DSE (D 29060)
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Jan 12, 2012, 7:02 PM
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Tailstrikes
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Debating unicorns, grids, stolen AADs, and glide ratio is more fun but...
Godddamnit guys, please quit hitting the tail of the aircraft?! We now have a few DZ's that have banned WS and a number of DZ's that have restricted wingsuits and/or exits from their aircraft due to non-trained/badly trained WS dumbf**ks, most of em' low experience in high performance suits. Protect our discipline; train, brief, and work with the idiots.
inreply to "Protect our discipline; train, brief, and work with the idiots. " ................................................
OK, Exit priority for a wingsuiter. Miss the tail plane.
Remember, if you have a short attention span, its more important to exit safely than to exit quickly. Quick will happen naturally , as you get experience.
At the door (side door exit )
*FACE the direction you want to go (recommended looking forward and down)
*KNEES together, (this closes your leg wings, practise waddling like a duck with your knees together )
*ELBOWS against your rib-cage,( this closes your arm wings)
*HANDS/FISTS covering your EP handles, close to your chest. (In this position your can use your strength to keep your arm wings closed as you hit the prop blast.)
*CHIN tucked in a bit . (This will give your head just that little bit extra space as you go under the tailplane and help prevent you from planing up straight out the door.)
STAY LOW in the door and out you go , like a baby seal, looking down and forward all flippers and no wings. Its more like a head down freefly exit than a poised student exit When you see the tail plane go over your head . Hey, congratulations ! you missed it.
No doubt there are untold permutations on this , work your own out if you don't like this one, just remember exit priority is ?????
The two jumpships with lower horizontal elevators (Beech & PAC750) are both low-wing planes. So for these (when looking forward on exit), wait till the plane’s main wing trailing edge goes by your face to open your wings.
I regularly exit a PAC750. The tail is both low and close to the door. If you exit with wings open or jumping up you're probably going to hit the tail ...
*FACE the direction you want to go (recommended looking forward and down)
*HANDS/FISTS covering your EP handles, close to your chest. (In this position your can use your strength to keep your arm wings closed as you hit the prop blast.)
Have to disagree on these.
Looking up on exit will create a natural arch which will allow for a cleaner exit. Looking down presents the opportunity to end up head low on exit which can disorientate newer jumpers - especially when jumping in groups. Also, if you look up, you'll be able to see the tail as it goes by...
Additionally, exiting with hands covering your handles is a bad idea. Although unlikely, it poses a risk of one of those handles being used when it shouldn't be.
Better to either have you hands higher up on your chest, or exit with them at waist height, then you can progressively open your wings.
(This post was edited by Zeemax on Jan 13, 2012, 6:24 AM)
I regularly exit a PAC750. The tail is both low and close to the door. If you exit with wings open or jumping up you're probably going to hit the tail ...
Than you should know that speed on jump run is important. Is _does_ matter if it's 120 knots or 105 knots.
You can still get better results if you communicate with the pilot.
You know, this subject really pisses me off. It's easily preventable, but we have people who are either are not properly trained or become complacent and forget...
Several years ago, we lost Steve Harrington due to a tail strike. Let's learn something from that loss, rather than simply flailing out of the plane like a bunch of baboons on meth.
Are there any details, maybe with name and DZ withheld but enough that we could see what the trend is. Are these major DZ's or rural? Are these new suits bough recently or bought used? If we want to make a difference we need to see the trends and address them.
I regularly exit a PAC750. The tail is both low and close to the door. If you exit with wings open or jumping up you're probably going to hit the tail ...
Than you should know that speed on jump run is important. Is _does_ matter if it's 120 knots or 105 knots.
You can still get better results if you communicate with the pilot.
I know that speed on jump run along with communicating with the pilot (about speed, planned flight, etc...) is very important.
It is. But it is ultimately the jumper's responsibility to be aware of WTF is going on around them. The Miami tailstrike, people were starting to try to find some way to blame the pilot. This is bullshit. The lack of a cut or a high exit speed are incredibly obvious to any slightly seasoned jumper. And there shouldn't BE any non-slightly-seasoned wingsuit pilots.
When I get unexpectedly high exit blast in the door, I either look at the pilot expectantly and wait, or scrunch up wicked small and exit anyway. This is not rocket surgery. We only lost Steve because the brother let his guard down for a second. So DON'T. See my sig line for instructions. Lets keep getting the word out, shout it from the rooftops if we have to. Add it to the customary battlecry in the plane... "Check your gear!!! Watch the tail!!!" I've lost enough friends already. -B
Thank you for point out that problem again, DSE! Too bad to see that is is necessary.
