almeister112

That link may not work much longer. Some crazy person may or may not have bought it...

My legend is spreading! I'm so proud.

It was great jumping with you! Hopefully we'll see you again soon!

How exactly does one feel her contradictions?

"You're jumping out of an airplane. You have nothing to prove!" "I'm sure i could keep jumping that same canopy and safely land it (most) of the time. But (most) of the time ain't good enough!" You have exactly the kind of attitude that we all need. I think you have great things in your future. Thanks for your posts! Hopefully newer jumpers will read and heed.

I've long wanted to get my time on a 2x2 under a minute and do the same thing. I know I'll never be good enough to do a 3x3 in time, so my hat is off to this guy. I do question the wisdom of not drilling a hole in a corner and tethering it to your wrist, though. That seems like a small, multicolored crater just waiting to happen.

That's how we exited last time. It was almost perfect; I just didn't get up quite enough, so we barely missed it. I just need to suck slightly less and we'll be good to go!

I make sure I carry my anti-malfunction Bat-spray in my utility belt at all times. I've avoided cutaways on 100% of the 3 jumps on which I've worn the belt (it lights up, so I took it on a night jump). Can't argue with statistics! I'm gonna try one more jump with Ke to get slightly better pictures of the exit and then not be as much of a wuss flying down to him (I'm still not used to the burble being behind me, so I keep expecting to collapse onto people right below me), and then I'm gonna send the pictures in to DC Comics. They'll either get a kick out of it or send me a cease and desist letter.

After putting 25 or so jumps on my new Phantom 2, I finally got the pictures I wanted. I happen to be a huge comic book nerd, so when I ordered my suit I made sure I got Batman colors. That, naturally, wasn't nearly good enough, so today I took the next logical step--adding a utility belt and mask. The looks from the rest of the people on the load were priceless.

I haven't hurt myself or others due to my progression for one big reason: I've been very conservative in my choices and listened to advice. I made one dodgy canopy decision: I went from a 210 rental canopy to the Sabre 170 I got with my first rig. I was really nervous on that first jump, and I probably should have rented a 190. But I got through it just fine. I then did about 400 jumps on the 170 until moving to my Storm 150, which I plan to stick with for at least several hundred more jumps. I'll probably eventually downsize to a 135, but I don't see myself ever getting below a 120 at the smallest. I also followed the recommendations for wingsuits (now a BSR) and cameras. I made sure I had 200 jumps before trying either. Would I have survived strapping a GoPro to my head at 100 jumps? Probably. But I really didn't know anything at that point, and the added distraction really would not have been good for me. The question is do I think we need more regulation. My answer is we need fewer over-eager young skydivers who think they're awesome and don't need to listen to the guys who've been jumping since the 60's. I'm 23, and while I'm confident in my skills, I will always listen to the guy who has 10,000 jumps and has been in the sport since before I was born. He's probably right; at the very least he has something to say that's worth considering. If we all followed the recommendations we'd be in much better shape, but too many people don't. I personally didn't need more regulation since I was conservative in my approach, but I think we owe it to new jumpers to rein in their enthusiasm to keep them alive. Some kind of sign-off on canopy skills (with or without a jump # requirement) before downsizing sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

Well, after a long wait (July 14 to October 17), I finally got my Phantom. I got a package from Phoenix-Fly 2 weeks ago, excitedly opened it up...and found a Shadow. I emailed them back and let them know they made me the wrong suit, and Robert Pecnik wrote back right away. I got my replacement suit in 2 weeks, he said I should feel free to jump the Shadow until the Phantom arrived, and he knocked off 20% from the price (which I didn't even ask for). I couldn't be happier with how Phoenix-Fly treated me after they made a mistake. The suit fits great (even better than the Shadow, which I didn't think was possible), and I was really impressed with the Shadow as I jumped it the past 2 weekends. I can't wait to try out the Phantom. I can't say I was too thrilled with the time it took to get the suit or the fact that the factory messed up, but they know how to take care of a customer. And the Shadow fits a friend of mine perfectly, so it looks like we'll both get great suits for great prices.

