ficus

A halfway point might be an annual in-person meeting with regular old-fashioned telephone conference calls between. Sure, the phone is not as good as visiting in person, but it would handily suffice for "easy" stuff like routine waivers. Or a hybrid solution like a WebEx conference with a phone dial-in for the unmotivated.

This is just plain not true. The problem with learning on short recovery arc canopies is exactly that they provide a small margin for error. A longer recovery arc not only gives you more adaptability to save the swoop if you are a little high or a little low, but most importantly, allows you to BAIL EARLIER if the ground looks big. That longer arc buys you the two most valuable things you can get: more altitude and more time. Think about it this way -- would you rather turn 50 ft low on a Crossfire or on a Stiletto? Edit: sorry I am a dumbass and didn't see that this post was old and I had already been repeatedly beaten to the punch.

There generally aren't massive quantities of spectators packed into a limited area beneath BASE wingsuiters. The low openings aren't so much an issue per se (in my mind), It's the low openings above spectators. The low opening stunt these guys wanted to do would be done behind a crowd line, just like any other airshow stunt.

Happy birthday Sean!

Aviacom does not suggest using "any battery of same model". From the Argus manual, section 2.2:

It's a good idea to go through that form with a gear dealer who can explain the various options to you, or at a bare minimum, an experienced jumper (preferably one who has experience with the model of rig you are looking at).

no more snaps on the PdF toggles (which is a good thing) Almost is the word... in my short skydiving carreer, I saw scarily maltreated velcro making it as useful as .. nothing It doesn't make sense to compare one system, poorly maintained, to another system in good shape. I have had more than one brake fire jumping a set of risers with pin-based toggle keepers, because the pocket the pin went into was old and stretched out and put poor tension on the pin. I don't know if the PdF design is susceptible to this because I still haven't seen a picture or heard an explanation, but the point is this: no gear is maintenance free, and at equal levels of repair, I don't know of a toggle keeper system that will outperform Velcro in the prevention of accidental brake release.

what has the velcro to do with that ? This is pretty obvious, no? Velcro toggles are the hardest to accidentally dislodge. How do they work?

Velcro actually becomes a better and better idea the more high-performance your canopy gets, because of the increased severity of a brake fire.

If this has only happened once, maybe Mike G's idea that they are just old batteries is all that's going on here. Occam's razor strikes again. Seems like a good idea for Aviacom to put out a SB or at least some kind of notice about the bad batteries.

I just Google for "date calculator".

Who installed the Argus in your rig? I have heard of a case of this happening when two mismatched batteries were put in the unit.

This is true if interpreted literally, as "margin". Of course the profit margin on upjumpers is lower than that of tandems. But that doesn't mean they are not profitable. The canonical tandem passenger who comes and does his jump and gets a video and a t-shirt may represent $100 in profit. Compare that to a random upjumper who maybe earns the DZ $2 a jump. But that upjumper is going to generate $2 100+ times a year. Their overall contribution to the bottom line is not as close to nil as you are making it out to be. You are thinking only one move ahead here. The long-term goal is not to get Airspeed driving BMWs to the DZ. The point is that corporate sponsorship comes hand-in-hand with publicity. More publicity means more skydivers. More skydivers means more money in the skydiving industry, which in turn means more incentive for R&D. This would result in cheaper and better gear, more funds for developing educational programs, and so on. Whether or not this plan would actually work or not is another issue. But there is some logic to it. You say everyone who's going to become a regular skydiver already will. I'm not so sure of that. A few years ago, one of my friends brought up the idea of doing a tandem. I had always wanted to try it, but never got around to it, and his mentioning it was enough to finally motivate me. I did my tandem, thought it was fun, and had no idea why anyone would do it again and again. I was done with it. But my friend badgered me into attending ground school with him and doing AFF level 1. I landed my own parachute and suddenly -- I understood. You are well aware of how that turned out :) It took two swings to get me. I'm glad it happened. Maybe more people should have that chance.

Nice! I realized it when I saw the sand pits in the background.

Not all chest strap misrouting configurations will give with a little tug. Look at the friction adapter. Fabric, metal, fabric. OP: Nice one. That's why we do gear checks!

How can this be? Didn't the guys who did this in the Skyhook demo video have their reserves packed slider-down?

After the Shindig incident, I tried modifying my procedures to unstow brakes before loosening my chest strap. I found it to be annoying. So now I do what Drew mentioned above: I look at my toggles and excess brake line before I unstow the brakes. It has been a workable compromise for me so far.

I see where you're coming from here. It does seem strange that a new rigger could sign off pack jobs while the ink is still drying on his ticket. But if this new rigger is equipped to know the correctness of his own work (and he is, according to his brand new ticket), then he is equipped to verify the correctness of another's work. A Master Rigger does not even necessarily have more experience than a Senior Rigger. The Master Rigger has demonstrated a higher breadth and depth of rigging competence, but competence in rigging does not necessarily equate to competence in teaching. If anything, you ought to be arguing for a Rigger Instructor rating. (More regulation from the FAA, just what we need :) Besides, at the end of the day, the rigger(s) supervising those first 20 packjobs don't hand out the ticket -- the candidate still needs to pass muster with the DPRE. Of course, and this is why the DPRE tests on much more than just a reserve I&R. Ficus

I have jumped 20-30 packjobs done by the guy who packed for you on this jump. In my experience, he is pretty good at getting the canopy in the bag straight and symmetrical (the openings have been better than from my own packjobs), but does a poor job at dressing the rig in other aspects. I have seen the bridle between main pin and BOC insufficiently tucked in, a bit of main PC fabric sticking out, and then the thing that really comes to mind in your case: More than once, he has put my main risers directly on top of my reserve risers. Those of you with Wings rigs will note that this is underneath the flap that says "Place main risers ON TOP of this flap". Especially with a low amount of excess line after the last stow, I could easily see this causing a riser slap on your helmet. Then one riser hangs on your helmet buckle, they load unevenly, a Velocity comes out of the bag, and it's off to the races.

Same thing, as far as I know.

Lay your rig out like you were going to pack it. Rotate the container 360 degrees in line with your risers and lines (e.g. grab the BOC and pull it up over the yoke and keep going). You now have a stepthrough. Don't forget to take it back out. :)

Fair point, but it should be mentioned that pulling around 400' on terminal wingsuit jumps is not at all unusual in the BASE environment. They are not necessarily doing 120 mph vertically. Of course, I don't know if they are planning on wearing wingsuits or not, whether their waiver mentioned that, etc. Just another data point. JP's idea about the tethered balloon is probably the best way for them to get it done.

These same guys are already doing fixed-object demos from similar altitudes. If one of them were to go in during one of those demos, I doubt the general public would even understand the difference between that and a jump from an airplane. I do see the point that it might harm the perception of safe self-regulation. But if there exists a system whereby stunt pilots can fly inverted 10 feet off the deck, surely there should be a way for these guys to deploy at 400 feet. This is actually a fairly conservative altitude on the BASE scale.

Your prerogative, obviously, but I do want to point out one thing. Any rig, new or used, needs a thorough inspection by a rigger. Manufacturers make errors, too. There is nothing magic about new gear, safety-wise.

Did he get fired? How else do you leave Lodi? As Gareth put it, "Nobody says, 'Boy, I sure am tired of these big planes and cheap jumps!'"