off on descent and the jumper survived with minor injuries but badly shaken. It mustn't have occurred to the jumper to simply dump out as another option. Perhaps a broken leg or ankle would result but sure sounds better than the gravel rash option. The 'good ol' leather bootie strongly sewn to tough jumpsuits will no doubt continue to cause unlucky snaggy jumpers bother . The boosters on inexperienced legs is another story.

I've got a used ZP with experimental valves cut in the bottom going cheap. --------------- major bonus -------------it actually goes back up in high speed flight . I've also heard that if you cut the end cells off a stilleto the thing actually improves its opening performances. Let us know how it goes.

Thanks for your kind reply Muenkel, It must have been extra hard getting injured before finishing AFF. If you really want to do it and your body lets you you'll be back there in the sky. One of my most beautiful skydives was a tandem where I was trusted to take a paraplegic passenger. This guy told me that even if I smashed his legs he wouldn't mind as he wouldn't feel it anyway. We had to tie his legs up and secure him as well as we could and then just do it. Under canopy he was in no hurry to get back down unlike a lot of passengers. We landed in the pit ..not a scratch but lots of cheering from his loved ones. That is one skydive i'd really love to repeat as often as possible. Muenkel if you're ever having trouble getting UP SKY let us know and I'm sure we can work something out. Drag, crawl, shuffle ,walk ,hurry ,run .....& FLY. Cheers Trae

....................... Steam catapults??? Teflon coated suits... inside and out. Wonder what the take off speed would be???

in reply to "what skills should i have under my belt before i go down that path "???? ........................................................ Prerequisites??? (1) It's a sure bet that most wingsuiters cut their teeth flying using daddy's, mummy's or some-ones umbrella,&/or a small cape and a handy first floor window exit point. (2) All of us that survived the ground strikes went on to PLF's and then butt-slides. (3) After jumping up and falling down lots ......still believing that a person can fly Last prerequisite ...

in reply to "you mean like titanium legs ?? " ................................................... Grandson of astro boy already has some.

in reply to "you mean like titanium legs ?? " .................................. I was thinking more like aluminium but definitely with titanium wearing surfaces ... where are those old Astro-boy comics???? They could have a few hints.

in reply to " heard of 60kg thrust.... " ............................ Strapping 60kg thrust motors to your ankles (as in Visa P's Rocket Boots ) could be problematic. It seems likely that if the power got this high you'd need a bit of help with some type of rigid support structure.