I also noticed that many jumpers to not have a good feeling for the plane's configuration. You can configure a Grand Caravan in so many ways. With 80KT airspeed and flaps one notch down you can still have 2 different configs: One where the plane is flying level supported by the engine and one with less power and a slight loss of altitude during jumprun. If you stand in the door an look at the stabilizer it is faaaar lower if the plane flies level. In a descending configuration there is far less prop wind pushing you back and the stabilizer is much lower.
So sure - know your exit technique, but also get to know more about the plane and flying. Talk to the pilot about his configs at the bonfire - you should pay him some beers anyhow after a long day of flying.
I used to exit out of our Beech 18 facing towards the wing and then waited a couple of seconds before opening up, but it always very turbulent as I exited and then I seemd to immeidatley go into a fairly hard spiraling turn as I opened my wings. I've changed to getting into the door on my knees with ankles crossed and hands across my chest. I then lean out the door until I began to fall out and then pull my head and shoulders back into an arch. This puts me out the door in a shallow dive, I then give it about a second and a half then open legs and arms. This gives me enough airspeed that I immediately have turn authority and can come on to my 90 turn.
The trend shows a favour for low-tail aircraft and big suits in 8 out 9 tailstrikes. 4 of those are selftrained and 3 linked to the same 'instructor' who clearly needs to expand his 5 minute briefings and tendancy to put people in big suits prematurely. Only 2 showed AC flying to fast. Though that still isnt reason to not do a proper exit way clear of a tail.
AC type is probably better to not mention to prevent more DZO panic. As they dont see bad training, they just see dangerous wingsuits, and simply ban them from that type of AC.
We're the smallest dicipline around, yet get most megative attention....hope that trend changes soon...
I don't think posting this on dz.com is going to have much impact, it only reaches those that read here and in reality that is few.
Maybe there should be an initiative to educate DZO and S&TA types about what they can do to help prevent a danger to their plane from loading up in the first place.
This year we added a survey to review the knowledge of new renters on topics like this but still it won't stop suits getting into the hands of those unprepared to handle them. The DZ itself is the last line of defense.
Brick, that exit style will complicate flocks a bit just because it takes you longer to get yourself sorted once you're clear of the aircraft... or at least longer than facing forward which allows you to "hit the air running" so to speak.
But you're a really big guy, right? In anything smaller than an Otter you'd HAVE to kneel wouldn't you? So a scrunched but poised exit from a standing position is all but out of the question for you isn't it?
I say nothing wrong with it at all actually. Sounds like you've worked out a pretty much perfect technique for big-guy-clean-exit-tail-dodging. Toppling out the door from your knees eliminates any possibility of jumping up, or catching sufficient air to be lofted up against your will. Judging by your description, you've got it nailed- its less graceful and smooth than just stepping out, but it is pretty much guaranteed to keep you from hitting that tail which is the -ONLY- thing that actually matters.
It sounds like a clumsy way to exit but I'd bet that if you keep doing it that way your technique will become very fluid and slick if it hasn't already. I'd say keep doing it that way- and tell people WHY. It'll help us keep newbs alive. And on behalf of the community, thank you for putting some thought into it. We need more birds who carefully consider their technique like that. I wish we had more birds that smart, it'd cut down on our incident rate. -B
What DZs have banned/restricted wingsuits? i plan to keep traveling around this winter and want to know what to avoid. Miami is the only one i know of.
It sounds like a clumsy way to exit but I'd bet that if you keep doing it that way your technique will become very fluid and slick if it hasn't already.
It really doesn't feel clumsy at all. Using the old exit, I'd get into that spiraling turn and my Supermach and I would have to have this little conversation about who was flying who. Using the falling exit, I'm immediately in control to the point that I'm already executing a crisp, on-heading 90 as my wings open and I've lost way less altitude.
Now THATS more like it. So you already ARE at the point of making it elegant. In that case I retract my comment about complicating flocks. I NEVER underestimate the value of learned-habit-technique and if thats your customary exit to the point of not even having to think about it, just topple over, twist and fly, then you're way ahead of many birds I've seen whose poised exit still includes steps like "flail and wobble for 2 seconds, often with very iffy or nonexistent wing surface control". You can probably execute that move and be merging with the flock faster than a lot of people using a more elaborate but less secure technique. If it doesn't FEEL clumsy to you, it isn't. And it won't look it on video, either. I'd actually quite like to see it, I bet it comes off pretty neat. And its SAFE... Right on! -B
Oh, and for what its worth, your exit style is pretty close to what I used to use to get off a Cessna without dying when I first started using a suit big enough to loft me involuntarily even at slow exit speeds. (S-Bird) Except I'd plant feet on the step instead of kneeling, then topple over forward and outward at close to a 90 degree to line of flight, objective being I don't care HOW I hit the air just so long as I miss that damn tail! After a couple repeats, I incorporated the necessary 90 degree left turn correction into the move itself- as my head clears the strut I'm beginning to turn but the turn is not complete and I can't get linear windblast lofting effects till I'm already 30 feet below and behind the plane- by which time it doesn't matter anyway.
