chrismgtis

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Content

    842

  • Joined

  • Last visited

    Never

  • Feedback

    0%

Everything posted by chrismgtis

  1. chrismgtis
    Yea, actually it was. The exit was wild. I pulled at 5000' and the adrenaline really started pumping around 6000 which I'm not used to. Normally I'm very relaxed. It was great though. Was entirely under control in freefall and doing turns and tracked a little bit which was great cause normally I end up in a turn and take a few seconds to correct. I wasn't used to having to get everything ready myself and I goofed a few times. I got a radio and forgot to tell the DZO I was going to be on standby. I had to wait for my chute to be packed and got it on just in time to get on the aircraft. All in all. The dives went great. It was a unique experience from the others. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  2. chrismgtis
    Jumped my level 7 today and made a solo dive. Thanks for all the help from those of you at dropzone.com and to instructors/staff at Chester, SC. I still owe you guys some beer. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  3. chrismgtis
    If you're worried about it I wouldn't jump either. If you think you'll be ok then you might be fine. Just pay attention to what your body is telling you. I'd hate to see anyone jump and have a whole pushed in their eardrum. That would suck and could be fatal. But seriously I'd see an ENT and ask his opinon. Have him look at your ear. If he thinks it looks ok and you feel ok then go for it as long as you know things are healed fine. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  4. chrismgtis
    I am single and make $13.50/hour (highly underpaid for a network administrator). I'm not complaining because when your a network admin and are the only I.T staff in a 250,000 square foot building with a massive network connected to a massive worldwide WAN, you're getting a lot of amazing experience - which I'll be able to use when this job is over to make what I deserve ($50-90k). At the moment I am living at home with my parents because the job I currently hold is moving to other locations and closing down, so I don't have a lot of bills to pay. When this job closes down I'll hopefully be able to get the job paying what I deserve and get moved back out. So, basically I am single and live with my parents and make very good money for that scenario. I've done the college deal eating ramen noodles all of the time and somehow surviving by making half of what your bills are costing you. It sucks. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  5. chrismgtis
    I agree. As someone said, your ass is alive and a few bucks isn't worth worrying about when you cheated death yet again. Tandems (and maybe students) are the only thing I would say should get to go back up if they get a really short freefall (for free or at least for a lot smaller fee) since they pay so much and you don't want those people to be really upset and tell others about their experience (especially tandems - I'm sure most students would be understanding). I think you would want to make sure you make them happy if something bad went wrong. That is if they still want to jump after an emergency. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  6. chrismgtis
    Can't say I look down on anyone that decides not to jump. After all, their the sane ones on the load. Were the crazy ones. I'd say good job on having the sense not to do this crazy shit. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  7. chrismgtis
    You know, I've been using Photoshop for 8 years and I completely forgot that option even existed. Oops. Thanks for the tip. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  8. chrismgtis
    Too bad. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  9. chrismgtis
    Unbelievable. Man skydives with turbine engines strapped to his feet. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5417019303200331106&q=skydive&hl=en Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  10. chrismgtis
    I said I probably wouldn't do it more than once. Now I've got 10 jumps and one away from finishing AFF. Hoping to have my own rig within the next 6 months. If it's something you want to do you just have to have faith in your gear and instructors and say "fuck it" and tell the fear to kiss your butt. That's what I do and I've gotten to the point now that I'm not very nervous anymore when it comes time to exit that door. Although, when I get to the door I still have that fear of "falling out" somewhat and tend to not stick my head out far enough, but once it comes time for me to jump with no supervision I'm just going to walk out and worry about being stable later. Instead of standing there waiting to check in and out and letting that "fear of falling out" come in. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  11. chrismgtis
    I was sore the first two or so times I did AFF. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  12. chrismgtis
    N/A
  13. chrismgtis
    I didn't know there was actual footage of Joe Kittenger's jump. Thought this might be of some interest to some of you. http://www.metacafe.com/watch/42263/the_speed_of_sound/ Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  14. chrismgtis
    The avatar file size requirement is a bit too small. It's not easy to get a 65x75 file down to 10KB. 15KB wouldn't be too hard. In Photoshop you can size the image to a 65x75 JPEG with a quality of 0 out of 10 and still not be below the 10KB file size. Can we possibly change this to at least 15-16KB? Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  15. chrismgtis
    Don't feel bad, I was in 3 accidents that weren't my fault in a 10 month time frame about 2 years ago. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  16. chrismgtis
    This DZ has just about everything you would expect a DZ to offer. There are no cons that I can name. I would recommend it to anyone wanting to experience a tandem or to get an A-license. Everyone is very nice and considerate. I've made a lot of friends at the DZ. Met a lot of interesting people. The instructors make the process of learning actually very easy considering the fact that I was learning to jump out of an airplane, something you really don't know how to prepare yourself for, but I learned to listen and do what I was told and everything went 100% smooth through every jump all the way to my A-license.
  17. chrismgtis
    You sure standing near the door with your helmet off is a smart move? Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  18. chrismgtis
    As someone said the tubes are an option. From what I understand from my research, any problems you have such as ETD wouldn't matter anymore, because there would be hole between your eustachian tube and the ear canal and you wouldn't have to equalize pressure. But talk to your doctor about it and see what he recommends. I would say that is the last resort too. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  19. chrismgtis
    I have heard instructors say they got that initial shock of the temperature difference after an exit, but that they don't notice it very much after a few seconds. I personally don't think I've ever noticed how cold it was in the 7 jumps I've done. Under canopy I did notice the cold, but in freefall I never noticed it even as I was standing at the door. The adrenaline starts pumping when that door opens though. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  20. chrismgtis
    When the door opens you feel that wind enter the plane and you're thinking "MAN that is cold", but once you exit you don't seem to even notice that it is cold. I'm assuming it's adrenaline keeping you warm and with everything going on you're mind is on other things? Or is there some scientific explanation to this? Hey, not that I'm complaining. It just seems crazy to me that it's been probably 10-25'F up there the last few jumps and I couldn't even feel it. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  21. chrismgtis
    Still, it's good to get an opinion from others. I never take anything you guys say TOO seriously, afterall you could be wrong. It's ok to take the advice into consideration. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  22. chrismgtis
    A new instructor at the DZ helped me figure out what my problem was and made some suggestions. In freefall everything he told me helped out a lot. I think one of the things might have been that my legs were not tense enough, so I might have been relaxing one or the other a little more than the other, just enough to cause a turn. We worked on my arch and from what I can tell that seems to have been my problem. Either way I did a lot better and got cleared for the next level. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  23. chrismgtis
    Had that problem myself on my first jump. Left ear pressure wouldn't clear. Valsalva wouldn't help and found out I had a retracted ear drum a few days later. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  24. chrismgtis
    ...holy...that sounds pretty sick. I hope that was highly exagerated heh. That is freaky. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan
  25. chrismgtis
    There are DZs that actually do HALO jumps (not sure what else you would call a 30k' jump)? I know there are some (I assume ex-military personell or existing military personell) that do this, but I had never heard of the typical DZ doing anything like that. Rodriguez Brother #1614, Muff Brother #4033 Jumped: Twin Otter, Cessna 182, CASA, Helicopter, Caravan