SkymonkeyONE

They are both fine canopies. I jump a Sabre2 (97)in my wingsuit rig and love it. My wife owns two Pilots (124's). She had two sizes of Sabre2's before deciding she liked the Pilot better.

Cancelled due to lack of interest. There will, though, be a course run for sure during the Deland bigway and skills camp weekend at the beginning of December. PM me or call BirdMan for details.

But mine sure is. Keep it civil, boys.

Like Dave said, there is no longer a written exam for the A-license. There is a verbal exam. The completed and stamped A-license proficiency card is the A-license. No need to send it in to USPA at all unless the person wants a number.

$800 is extremely cheap for a real GENTEX with coms. FWIW, I still have mine and it's a fantastic helmet for winter riding on my Harley (along with my Scott motocross goggles with rock guard). The only jumping it sees these days is for military demos. Chuck

Looks like I will also be running a BMI course either at night during the boogie, or right at the end. One of my English buddies needs the course, so I am going to make it happen. Anyone else interested in joining in PM me. Chuck

So how come you couldn't get out of the twists? Fair enough, you had lots, but also 2000ft to play with. If I saw that many twists, I'd cut away the wings in half a second flat, rather than playing with zips. Any reason you didn't? I can't answer for Jenn (edited), but I can tell you that I can unzip at least as fast as it takes me to pull the wing cutaways. Practice, practice, practice your EP's. The more you practice your post-opening procedures, the faster you will be able to address the linetwists. On a skydiving wingsuit jump, the primary way of getting out of your wings is your zippers. Your wing cutaways are your secondary, or contingency means. That is not to say that it's not OK to go straight for your arm cutaways, just that it makes it much more of a pain in the ass to re-rig for your next jump if you go that route. Some BASE guys will argue that it makes more sense to go straight for the cutaways, but I can promise you that that isn't the smartest way to do things if you have any posibility of landing in the water. Also, in the event of an irrecoverable spinner on a skydive in a wingsuit the first course of action is to cutaway, not dick around with your zippers or your wing cutaways. You deal with the suit after dealing with the malfunction. In this case, though, Jenn had the canopy straight over her head for quite some time and had every reason to believe that he was going to be able to eventually kick out of the twists. It's all good; he lived. I have had two rides on wingsuit jumps; one nearly killed me three years ago. The simple act of dicking around with my zippers under a spun-up canopy got me, under my 75 square foot main, spun up to my neck and diving at the ground at near terminal velocity. Chopping immediately would have definitely helped in preventing my cutaway cables being locked into the twisted risers. I don't recommend anyone attempt to recreate my problem. Firing my reserve straight into that shit was definitely not the hot ticket, but I lived to tell about it. The bottom line here is that I know very, very few active wingsuit pilots who have not chopped in a suit. Chuck edited because I misread who started the thread...

I do not watch my deployment over my shoulder on wingsuit jumps and will never teach anyone to do so. I have a lot of wingsuit jumps and have taught a lot of students. I throw my PC symetrically, start sitting up, then look straight up at my canopy for a split second as the canopy starts pulling me upright in the harness. PC hesitations are not a problem when you are jumping the right kind of gear and are not bullshitting when you throw your PC. Throw it like you mean it! Still, the posibility of such a thing happening is the main reason that we pull higher than normal on wingsuit jumps; particularly first flights and up until we are very comfortable with our openings in suits. Also, I have never used anything other than a hackey or a monkeyfist handle on any of my 500+ wingsuit flights. Short bridles, un-cut corners, weak throws, out of trim canopies and poor body position at pulltime are the major causes of PC hesitation and linetwists. That said, I think lighter PC handles are a smart idea and I may toy around with a floating handle to see how I like it; it sounds like a no-brainer. Chuck Blue D-12501 BMCI

We use Navigators in sizes 260, 240, and 220 for students and will probably end up with one of the largest ones and at least one 200. The great majority of our students start out on 240's. For "other" rental, post-AFF rigs, we have a combo of PD Spectres and Sabre2's in various smaller sizes (down to 170).

