SkymonkeyONE

Actually 500 jumps is what is recommended, but we (BM-I's) will take people with 200 very-current jumps and demonstrated airskills if you really want to push it. Chuck

I think you should find someone to write you the code to make a regular CD writer burn your DVD's like we did.

Agreed.....WAR DAMN, EAGLE! While I have been in North Carolina since 1984, I am definitely still an Alabama boy.

New Sigmas have no crystal ball. Not unless you order one without a Skyhook.

I would not buy anything new nowadays except a Neptune, bugs or not, but I currently jump a Pro Dytter

Both are totally incredible flights.

J.E., did you mean BM-I drills, or simply solo BirdMan dives you can do. If the Instructor in you is coming out, then I can tell you that drills are best conducted with another flyer. Think exactly like you would on an AFF cat E solo exit dive. We launch alongside our students, evaluate their body position and then give corrective hand signals and demonstrate what we want them to do. One of the most critical instructor skills is being able to close the gap very quicky, but safely, after a student zoo's an exit. Often times, people just learning will be flying off to another county without even realizing it. If you can't catch them very quicky and "herd" them back to the dropzone then you can't effectively help them with anything else. On tight dropzones with few outs this is incredibly important. There are flight tips in the BM Instructor checklist listed on their website. If you are just talking about drill dives to make you a better wingsuit pilot, then I would urge you to not get locked into one mode of flight. Once you have the basic body position down, then it's time to throw in some barrel rolls, front rolls, etc. Recovery from instability is something that you must be familiar with. The sooner you are not afraid of your suit, the sooner you can really wear out the sky in it. Peace, Chuck

Actually, distance is all that matters to you and those of you who feel that way. I love travelling very long distances in my S3, but at the same dive derive my greatest pleasure from technical flocking, something that BASE guys don't do a lot of. While I agree that "hang time" is not the most important thing, if it were not important to a niche then there would not be a "minute man" listing on the BirdMan site for BASE flilghts. Chuck

Actually, I do stuff like that all the time diving after errant students, but yes, it does lose a lot of altitude. It is a much more powerful maneuver in a wingsuit than it is in a "regular" track, but anyone who says that you cannot quickly reverse your direction in freefall need only watch one Golden Knights "diamond track". Edited to add that this is a snap 180 degree maneuver performed from a full-on max track. Chuck

it's raining again it better fucking clear up or I will be pissed Get off my ass now jump in the shower quickly wash my nasty ass Go to the hangar Fuck with my Harley a bit Redbone Express, yeah Aviators SUCKS I am tired of eating there Tom is a crackhead Drive to town instead Buy me a hotcake special from McDonalds Do some AFF Watch my dog beg for some food Make fun of GK's

Proper PW'ing, the kind that people don't get pissed off at, involves raising your numbers while actually having something of consequence to offer. Starting mindless threads with half-finished "hook" subject lines are irritating. Starting "I'm a PW" threads then having the lemmings follow you is lame as well. I have found over the years that those who type just to see their words on the screen burn out eventually. Hell, even Clay slowed WAY down for a good while. There are very few active posters from the "original" dropzone.com who still post more than two or three times a month.

The Gypsy Moths was a great drama. The low pull scene, straight over the bleachers was fucking nuts. I would love to have the DVD; where is it available? Chuck Blue D-12501

Michele, rather than having a "clean" logbook for people to sign, I have found it better on the several ash dives I have been involved with that the jump participants all sign the current logbook as "the last dive". Just a thought. Just a thought. We executed a brilliant ash dive this past weekend for an old former Navy Chuting Stars Member. I did the tandem and the passenger was one of the sons of the deceased. He had not only never skydived, he had never even been in an airplane. We released all his fathers ashes over Raeford with the aid of another skydiver, Chris Wagner. The other son was was 20 feet away in freefall, also in tandem, watching the release. These dives, when properly executed, are fantastically moving. Chuck

Soccer=LAME

Good point, Jason. That would be a great way to judge ones "flare power" in a suit. This, of course, assuming you are already to the skill level where you can fly relative with a small performance main. There are VERY few people who are even at that level of proficiency, so it's not realistic that we will have anyone_anytime_soon trying this stunt. I don't know of a single wingsuit experienced wingsuit pilot who realistically contemplates this. As to the rigid wing theories, I discount anything of the sort. Plenty of people already land gliders and airplanes. If it's not the new generation of "safe" wingsuits which we currently jump, of something truly of the sort, then we are veering away from the topic of this thread. Is it possible to match the grade of a sloped surface in freefall? Absolutely, We have all seen the video of Loic doing exactly that in Verbier, but we also know how fast he was going as he zoomed past the cameras. Leading with your head, unprotected except for a skydiving helmet and having your arms secured back at the angle your suit restricts you to, what do you think your chances of sliding that landing out without breaking your neck? I say very, very slim. Even with some sort of skid plate rigged to your torso to elevate you up a bit (sort of like a skeleton sled), you then have to deal with stopping the thing. Not me bro, and I have a lot of fucking wingsuit experience. Not with the suits we have available to us today.

There are plenty of "minute men" wingsuit BASE folks nowadays. They rule the valleys of Europe.

