Divalent

According to all I've read, it depends on whether you are upwind or downwind, and how high the winds are. If upwind in a stiff wind, deep brakes can slow your descent and allow you to get carried along by the winds. But if you are downwind, brakes will likely make your position worse, giving you a steeper descent angle. In that case, depending on the headwind speed and your canopy, rear risers may help. Regardless of wind speed and direction, you do want to reduce your body's drag by reducing your surface area.

Right there at the start, where he tried (and succeeded?) to dock on his own canopy. (But I'm not familiar with the rules, so maybe he didn't hold it long enough?)

Or was it successful? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VOV-Fn4Iu6A

You might want to check these out before you go the camera route: http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=4117038#4117038 http://www.uspa.org/SIM/Read/Section6/tabid/169/Default.aspx#983 http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=3894693#3894693

IMO, in most cases when seeking any sort of information, the internet is often a good place to start, but a bad place to stop. Nothing wrong with asking the question in this case (and in similar cases): knowing what others experienced would help him decide if its worth pursuing and, if so, whether it would be useful to expend time and money in advance before he does so.

Welcome and congrats. For me, landings took ~ 8 jumps before I stood one up. (6 of 7 AFF jumps were butt slides). Pretty much it's timing the flare, and confidence you did it right (or close enough). And I find each time I jump a new canopy, timing may have to be a bit different. But PLFs are good to know and practice, as you never know when circumstances will force you to have to rely on one. Anyway, YMMV. Good luck.

Okay, I'll be the contrarian: Tell them both that you love and care and are concerned about each of them, and that while you recognize the pain and hurt they might be going through now, and that you will not be dragged by either of them into "picking sides" or be forced to pass judgment based on one persons version of recent events. I recommend this for several reasons, the paramount one is that its for your own sanity. But if you do really care for them, by remaining an unbiased neutral friendly party, you will be in a much better position to actually help guide them away from petty destructive acts and do what is best for the long term happiness of both. Good luck.

Yeah, not sure I would've wanted to know too much about skydiving fatalities before I did my first jump. OTOH, I did decided to do AFF *after* doing a similar detailed analysis. After looking at the breakdown, it is my hope that I can be nearly 10 times safer than average once I get farther beyond my student status; and I think this is a realistic goal. This analysis helped me see where common errors were made, and helped me ensure I was picking up the skills and training that would allow me to minimize my risk. 1. Don't do low turns. (So I spent a lot of time under canopy on my solos practicing flat turns and braked turns.) 2. Don't jump in bad winds. 3. Don't swoop. 4. Stay the hell away from people that are swooping. 5. Be vigilant under canopy for other traffic. 6. Gear checks. 7. Don't do rigging in the air. (Altitude awareness if the main is not perfect) 8. Think about everything you do, in free fall and under canopy. 9. Be an expert PLF'r. (I also don't want titanium hardware holding me up.) 10. Jump with an AAD. (and of course, don't commit suicide or do stupid stuff like climbing out of my rig in FF) I'm still a novice and continue to make mistakes, but when I make them, I try to recognize it an learn the lesson. Hopefully I will progressively rely more on my own skill and capabilities, and less on luck, for earning the opportunity to walk back to the hanger under my own power.

Your weight challenge is relatively modest compared to this guy's: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtPs1XUQ368

What that on your head?

You don't see too many people jumping these nowadays. But you might try putting up an ad in the gear-for-sale section here. (Canopy size might be just right for a heavy person just learning to swoop. )

Agree. More data collection in the future (although I hope we don't put off trying to improve things waiting for that data to come in). I'll note that the report by the guy at Eloy on their last ten years worth of incidents found (IIRC) that vistors/new people were disproportionately involved in accidents (although I think not necessarily HP/swoop/>90-degree-turn ones). Perhaps unfamiliarity with the LZ rather means you spend more time looking at where you are going, and so less time spent looking where others are going. It would be valuable if some other large DZ's also did a survey of their own expriences.

It struck me (as a recent AFF grad) that the standard pull signal is just too ambiguous. I've read accounts of students not pulling because they interpreted it as meaning something else (like "You da man!" or "look there!"). It doesn't really mimick the pulling action or the effect of pulling, so it ends up being kind of an arbitrary signal. (And in most other contexts on the ground, it generally means "look there".) Yeah, they should remember it from class and the dirt dive, but there's a gajillion other minor details the student is trying to keep in mind, so its not surprising that occassionally someone can forget it. When jumping in groups, what do you do when you want to point out something to another jumper, without inadvertantly signalling that one or both of you should pull for some reason? (I'm not sure what would be better. How about a hand that closes into a fist (like grabbing a hackey) and then with a thumb pointing up, do a sharp upward jerk?)

