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My comments here are a result of reading a few messages about someone's AAD firing after a canopy sniveled too long (or they pulled too low considering how long it normally takes for their canopy to open.) We want our canopies to snivel for a certain amount of time so that they don't just open right away and slam us. You know, the old "force = velocity squared" formula, meaning that the slower you can make you and your canopy go just before inflation (canopy _spreading_), the more comfortable your opening. Due to lack of understanding, I find that skydivers seem to latch on to an idea, and then go overboard on it, for example, they think that the longer their canopy snivels, the better their opening. Well, only up to a point. Actually, once we and our canopy reach an equilibrium, or what I would propose we call "terminal snivel", that waiting any longer for our canopy to open is a waste of time and altitude, (and could actually be dangerous too, couldn't it?). It is simply time that our canopy can use to misbehave and possibly fly itself into a turn or something. I hear Tandem instructors in particular saying how cool it is for a canopy to snivel so long and give them a great opening, but when I jump the same canopy, I can tell that I have reached "terminal snivel" long before canopy spreading, and then have to wait and watch the damn thing start dancing, turning one way, then (thank goodness usually) turning the other way. (By the way, how can I tell, you ask? Good question. If one is in tune with their canopy opening sequence they can feel the equilibrium by the stabilization of G forces in their harness.) Note: Only canopies noted for their slow opening will ever reach terminal snivel and allow you to feel this. Most canopies begin spreading before terminal snivel, (but still open slow enough to be comfortable.)

You know, I've heard a lot of blonde jokes in my time, but the only thing I seem to be able to remember is... "Oh, no! Not another breath-a-lyzer test."

I'm usually a rec.skydiving kind of guy because it is so much quicker to view posts there, and the fact that they talk politics there more often, but maybe we can entertain ourselves here too...... It's not too early to talk USPA election politics- Now that the candidates for the USPA BOD election (that are going to be on the ballots you will soon receive) have been announced, I was wondering what you all thought. Have you talked to any of them? Ever email your RD? What did you ask? Plan to vote for anyone running as a write-in? Who do you plan to vote for and why? - name recognition? - know them personally? - know their politics? - only person listed on the ballot for RD? - etc.

Pictures: 2 of me landing at exhibition jumps 1 hanging from Bud Fuchs' Stearman over UIN 1 self portrait under canopy like you see to the left Wallpaper on my computer is picture I took of a 9 way over a lake we were landing near jumping into a buddy's folk's home near the lake. And of course a complete binder of PCPRG photos for visitors (pcprg.com, blantant plug)

Here is some BASIC source code to a quick one I wrote. (Line 420 seems to be wrapping, but you get the idea.) Use GWBASIC.EXE 10 CLS 20 PRINT "Freefall time calculator" 30 PRINT "note: hours do not rollover into days" 40 PRINT 50 INPUT "Starting Hours"; HOUR 60 INPUT "Starting Minutes"; MINUTE 70 INPUT "Starting Seconds"; SECOND 200 IF SECOND

http://www.pcprg.com/packing.htm I "stack" pack my Stiletto, and even put packing tabs on it to make this easier. I have stack-packed several other high performance canopies and the people that jumped them did not notice any difference from the usual pro-pack.

Oh, yeh, love that Skyvan door! NOT! At the WFFC I had to operate it almost every time I was on it because my organized loads were big emough to be out first. My big fear is dropping my helmet or goggles out the door when I am fumbling with them on jump run, since the Lexan door was almost always left open. But this year all I lost was an earplug. Big tip is to read the instructions- use two people because the door needs to not be twisted, and also you need to move the door back and forth a bit to find the slot for the pin to go into.

Due to our continuing accidents during canopy swoops, I would like to propose a concept about them, and that is that every canopy swoop you do is basically a type of demo, or exhibition jump. That is, every landing where someone is watching, which is most landings. And with demo jumps comes more difficulty, emotion, ego, etc. (Refer to the USPA Skydivers Information Manual, the section about exhibition jumps.) We need to evaluate these landings as we do them to insure that we are not letting the "demo factors" of the landing cause us to do something that we would not normally do with a non-swoop landing. I recently found myself thinking (and hope I continue to remember to think) during my downwind leg, about "why I am doing this swoop?", and "what am I thinking that others are thinking of the landing?" I hope it helps. Maybe this attitude can help some of us keep from doing something wrong on our "demo". Please be careful.

This is an interesting topic that I have thought about many times in the past. Skydiving is the best demonstration of the "left brain/right brain" phenomenon that I can think of. This is how I have seen it described (? accuracy): (For right handed males at least) the left brain is supposed to be the "verbal" side of the brain and the right side the "non-verbal". For other it may be switched. When we start to exit we switch to the non-verbal brain and lose verbal conciousness, which means our "awareness" goes away. This is much like how we can drive a car and be totally mindless to actually what we are doing while thinking of something else. During the skydive our non-verbal brain is remembering things non-verbally. That is why when we get to the ground and hang out a while we begin to transfer those memories from the non-verbal brain to the verbal brain where we can begin to remember them and talk about them. Sometimes we switch back to the verbal side upon canopy opening, but it can last until landing or longer. OK, maybe this is all a stretch, and you don't agree, but it explains a lot about "awareness". Now to answer your question, the way I have been able to increase awareness is to simply pause right before the count, smile at your buddies, and _force_ yourself to switch back to the verbal brain. Of course as soon as you say "go" you might switch back, but you get the idea. Skydiving is so intense it causes us to switch back to non-verbal at the slightest provocation. We have to work hard to remain aware.