Remembering Seth Blake

[GravityGirl 0]

I still miss you....

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Peace and Blue Skies!
Bonnie ==>Gravity Gear!

[jimmyh 0]

I hear that!!!!

He was an unbelievable person. Talented beyond normal standards. And he took me on my first base jump in '91 when I was 18.

Seth....no words

[cpoxon 0]

Seth taught the guy who taught me. Although I never met the guy, I owe him. Cheers Seth

BSBD

Skydiving Fatalities - Cease not to learn 'til thou cease to live

[KevinMcGuire 0]

Back in 93, I was in the hanger at Eloy packing my BASE rig after a jump when this dude walked up and started talking to me. For some reason; I liked the guy right away. We just seemed to hit it off. We talked for a while then he hit me with a question
He said that he had a few BASE jumps and wondered if I would take him with me on my next jump (which was to be from the little donkey the following morning).
Not really knowing this guy, I decided to quiz him to see just what he knew. After all, I only had a few jumps my self and I was not prepared to take a newbie out for his first jump
I asked him where he had jumped before, who he had jumped with, what type of gear he had used, what type of delays he had taken, what size P/C’s he preferred and so on. He seemed to have all the right answers so I greed to take him. He then added that he didn’t bring his rig to Eloy and asked if I had an extra or if I knew some one that did.
"Sure, No problem" I said. "I'm sure we can find one around here some where."
After many beers, and several hours of knocking on trailer doors around the DZ, we finally got some one drunk enough to lend us their rig. And with that, we were off. We would need to be at the exit point by sun up if we were to avoid an unpleasant encounter with the cops.
After driving for several hours we reached the camp ground near the little donkey with enough time to hike up river and climb the steel.
Once at the exit pont, I began to gear up. First, I donned my rig. Then I pulled the P/C out of the pouch, placed the bridle over my palm and began to S-fold the bridle. As I was doing this, I noticed some thing strange. Seth was not gearing up. Instead, he was watching my every move as closely as he could. I paused what I was doing and looked at him. Then it hit me.
“You’ve never done this before have you?” I asked. He looked up at me stared me straight in the eyes and said nothing. He just looked back to my hand and waited for me to restart my unintentional instruction.
I paused for a moment and thought about what I should do. Should I abort and order him off the steel? “I’m a big dude, I told me self, I can make him go back down”. Then I thought, wait a minuet. He’s a pretty big dude him self. What if he doesn’t want to climb down? What then? Fuck it I decided, if he had he balls to con his way up here, then he has the balls to jump. So be it.
Outwardly I was pissed but inwardly, I admired his courage. What balls!
I finished what I was doing and waited for him to gear up. He did so without questions, without mistakes, and with out hesitation.
I placed my toes over the edge, looked back at him and said, “do what I do. See you on the ground.” As I counted down in my head I thought, “ I hope I don’t bounce. That would be a shitty example to make” and off I went.
Standing on the ground below looking back up at where Seth was now standing, I thought how freaky it is to be last off and how freaked out he must be being up there all by him self.
A moment later he was off. He free fell for a solid second and pitched. (BTW, One second at the Donkey is a nice and fat delay) His opening and landing were text book. What else can I say, but the guy was a natural.
Seth and I spent the next few years cutting our BASE teeth together on objects all over the country. In 94, he and I hit a total of 46 new objects in a 9 month period .
Seth had it all. Brains, Looks, and, natural ability, and finally, the love of a great woman. Seth Blake was the man that women wanted and the man that men want to be. I will be forever great full that I was able to call him friend.
Kevin

[ZegeunerLeben 0]

>>That's a gem of a story, I never knew that about him.

[KevinMcGuire 0]

Quote

>>That's a gem of a story, I never knew that about him.

He was a gem of a dude

[bodypilot1 0]

Quote

He was a gem of a dude

Ditto.

Seems only like yesterday we laughed together.



Be safe.
Ed

www.WestCoastWingsuits.com
www.PrecisionSkydiving.com

[RayLosli 11]

Ya , Seth was more than a nice guy. After your around him for any length of time. You could not help but like him .
The first BASE jump I ever saw was with him. It was @ Davis skydiving and me and Jerry Loftis were Board jumping. That night we were drinking some beer at a Keg at a party, DZ get-together after dark thing.
After some hours later Seth and one other Guy (cant remember his name) were asking around for some ground crew.
Jerry said that he did a BASE jump once and that, I - NEEDED - to see one done and lets go, So I said, " Hell Ya."
So we all piled into a car and drive to near-by Sac. To a, Free-Stander. park the car in the back of the store behind the dumpster and that was the first BASE jump I saw.
It was not to many months after that night and seeing them jump. I bought a Rig and started BASE Jumping.
.
.