I'm fully aware of the stats on fatalities--very few people die due to equipment failure, but I actually find that comforting when it comes to my chances of injury. The vast majority of incidents are pilot error and 100% preventable--mostly low turns and canopy collisions. Low turns are caused by people making poor decisions in a problem spot, deciding to force a landing into the wind or avoiding an obstacle they shouldn't have been near to begin with. I'm not saying I'm incapable of making those mistakes; far from it. But I do fly a safe, predictable pattern on every jump so I can minimize the chances of killing myself hooking it in. A canopy collision is obviously a different matter, but I do everything I can to avoid getting myself into situations where they could occur. I stay the hell away from the high-performance canopy pilots as much as possible and I keep my head on a swivel to avoid traffic the entire time I'm under canopy. Note: that isn't to say swoopers are the only people who cause canopy collisions or the only people you need to look out for, but it is easier to avoid canopies flying at lower speeds. That doesn't mean I can't miss something or get taken out by someone doing something stupid, but I'm doing everything in my power to fly my canopy safely. Is skydiving "safe"? Depends on your definition. If most of the fatalities were due to equipment failure and people doing everything right but still dying, I wouldn't jump (which is why I find the recent spate of canopy collisions really worrying). But if I die skydiving, the odds are very good it's because I killed myself doing something stupid that I should have been able to prevent. That makes the risks of skydiving acceptable to me, since I trust myself to make good decisions. So I guess I consider the equipment itself very safe and the sport dangerous but manageable. And I should also mention that I've had this conversation with my family, too, and they pretty much agree with me. It's impossible to avoid injury/death all the time. But I've made decisions that make the benefits of skydiving outweigh the risks for me personally, and I'm doing the best I can to stay safe.

I second the idea that bringing family members out to the DZ can do wonders. For me it wasn't bringing them to the DZ, it was showing them the gear, but if you're still a student those are one and the same. Either you or an instructor should walk your dad through how a rig works: the main, the reserve, the cutaway and reserve handles, and especially the RSL and AAD. Once my family knew I had trained for emergencies A LOT, my reserve was packed by an FAA-certified rigger, AND I had 2 different backup devices in case I didn't pull my reserve after cutting away they felt a lot better about the whole enterprise. I'm assuming you've already explained that stuff, but seeing how well the gear is built really impressed my family. They still think swooping and BASE jumping are for people with death wishes, but they realize that skydiving isn't as dangerous as whuffos assume.

In terms of not recording CRW jumps, my Pro-Track doesn't record any jump where I don't get a decent delay before opening. CRW and hop 'n pops don't get logged, since the unit doesn't sense a high enough speed to switch to recording mode.

Yeah, like I said, don't go messing with that stuff until you've had a talk with an instructor. Both of those techniques can cause damage. But the same is true of toggles--I know a guy who's currently recovering from a compressed vertebra from using toggles to clear some gravel and holding on too long. When he went to flare he didn't have much of anything left, so he hit hard. I tend not to do too much on my final approach. If it looks like I'm coming in short, I'll make an acute angle on my base leg to cut the corner a bit, and if I'm still too high I'll do an obtuse base leg. Then again, my accuracy is also kinda shitty, so I'm not necessarily a good source of info on this topic. Edited to add: I don't really use toggles on final other than minor left/right adjustments. I need to work on it, but it's not a skill I've developed.

If you want to be successful and safe jumping at a big dropzone, I would entirely eliminate S-turns (sashaying) on final. You'll get a talking to from our safety guy and scare the crap out of everyone else on the load if you're bleeding off altitude that way. It's not a good technique to use in traffic, so I wouldn't rely on it. And S-turns also make it harder to figure out what you did wrong: if you set up your pattern consistently, overshooting some landings will help you dial in where you need to fine-tune your approach. Changing your pattern altitudes AND S-turning AND changing where you set up introduces too many variables to see what affects what, so try to stick to changing only one thing per landing and learn from it. For over- or undershooting, talk to your instructors. I give myself a little bit of rear risers if I'm undershooting and use my front risers if I'm overshooting, but if you do either of those too low to the ground you're asking for trouble. I'd rely on first-hand coaching for that stuff.

I actually waited until I had 200 jumps to put on a GoPro, and I'm really glad I did. Would I have survived putting one on at jump #50? Probably. I didn't have my first cutaway until jump 400-something, so I probably would've been fine. But I, like everybody else, assumed I'd just "put it on and forget it's there;" that simply isn't true. It IS a distraction: I've gotten my head stuck in the door more than once when I didn't duck low enough, and tracking feels very different with the added drag and weight on my helmet. I also fiddle with it on the plane to make sure the angle is set up properly, and if I didn't have a very defined routine of handle and gear checks in place from having jumped for a while I could easily forget to do so. Will you survive jumping a camera earlier than 200 jumps? Odds are pretty good you will. But why add another risk factor when you still don't really know what you're doing? Focus on honing your flying, being aware and intelligent under canopy, and just wait a while before adding that extra distraction. If you fly anything like I did when I had 100 jumps, your footage will likely be a record of your failed docks, going low on formations, and out landings anyway. Patience, young Padawan.

Tunnel time and coaching in general are always a great idea. Definitely do those. But that said, you have 35 jumps. You aren't expected to be flying at their level yet. It took me a looooong time to stop totally sucking, and I still have trouble diving down to formations, turning on my center point, and other things. I absolutely understand your frustration--there was no more frustrating feeling than going low on a jump and knowing I wasn't getting back up. I did that A LOT. The experienced guys at Skydive Arizona were nice (and patient!) enough to take me along even when I was completely terrible, and after a while I started actually being able to fly with them. The analogy they always told me was this: "Were you an expert at driving a car when you'd been behind the wheel for 35 minutes?" That's how much freefall time you have now. Moral of the story: yes, get in the tunnel. Get coaching. But if the experienced guys you were jumping with are willing to take you along, you'll learn a lot from them and eventually get better. It just takes time. We've all been there.