Just for giggles, I googled "extra large helmet" and found (among many others), this: http://www.xsportsprotective.com/s-one-cromag-xl-skateboard-helmet.html They are for skateboarding, so maybe you also have to buy one of these: http://www.zazzle.com/skydiving+skateboards

Do a "File | Save As" and save it to your computer. After that you should be able to open and modify it. (In Excel, "read only" just means you can't save any changes to the original file that you linked to.)

Can you upload it to YouTube? (How long is it? Maybe have to be in Multiple parts if more than an hour.)

In case you don't understand the digs at facebook, I assume they get what I get every time I click on the link: "This content is currently unavailable. The page you requested cannot be displayed right now. It may be temporarily unavailable, the link you clicked on may have expired, or you may not have permission to view this page."

Actually, this is not exclusively an academic situation that is best accomplished by avoiding the need to do one. To get an A licence you *must* deliberately perform a braked landing. It's a Category F item, and is on the proficiency card (item 3 under Canopy Skills: "Perform a braked approach and landing.")

Just to clarify, it sounds like what you are describing is similar to the baseball slide into second base, similar to what the author was suggesting. That is, in the high speed version, you are attempting to keep your feet moving ahead of you (aimed in the direction of landing) as the rest of your body (feet, ankle-knees, hips, torso) touch down in succession behind them. To do that, feet have to be sliding downwind after touch, and I think one would have to be leaning back to keep from doing a face plant or forward head-over-heals. Otherwise, I don't see how you can keep your feet in front of you: standard PDF is feet touch down, then the rest of the body in succession (with body angled a bit), leaving the head somewhat downwind of the feet. (Unless the final position you described is achieved after a roll on the back, allowing the person to swing their feet forward again).

Thanks, Lisa and Bill. I *think* that answers my Q. However ... ... maybe I should describe the DZ operation.

I made 10 jumps back in the '70s under a round parachute, and I'm trying to recall if the toogles worked the same back then as they do now (i.e., pull right to go right) or if it was the other way around. My fuzzy recollection was that pulling on the right toggle deformed the hole in the back right side to make it bigger, and so it would expel more air, so you would go left. But I may be mistaken (maybe it made the hole smaller). Can anyone remind me of how they operated? Thanks.

What if you lose your phone? Is the info stored elsewhere and retrievable? (And what if you downgrade to a dumb phone?) (Yeah, I know you can lose a log book, but you don't carry that around in your pocket all the time.)

I ran across this article recently in the Canopy Control section of this website (in the Safety section), entitled “An Inconvenient Truth Regarding PLF's”: (http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/safety/detail_page.cgi?ID=729). I searched to see if this article (published in March of last year) generated any discussion, but didn’t find any. In one section of the article, the author argues that PLFs on downwind landings are dangerous, and he proposes (and apparently has taught for many years) an alternative. Here’s a quote of the gist this. “There is a solution to this downwind landing possibility. It is easy to train and easily understood by newcomers and experienced skydivers alike. The simplest way to prepare for as many landing scenarios as possible is to assume the PLF position, fly the parachute and slide on one hip in the event of a forward motion, high speed landing.” So, if I interpret this correctly, it’s not exactly a butt slide, more of a hip slide (like sliding into second base?). Anyway, I’d be interested in hearing other peoples view of (and experience with, if any) this technique.

Yeah, I get it. (just *seemed* like you were focused on looking for a correction to one problem by trying to perfect that "perfect save" maneuver). Actually, I do find myself doing a similar thing: looking at YouTube videos of actual situations to get a sense of what they look like, and to then think about what the ideal response should be. I know a video of, say, a spinning mal is no substitute for the real thing, but at least the visual of what they experienced is better than just a verbal account, and perhaps will help me make the best decision if/when it happens to me.

It strikes me that you are putting a huge amount of thought and planning and consideration into the wrong thing. You seem to be admitting to a very very very serious problem, and IMO it seems like you are trying to figure out a way to buy yourself a measly extra second to deal with the consequences the next time it happens. (But what do I know? I'm just a noob.)