I wear my "Ice" framed Gatorz all the time: on my Harley, day-to-day shit, and skydiving. I don't tear up much at all with them as they fit my face really well. Katie has a pair of Ice as well and likes them for skydiving much better than jumping in her Batray frames.

I put "other" because both answers apply. There are more than a few types of canopies produced in the age of square parachutes which "generally" open harder than others. Yes, packing also plays a hand.

What Scott said. There are a lot of people and places, at least around here, where spare parts for MT1-XX, MC-4, and MC-5's can be found. Simply starting this thread will probably get you several PM's from people hording the stuff. Chuck MFFJM (among other things)

I will, of course, be there.

While there may be people out there with more time in the cone than I have, our desire to keep our moderator pool as small as possible lands me here keeping this forum in check. Just as a matter of reference though, I have accumulated 254 hours of tunnel time, all of it in the military tunnel on Fort Bragg. I am possibly best known in that capacity as being the guy who flew Joan Lunden in the tunnel on "Behind Closed Doors" which has played probably 100 times on TV. Please just keep Sangiro's "no advertising" rules in mind when posting here and all will be well. Chuck Blue D-12501

I have done Para-Draeger MFF jumps into open water with Rocket Fins on, but haven't ever jumped them on a sport jump just for fun.

Agreed. As someone who has taught at dropzones which have used both systems, I am 100% in favor of direct bag for SL.

What up, Doug?!

I had forgotten all about those pictures, Deuce. My, what big pupils he and I had... A brilliant evening, if I do say so.

Since when did CSS get a bunkhouse?

The only place I know of in Maine is Lebanon and I am not sure if they are sticking with the 18 year old age minimum formerly required or if they are following new USPA guidance and letting 16 year olds jump with parental consent. Here is there contact info: 207-339-1520 207-339-8865 (fax) ugojump@SkydiveNewEngland.com http://www.ugojump.com

Personally, I think if a person wants to end it, then let them end it. I would much rather it be OK for a person to simply report to a place and get a painless lethal injection than to have to clean up the mess they make when they finally decide to eat a gun. If a person has had enough, then who the hell are we to force them to stay around longer and remain miserable? Seriously. This, assuming they had no complicated binding agreements they were trying to escape. I absolutely believe that anyone sentenced to a life-long prison term (or one which would effectively end their useful years) ought to be given the option to simply check out as well. I know for a fact that I would choose to end it immediately if I were ever convicted of such a sentence. Likewise, I would have no problem whatsoever letting a widow or widower end it at will. If they have lived their life and just lost their soulmate, then why force them to live on if they would rather not? Same for a person seriously disfigured in an accident (or by birth defect) who simply does not want to live. You feel like forcing them to live a life of welfare and ridicule (in their minds anyway) when they simply want to die? Call me callous if you like, but I have seen a lot of death, pain and suffering in my life and this is something that I think about on occasion. I am a total realist in this regard.

"We got us the Josey Wales!" -the character Michele's dad was playing "Fuck you AND your president" -snake pliskin "I gave her my hart and she gave me a pen" -Lloyd Dobler "Lloyd, Lloyd, all null and void. He's wiggin every day, wiggin every night he's wiggin, YEAH! He's wiggin! Wiggidy-wig!" -Lloyd's friends rapping to him in front of the "gas and sip" in "Say Anything" "Oh I hated the Colonel with those wee, beady eyes, and that smug look on his face! OOh, you're gonna buy my chicken, OOoooh."

Outstanding. That's a fantastic body position for a first flight. Looks like you were killing it.

I don't understand what you are asking here. Are you asking how to have people exit SL from twins? We, out of our otter when we used to do SL and the Cessna was unavailable for some reason, would have them stand in the door just like an AFF student (poising with right foot forward, left foot back, head outside the plane looking at the port-side prop). We always have them hang from the strut of the C-182 with legs extended for both SL and IAD whenever they get used.

I don't even know where I would recommend a person try to get a hotel. The airport in Laurenburg is around 20 miles from Raeford. We have a Comfort Inn in downtown Raeford. I am sure there are some hotels over in Laurenburg, but once again, they are at least ten miles from the DZ as far as I can tell.