I'm a total wuss when it comes to motion sickness (a little turbulence and I don't do so great), but like an idiot I said "OK!" when my tandem instructor asked if I wanted to do spirals on my first jump. I felt sick for the rest of the day, but went ahead and did AFF anyway (after checking that I could pay for the package deal only after making sure I didn't get sick on every jump). Flying your own canopy should, I think, get rid of the motion sickness for 2 reasons: 1, like people said, it's different when you're in control. But more importantly, your being in control means you can stop it if it gets to be too much--I still can't do more than about 540 degrees burying a toggle before I start to feel it, so I just stop the turn before it's a problem. I think you should be fine.

Jump 101, I was doing a 2-way with a guy out of a Skyvan. I needed practice diving down to a formation, so he told me to give him a couple seconds then dive out after him. He said he wasn't even going to look for me--I should just get down to him. He jumped, I gave him a few seconds, and then I followed. Turned out my accuracy in diving down was incredible--I was able to head straight for him. However, my stopping ability was somewhat lacking, to say the least, and I slammed into him at pretty much full speed. I bounced off and looked back to see his reserve deploying at 11 grand. I proceeded to freak the hell out and land as fast as possible, assuming I had managed to dislodge his reserve after I killed him. When I finally saw him turning his canopy a few minutes later I breathed a massive sigh of relief. It turns out that I either dislocated or pinched a nerve in his right shoulder, which rendered it useless for a bit, so he decided to go to his reserve right away. He got feeling back in it as he was coming down and was able to land just fine. Lessons learned: Learn to stop. If you aren't able to stop in time, realize that with enough time to avoid taking out the formation. Always jump with an AAD (he didn't have one at the time, and it's a miracle I didn't knock him out). Always watch out for everyone around you. The reserve on that container works, which was good to know when I bought the rig off him a few months ago and then had to use it on my first cutaway. The two of us are now good friends and joke about it all the time (I always call him "the guy I tried to kill" when talking to people about him), but it easily could have been a fatality. We both learned a lot from it (to this day I'm still overly-conservative when approaching formations), but I never want to come close to anything like that happening again.

I completely agree that the wingsuit and BASE scenes were awesome. If only the rest of the movie weren't one of the most expensive piles of crap I've ever seen...terrible plot, worse dialogue, and even worse "comedy" made for a pretty miserable movie. The incredible effects weren't enough to make up for those. IMO, at least.

I saw this posted on Gizmodo and figured I had to share it. Pretty decent little film. It was done by Mathias Lachal as a final school project, apparently. http://vimeo.com/25352973

I had a bad opening that somehow took off a chunk of skin on one of my fingers and had me bleeding pretty good, and since then I always wear gloves. On the topic of the tackified receiver gloves: I really like the gloves, but after a day of jumping my hands always develop a distinct gross-inside-of-glove smell that's tough to get rid of. I've baby-powdered the gloves multiple times, but it never does any good. Anybody else have that problem? I've switched to batting gloves in the meantime, which work just fine, but I do like the receiver gloves.

Keep in mind that I've only jumped at Skydive Arizona, where we also follow a FMD rule. The first person sets the pattern, with the understanding that the FMD has the responsibility for setting the pattern for the whole load and should therefore follow the direction the tetrahedron is pointing. The other critical point is that HP landings are done into the wind. Assuming the first man down follows the direction of the tetrahedron (which happens almost all of the time, since it's almost always the tandem videographers or another local swooper landing first), then everything works perfectly. Suppose the tetrahedron is ambiguous or the FMD decides today's a beautiful day for a downwinder, though. I don't see how you can safely have any system that DOESN'T have the rest of the load landing the same direction as the first guy. There have been times when half the load does what they're supposed to and follows the first guy down anyway, but the rest want to land into the wind. That gives you people landing right at each other, which is a recipe for a canopy collision if ever I've seen one. Say what you will about setting a landing direction before going up. I don't really have a problem with that. But I DO have a problem with people deciding to land in opposite directions in the same landing area on the same load. That's where things get bad quickly, and if the first guy lands downwind and half the load decides not to follow, I'm heading to the desert to avoid the mess that follows. So assuming we're all following what the first guy does anyway if we want to land in the grass with him, he may as well read the tetrahedron and get the most updated wind information available. If he screws it up, the whole load either lands with him or somewhere else.

Something that helped me out for a while was doing a half-flare relatively high and then finishing it out just as I was about to touch down. It kills your speed a bit and makes it easier to judge when you're just about to touch, so it's easier to finish out the flare at the right time. The downside is you lose the full flare ability at the end, so you come in faster and have to run it out a bit, but that helped me develop a better sense of when I needed to punch it.