Why are tandem instructors glorified skydivers? They fly bigger than student size canopies and half the time land on their butt.
I can't remember where anyone other than one of my tandem students has "glorified" me! If you know how to get the rest of the skydiving population to think I'm cool, by all means let me know.
50 pounds of shit on your back, 200 pounds of stupid on the front, 5 handles and a pilot chute in tow.
What could possibly go wrong?
Woah!!! I do not weigh 200 lbs!! and i might be blonde but far from stupidLet's not bring up the smirnoff's mixup. Just had to add that. Now back to the thread
(This post was edited by promise5 on Jan 24, 2013, 9:38 PM)
Why are tandem instructors glorified skydivers? they fly bigger than student size canopies and half the time land on their butt.
Yeah, they fly those canopies at anywhere from a .8 to 1.7 wingloadings on a regular basis in every weather condition that you won't jump in, while getting thrown up on, snotted on, landing regularly to PRO rating standards, while teaching the mostly uninformed and keeping them involved including having them assist in the landings.
But make no thought of the hundreds to thousands of skydived the made to get to the rating, or the time they spent in the sport watching everything that could possibly go wrong.
Instead why not belittle the guys and girls that keep the financial side of this sport alive and afford the turbine jump ships and amenities that you enjoy daily?
50 pounds of shit on your back, 200 pounds of stupid on the front, 5 handles and a pilot chute in tow.
What could possibly go wrong?
you forgot having a different wing loading on any every jump.
As for the OP. Man up and try it and you might find the answer.
I am a tandem I with 750+ tandems so i think i can say i have maned up and tried it. I have made 24 tandems in a day, in all weather conditions(gotta eat). i dont think i forgot the fact that the wing loading changes. For some reason After i became a Ti i didnt like most feel the need to strut around telling B liscence holders what to do and listen to me because i am a glorified skydiver now that i take 260 pound men on tandems in high wind.
Not replying to you directly, more of a general statement.
I've never understood the "200 lbs of stupid" comment. I hear it occasionally, but it always puzzles me.
I'd have to check my numbers, but I think I've made 4000 tandem jumps, not a huge number by today's standards, but enough to be able to evaluate things I believe. I'm gonna guess I have made those jumps in probably 8-10 different countries over the last decade, and I can't think of a single instance of looking down and seeing "stupid" hanging off of me under canopy.
I guess my point is, if I have one, it's that our students are only as smart or "stupid" as we train them to be. If I were ever to look down and see "200 lbs of stupid" hanging off me, I would consider it a failure on my part, not theirs.
As an industry, we must remain vigilant in training our students to the best of our ability, otherwise someday we may collectively lose the privilege of doing so.
I know some TIs use that phrase as a joke, but there are those out there that genuinely believe it. Tandem skydiving is a serious business, a training business, and at it's core, it is a responsibility business.......we are in the business of acting responsibly. That responsibility starts with treating every student we work with as thought they are the most important person in our lives and training them accordingly, because for that period of time that we re with them, they are the most important person in our lives.
(This post was edited by TomNoonan on Jan 25, 2013, 2:40 PM)
50 pounds of shit on your back, 200 pounds of stupid on the front, 5 handles and a pilot chute in tow.
What could possibly go wrong?
you forgot having a different wing loading on any every jump.
As for the OP. Man up and try it and you might find the answer.
I am a tandem I with 750+ tandems so i think i can say i have maned up and tried it. I have made 24 tandems in a day, in all weather conditions(gotta eat). i dont think i forgot the fact that the wing loading changes. For some reason After i became a Ti i didnt like most feel the need to strut around telling B liscence holders what to do and listen to me because i am a glorified skydiver now that i take 260 pound men on tandems in high wind.
Yeah yeah yeah...ya should have been there before they figured out adding a drogue would make both the F1-11 & the TI last for than 50 jumps!
For some reason After i became a Ti i didnt like most feel the need to strut around telling B liscence holders what to do and listen to me because i am a glorified skydiver now that i take 260 pound men on tandems in high wind;
For some reason I didn't either.
But I've done enough first aid on injured people and seen enough dead skydivers to know a thing or two, and when I see someone who looks like they could use a little advice or help, I'll give it to them.
