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The Importance of Ear Protection While Skydiving

By nettenetteon - Read 14534 times

Not wearing earplugs on every skydive? Hear me out (while you still can): It’s pretty damn important to add a pair to your every-jump kit, and your excuses probably don’t hold up to expert scrutiny.

What expert? A lofty one. Last week, I got to talk to Dr. Anna Hicks* at length about the thorny matter of skydiving with a cold (watch the February issue of Parachutist for that one). At one point, our conversation took a slight diversion towards hearing damage. The content of that more than deserves its own moment in the sun: Our delicate soundholes, and the damage we don’t have to do them.

So: Why aren’t you wearing earplugs on every jump?

1. Because it’s not that big a deal.

If you like listening to things other than phantom roaring, then sorry. It kinda is.

Each of us is born with 15,000 sound-sensing cells per ear. (I like to think of ‘em as magical hearing hair, because that’s kinda what they look like.) Hearing loss occurs when they die. It’s not just noise exposure that kills them; certain medications and other environmental factors and do it, too, but those are freak deaths by comparison. Once they’re gone, they’re gone. Birds, fish, and amphibians have the ability to grow back magical hearing hair. Mammals, like your average skydiver, lack the ability to regenerate these cells. All we can do is stick in a hearing aid and hope for the best.

You don’t have to take my word for it. Talk to anybody who suffers from tinnitus and ask them if they’d have taken precautions to prevent it.

2. Because I don’t jump that much.

Dr. Hicks begs to differ.

“I see so many skydivers that have damaged their hearing,” she notes. “Even if you’re just doing 100 jumps a year, every time you jump, the engine is noisy, and the freefall is noisy, too. Over your skydiving career, that adds up to a lot of noise exposure.”

“I still find some people that can’t be bothered with ear plugs even in the wind tunnel,” she adds, “but our hearing is too important not to take ten seconds to put them in every time. You don’t want to end up not able to hear your friend at the pub because you knackered your hearing from too much noise exposure.”**

3. Wearing earplugs in freefall is dangerous.

If it’s not just laziness that’s keeping you from protecting your hearing, it might be a misplaced sense of safety. Dr. Hicks wears hers from ground to ground, and she recommends that you do too, even if it’s just on the way up to altitude.

“I am a big advocate with any patient I see,” she says, “especially those whose job is skydiving, to wear ear plugs at least on the way up and ideally on the way down as well. Earplugs do not prevent situational awareness, stop you from being able to talk to your students, or to hear shouts under canopy.  You can hear what you need to hear, usually you can actually hear your audible altimeter better because the background freefall crackle is reduced, and vitally, [wearing earplugs] reduces the longer-term damage we can experience from our sport.”

Some people discover that they find a problem equalizing if they have earplugs in on the way down. Dr. Hicks’ advice: If equalizing is a problem for you, try using the  vented plugs (which you can buy from a pharmacy for a few dollars) to better equalize during descent.

4. I can’t afford the nice ones and the foam ones cause ear infections.

According to Dr. Hicks, that is not a thing. As long as the plugs are rated, they’ll provide the protection you need.  “You can wear posh ear plugs or the cheap foam ones like you get in the tunnel,” she says. “Either-or.”

According to a study of sixty long-range patrol-aircraft crew members, the idea that disposable foam earplugs cause ear infections is a total myth. The crew members were randomly divided into three groups: one wearing fancy custom-molded earplugs, the second using foam earplugs that they washed after each use, and the third group using foam earplugs washed only once per week. The study lasted eight weeks and included examinations by a medical officer as well as skin scrapings for bacterial culture and fungal examinations. The results indicated no fungal infections or clinically significant bacterial infections, and no differences in positive bacterial culture between the groups.

Moral of the story: roll ‘em up and stick ‘em in. They’re going to prevent a heck of a lot more damage than they could possibly cause, and 50-year-old you (who doesn’t have to have the TV on FULL BLAST ALL THE TIME) will thank you.

*Dr. Hicks is a certified badass. An active-duty Aviation Medicine specialist in the British Regular Army, she has logged more than 4,000 jumps over 15 years in the sport, many of which as the Outside Center for the multi-medaled British 4-way team NFTO. Dr. Hicks is also a British Parachute Association Accelerated Freefall Instructor and formation skydiving coach, as well as a Skydiving Instructor at Britain’s legendary Skydive Netheravon. Oh: and she was Tom Cruise’s personal aviation doc during the filming of the latest Mission: Impossible reboot. ‘Nuff said.

**Confused? Ask a British person for a translation.

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About The Author

Annette O'Neil is a copywriter, travel journalist and commercial producer who sometimes pretends to live in Salt Lake City. When she's not messing around with her prodigious nylon collection, she's hurtling through the canyons on her Ninja, flopping around on a yoga mat or baking vegan cupcakes.

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3331

Excellent article! 

I’ve always worn ear plugs since the early days.  Those Beech D-18s and DC3s are loud.  Also, a career in the Engineering Construction Industry with lots of loud equipment and banging noise.  Sure glad I can listen to the TV and radio at low volume.   B|

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Guest

Yup. Always. Fortunately I see more people wearing them these days than in the past.

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Thunderbow
(edited)

From an oldschooler, DO IT.  I have ringing in my ears that is crazy. Looked up my old rigger from the 70's and 80's who happens to live 3 miles from me.  Asked him if he had ringing. Guess what? He does and bad. I sat behind a desk my whole working life. The really only LOUD activity I had was skydiving. Only 500 jumps but pretty sure that's what did it. And a lot of those early jumps were out of planes with no door at all, not that a jump door makes that much difference, just sayin'.

Edited by Thunderbow

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fcajump

Echo all of the above, wear them everytime.

Jumping since 1990, only been using earplugs for a few years.  And the ringing is annoying.

Fortunately, like many things, attitudes are changing and (for example) my DZ provides them for free to anyone.  If you're doesn't, ask why not and meanwhile go get your own.

 

JW

 

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tabouare

I have DB blocker non vented silicone custom earplugs and I tried them when the article came out. I was very scared of rupturing my eardrum because of point #3 in the article. Here's what I noticed about them:

3 000’ to 8 000’, I needed to do extensive jaw movement to get them to equalize
8 000’ to 12 000’, I was hearing the same sound as aluminum foil crushing next to my ear
12 000’ to 13 500’, I didn't notice them anymore since I was preparing to get out

I didn't notice them during freefall and everything was a lot quieter

On the ground, you need to remove them because you don't ear a lot. After 5 jumps in a day, I would sometimes hear noise in the evening. Kind of weird and I didn't like that.

Tried Laser Lite Earplugs - Howard Leight and they were a lot better. Didn't get the equalizing issues and noise at the end of the day.

I ordered DB blocker vented silicone ones and they are a charm. The equalize very well, I can hear people in the plane a lot better while climbing and I didn't notice weird stuff with them yet.

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Aristartle

After tandem one without them, I thought to use earplugs to help my mindfulness and focus during tandem two. Earplugs really added to a better experience. They're my first equipment, good friends helping me stay focused.

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Iwan

I can't agree. I think we need to hear if someone is yelling in the air, before the collision. I'm almost 30 years in skydiving, many years I've spent in An-2. Something like 12k skydives + lot of hours on my motorbike, also without earplugs. Also I'm using earplugs, they are really good for sleeping. About 20 years without any problems. 

So, if you are alone in the air or on the road, then earplugs are OK. If not..maybe one day your ears could be very important for saving life information. 

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