I eventually worked my way up to launching scrunched, poised, off the step, clinging to the strut, but even now, it still makes me a bit nervous. Even as scrunched as I can get, I still get noticeable loft off the relative wind. Its not much, but its the difference between clearing the tail instantly in a straight down drop, versus clearing the tail in .5 seconds... during that .5 seconds I'm not quite hovering directly in front of the tail edge and counting on gravity to pull me below the tail's plane before I drift far enough back to reach it. And I actually wrap my wings around me tightly and dive off headfirst whenever I have any doubt at all. Theres just NO room for error there... kinda surprised we haven't had a bunch of cessna tailstrikes by now, that exit is EASY to screw up. -B
in reply to "Looking up on exit will create a natural arch which will allow for a cleaner exit. Looking down presents the opportunity to end up head low on exit which can disorientate newer jumpers - especially when jumping in groups. Also, if you look up, you'll be able to see the tail as it goes by... "
...................................
Well I have to disagree with that. We tend to go were we look. Looking up and arching increases the chance of planing UP into the tail plane. people trying to arch a Ws out the door ...imho counterproductive to missing the tailplane.
Disorientation? people wingsuiting should already be competent, well rounded skydivers and not so easily disorientated on exit.
End up head low ?, YES the objective is to miss the tail plane. If you are looking down and forward you can see the tail plane AFTER you have missed it.
in reply to "Additionally, exiting with hands covering your handles is a bad idea. Although unlikely, it poses a risk of one of those handles being used when it shouldn't be. "
Not covering them poses more of a risk . I could more accurately have said protecting your handles rather than covering them . Of course it's bad idea to inadvertantly operate your handles , once again a competent skydiver will have no problem with this. If a newbie WSer is an incompetent skydiver they have no business flying a WS.
in reply to "Better to either have you hands higher up on your chest, or exit with them at waist height, then you can progressively open your wings. "
I'm not talking about opening your wings , I'm talking about keeping them closed.
but imho your permutations re hand positioning have some merit.
(This post was edited by Trae on Jan 13, 2012, 3:04 PM)
Trae. I don't want to be a dick here but this will get people killed. I always teach new birds to look at the prop. It causes an arch directly into relative wind ensuring most stable exit. And it ensures their initial fallrate ramps up as fast as possible.
Looking down causes a dearch and if you wanted to inadvertently teach someone to launch themselves straight into the tail, THATs how.
Looking down gets one of two results. 1: commonly seen in students: Body follows eyes, bird's flightpath tips over immediately facefirst and steep, often into a spiral. Safe enough regarding the tail but no good for anything else. 2: Bird looks down, body rears up, combined with looking down the student has just inadvertently executed a radical "Pop" maneuver which I would normally only teach them to use when they need to climb hard and fast up to a flock far above them- and gets catapulted helplessly into the tail some 750mS later.
What do people do when they need to SHED drag and jack up the fallrate? ARCH! What do they do if they need to CLIMB? !!!Look Down!!!! Arch And Scrunch. Anything else and you're begging for a quick death. Teaching anything else is how we get Miami Tailstrike. The LAST thing you want to do is encourage a technique that creates ideal conditions for maximum possible exploitation of available lift in the moment of exit!
in reply to "I don't want to be a dick here but this will get people killed. I always teach new birds to look at the prop. It causes an arch directly into relative wind ensuring most stable exit. And it ensures their initial fallrate ramps up as fast as possible" ..............................
You're not a dick Lurch , you're a good bloke.
I've been watching newbie WSers arch out the door like they've been taught (not by me ) , with their wings open like PROPER dicks.
I said forward AND down. and my emphasis when I teach people is on keeping your wings closed, Stability ? what good is that if you hit the tail plane perfectly stable in a head up arch?
So you already ARE at the point of making it elegant. In that case I retract my comment about complicating flocks. I NEVER underestimate the value of learned-habit-technique and if thats your customary exit to the point of not even having to think about it, just topple over, twist and fly, then you're way ahead of many birds I've seen whose poised exit still includes steps like "flail and wobble for 2 seconds, often with very iffy or nonexistent wing surface control". You can probably execute that move and be merging with the flock faster than a lot of people using a more elaborate but less secure technique. If it doesn't FEEL clumsy to you, it isn't. And it won't look it on video, either. I'd actually quite like to see it, I bet it comes off pretty neat. 
forwards and down.JPG
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