If they don't want it, that's fine too. I've seen the results of people who don't want to listen or learn.
Has someone recently played Skygod around you? Because you seem pretty put off by something.
For some reason After i became a Ti i didnt like most feel the need to strut around telling B liscence holders what to do and listen to me because i am a glorified skydiver now that i take 260 pound men on tandems in high wind;
For some reason I didn't either.
But I've done enough first aid on injured people and seen enough dead skydivers to know a thing or two, and when I see someone who looks like they could use a little advice or help, I'll give it to them.
If they don't want it, that's fine too. I've seen the results of people who don't want to listen or learn.
Has someone recently played Skygod around you? Because you seem pretty put off by something.
I can certainly understand the OPs point. I'm not a TI (you guys have bigger balls and more stamina and my hat is off to you) but I saw the attitude every day.
More than once I had to tell new TIs, "Just because you have TI rating doesn't make you any smarter than you were before."
More than once, I had to tell other TIs, "You handle he tandem students, I'll handle the AFF students."
From my experience, the TI 'skygod' attitude does not seem to be prevalent but it's common enough to be quite noticeable.
YMMV
Oh...BTW. Thanks you guys for financing the turbine rides.
Why are tandem instructors glorified skydivers? they fly bigger than student size canopies and half the time land on their butt.
I don't get it. After reading your own response later in the thread which says you ARE a Tandem Instructor, I"m curious what your thinking is. Are you trying to belittle OTHER tandem instructors who you see as shitty examples, or are you throwing ALL of us under the bus (yourself included)?
Tom Noonan made a good point. Students are as crappy or good as you train them to be. Others made the good point that we, as tandem instructors, carry a tremendous burden.
More than once I had to tell new TIs, "Just because you have TI rating doesn't make you any smarter than you were before."
More than once, I had to tell other TIs, "You handle he tandem students, I'll handle the AFF students."
From my experience, the TI 'skygod' attitude does not seem to be prevalent but it's common enough to be quite noticeable.
Thanks for the input. At other DZ's I don't mingle with the staff while they're working with students, so I wouldn't see it if it was a problem. At my home DZ I don't think I've seen much of a problem. Most of our TI's are also AFF I's, so they're pretty competent instructors. The ones that aren't seem pretty mellow.
I do know that all of our staff have been directed by management to look around and keep an eye out for trouble, whether working or not. Chest straps, gear checks, landing patterns, exit spacing; any of that is up for critique if we see something we don't like.
Along with what Tom Noonan said, apparently you do not have a tandem rating, nor have you had to deal with a real serious malfunction with 200lbs strapped on the front of you.
There is a lot of responsibility to any tandem jump and there is far more shit to go wrong than on any other 'normal' skydive out there. And we are expected to perform near flawlessly every jump because that is what the customer expects.
So the pressure is, in fact, 'on'.
I'd like to see you deal with the 150+MPH high-speed bag-lock on a Vector with a collapsed drogue that did not cutaway one side, but dumped the RSL and reserve into the trailing main resulting in the main-reserve entanglement and line knot the size of a football which then turned into the main starting to deploy with the already spinning reserve with a customer on the front who DOES actually know that something is wrong, and then flying that reserve with one brake at 75% and pulling off a stand-up landing in the peas under a malfunctioned reserve with half a main trailing behind it.
Because that is what I did - and for maybe just a short moment in my life, I was in fact 'glorified'.
I'd like to see you deal with the 150+MPH high-speed bag-lock on a Vector with a collapsed drogue that did not cutaway one side, but dumped the RSL and reserve into the trailing main resulting in the main-reserve entanglement and line knot the size of a football which then turned into the main starting to deploy with the already spinning reserve with a customer on the front who DOES actually know that something is wrong, and then flying that reserve with one brake at 75% and pulling off a stand-up landing in the peas under a malfunctioned reserve with half a main trailing behind it.
Because that is what I did - and for maybe just a short moment in my life, I was in fact 'glorified'.
SOLID!!! I didn't realize you were also in that club, TK. Me and Eric Butts will have a toast to that this afternoon. Greetings from Skydive San Marcos.
Most likely the TI pulled the handles out of sequence! 
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