klr

Hi, that type of stuff was par for the course back then - I was only starting when those guys were in their prime. I actually went to Cuba with that pilot & the jumpmaster .... theres quite a few residents there who won't ever forget the time we rented out a bi-plane in valladeros. For them rules were for other people. If you didn't get caught nothing happened. As for the hot coin incident in Bangkok & the other time he did a way way way too low level fly by his own house, the less said the better, I believe one of those incidents is still under investigation by the authorities. I think saying I jumped with these people is an exageration, we fell outa da plane together at roughly the same time .... and if we were very lucky we landed in the same county none of this accuracy sh1te ! rgds klr 'I came into this world kicking and screaming and covered in somebody elses blood, I plan to leave it the same way.'

Hi, not a scary story but different .... back when I started jumping in Ireland the whole operation was basically a drinking club interupted by the odd bout of near suicidal jumping when the clouds rarely lifted off the tree tops. Saturday nights were fairly legendary with what could only be described as heroic amounts of alcohol being drunk, we'd be in the bar by 4 p.m and stay there till we got kicked out then it was Avgas bonfires, home brew moonshine etc back at the DZ. It Usually ending up with people hitting the hay around 6 a.m. As a result of these liver damaging sprees Sunday morning jumping was kinda slow. After a few years of this the DZO, decided to try and get things going quicker on the Sunday by implementing a half price jump ticket for the first lift on the Sunday morning. A great idea in principle to get things moving in the morning, you would think. What he got was the real partygoers who'd had about 45 mins sleep & thought a good ole high lift would be just the thing to finish up on. I only ever did a couple of them ... the smell in the cramped C206 on the 24 minute ride to altitude was atrocious, even in the depths of winter we'd have half the door rolled up. On this particular lift we were dropping off a student at 4 grand to do a 3 second delay. So the pilot calls two minutes, everybody starts shuffling round to get a good view and the still plastered jumpmaster who was looking really green around the gills moves to the front of the door to dispatch the student. As the student edged in to the door I noticed the jumpmaster was starting to swallow profusely. As soon as the student was in the door she yelled 'cut and get the f**K out', no spotting no nothing, she could barely see the edge of the wing. However the student, who had gone to bed early was taking his time, he was going ot do this jump properly. He was going to get cleared for his 5 second delay. At this stage the jumpmaster was screaming at him to get his 'f**king skinny ass outa da plane' ... sensing there may be an issue the student finally exited. Just as the jumpmaster puked up about half a barrel of Guinness. Its not something you see everyday, A student in a perfect arch being follwed by chunks of undigested barbeque ribs in a raincloud of guinness. Anyway - the student deployed the canopy, just as the cloud of stale beer and food hit the centre top cell, lines, risers & student. He got pebbledashed - we could see him thrash around in the harness - it went down as far as his knees. So he had a rather aromatic 5 minutes piloting his manta down & we had about another 15 minutes with a retching jumpmaster. When our turn came to get out, our four way stumbled into position in the door, nobody noticed that the step was still somewhat covered in puke, I was rear float and was managing to hang on when the next lad out put one foot on the guinness coated step & slipped right off the plane. I'm not going to bother describing the rest of the jump - we didn't even get the four way together. With a perfect spot we all still managed to land way off and by the time we got back the student had left, forever, & the DZO was wondering why one of his student canopies smelled like a beermat. That was the last of the half pissed lifts ... All those boys are retired or dead now ... shame really. The place isin't the same. No more blindfold jumps, no more 'I swear that cloud is at 2 grand, c'mon lets bribe the pilot' 'I came into this world kicking and screaming and covered in somebody elses blood, I plan to leave it the same way.'

...... 'I came into this world kicking and screaming and covered in somebody elses blood, I plan to leave it the same way.'

Hi, The tower itself should be find, they're usually fairly solid. just pick a good solid point on it for exit & attachment of static. Checks the struts & bolts for rust etc. Its the transceivers that I wouldn't lean on. I've marked them in the pic attached. They're not load bearing & they're in use 24/7. Don't hit any of the mircowave transmitters (white dishes) , they work on line of sight, if you move one of them more than a fraction you'll break the link. Typically this'll pop up on an operators screen straight away. Normally they just sent out a field engineer to fix it. if you move one and then another one - they'll know somebodys arsing up their base station & it won't be the engineers they'll be calling. If the base station has been vandalised before chances are there will be alarms around the hut, bottom of the tower or on the access gate - just have a good look, you'll spot them easily enough - after all its not Fort Knox. Enjoy ... 'I came into this world kicking and screaming and covered in somebody elses blood, I plan to leave it the same way.'

Hi, Belive it or not but that piece of kit is actually called a Base Station, most cellular networks have thousands of them spread out around the country. Base stations pick up the signal from cell phones & send it back to the central network using microwave links. The arrays at the top are sectorised transceivers -if its in the states its probably 1900 MHZ, Europe 900MHZ / 1800 MHZ - nothing hugely dangerous about them, except they're not load bearing structures. The white dishes are Mircowave links & depending on the time of day, number of people making calls & radio traffic its generally not considered a good idea to spend any time in front of them - especially if you don't want the fillings in your teeth to rapidly heat up & expand. The hut at the bottom on the left will have a backup generator & WILL BE alarmed, more than likely connected to the local cop shop. They're usually built on the cheapest land so I'd imagine the landing area ain't the best either. hopes thats of use. 'I came into this world kicking and screaming and covered in somebody elses blood, I plan to leave it the same way.'

Hi, oh thats just priceless ! The stupid teaching the even more stupid ... I reckon we'll probably be hearing more of these warm organ donors soon enough, with their attitude its only a matter of time. nice of you to try and impart some knowledge on them - you just can't help some people. 'I came into this world kicking and screaming and covered in somebody elses blood, I plan to leave it the same way.'

Hi Paddy, Cheers man ! thanks. Saw your wingsuit vids from, Kjerag - yourself & luke got some excellent footage there. One day ...... klr 'I came into this world kicking and screaming and covered in somebody elses blood, I plan to leave it the same way.'

Hi, Ha ha, you wish dutchboy ! theres not enough alcohol in the world to get me that trashed .... just got back to work this morning, I'd forgotten how much the real world sucks .... and as for the originial posting - start off on a bridge & hit the water. I just did my first two base jumps last saturday on bridge day. Theres enough going on in your first base jump without having to worry about a quarter of a billion tons of cliff a couple of inches behind you. klr 'I came into this world kicking and screaming and covered in somebody elses blood, I plan to leave it the same way.'