HIS WEINER CAME OUT???? BWAHAHAHAHAHA! Brilliant.

-Don't misrepresent your true self to a date or person you might be hitting on. You might get laid or even become romantically involved, but your true self will eventually shine through and then you will have to pay the price for perpetrating a fraud. -Never screw a married woman or someone you know to be romantically involved, especially with a friend. Even if they do "run off" with you, Your complicity will catch up to you at some point later in life. -Do not ever, ever introduce anyone you truly care about to swinging if you have any jealousy in your body. Once that can is open, you can never expect to close it. -Never say "I love you" just to get some drawers. -Don't create elaborate lies and aliases when you are drunk in order to get laid; you will forget them at some point and get busted and your buddies will laugh (and scarf up the chick). -Don't drive ten hours one way every weekend just to get some drawers. There are plenty of suitable mates in your geographic region and running up the milage too fast on your Corvette really kills the resale value. - Don't let your incredibly drunk roommate drive your new Corvette back to the bar after you have already made it home safely, just because he thinks he might have a chance wtih the last troglodite standing at the bar. He will surely wreck your car and get YOU thrown in jail. -after you are done posturing with your two-tone Rolex and new Corvette, know that so long as you are a decent, fun person you you can still end up with a much nicer, compatible mate even though you choose to drive an old Volvo staion wagon and live on the dropzone. -The harder you look for love, the less likely you will find it. If you are able to have fun on a dropzone with your friends, then you will certainly happen into a like-minded mate at some point. -Don't obsess over what you cannot have. If you magically do end up with what you could not have, don't think for a minute it will be anything like what you imagined. -Don't marry a person you cannot live with for six months without wanting to kill or break up with. Previous to that, don't move in with a person you cannot date seriously for six months without wanting to kill or break up with.

So Art, are you asking yourself if you are coming back? Nice troll...... Katie and I will already be in Florida by then on an extended jumping vacation, so it's entirely possible that I will be there with the BM crew. Bring the pain, Chuck

We paid $13 per ticket last year. Are they $14 this year (plus boogie fee)? I am too lazy to do a search. It's still a great deal, but paying an extra fifty cents per jump ticket just for using a credit card would be pretty stupid for anyone planning on making a lot of jumps. Chuck

Think again. This reeks of Olav Zipser all over again. Privately run "licensing" organizations are bad ideas and hold no weight whatsoever, no matter what discipline you are talking about. While not having an AD rating kept you out of Space Games, not too many people cared about supporting Olav and his underlings anyway so it had no real effect on the sport as a whole in the end. People, soon enough, tired of paying an individual for the "opportunity" to jump with him, so now he and his system is passe. I liken that program to the Skydive University Coach rating; not at all applicable on the great majority of US dropzones without other, proper, USPA ratings. To that end, not having one of your private "licenses" is going to stop any freeflyer from getting on a load at a proper dropzone which offers free load organizing. Like you said, the honor system would totally be in effect, but only right up to the point where you either perform or fail to perform as advertised on your first jump with a new group. Your system is redundant in my opinion. On a separate but even grander scale, several years ago the fledgeling US Skydiver Association never got more than a curory glance, even though it was proposed as a cheaper, less burocratic alternative to USPA (much like you can choose between PADI, NAUI, and YMCA ratings in SCUBA diving). It never got off the ground because it really didn't offer any particular benefit, plus you still had to be a USPA member to skydive most places anyway. What you are proposing might work at your dropzone and those you can convince to follow your business template, but I can tell you as a dropzone school manager that it would not fly on my DZ. What you are proposing would require total cooperation, but if total cooperation were required, then USPA would be the one mandating it, not you (as a private individual) nor whatever consortium you propose. As in "flat" flying, USPA already has awards for 3D achievement. Look forward to new "real" USPA specific instructional ratings in the near future. I suspect that both wingsuit and freefly instructional ratings are on the way. Chuck Blue D-12501 AFF/SL/TM/BM-I, PRO, S&TA Raeford Parachute Center

Actually, Airspeed as a unit only had them for one season, but individual members still jump them for their "fun" main. A lot of the "team" Velos ended up at The Ranch as I recall. I know Maggot told me they got six of them. As to Velo openings, mine are fantastic as far as crossbraced canopies go. Before I got my Sabre2 I even jumped my Velo 79 as my primary BirdMan main. It, in over 50 flights, never spun once or smacked me. Actually, I have never been smacked by a Velocity at all, but openings on anything of this calibre must be "flown through", that, I believe if my recollection of my conversation with Craig is right, is the reason Airspeed got rid of them. Too much work at the sheer jump volume they do. Chuck

Fuck the Rodriguez Brothers! Mono Uno

If you have off heading and spinning openings on ANY canopy, then that main is not suitable, in your instance, for wingsuit jumping. The issue is the time it takes to free your arms before you can actively get out of your twists, not the wingloading. MOST wingsuit pilots have chopped from spinners in their suits, so proper practice of your emergency procedures is of paramount importance. Chuck

Not talking smack about Lower Alabama are you, Blair? You do know where I am from, don't you?