Interesting mal

[nickeadie 0]

This is a mal I had a couple of years ago on my 15th jump and thought id share as it seems to bring up many different responses as too appropriate responses. Was using chest mount ripcord student gear and had an uneventful freefall from 10 down to about 3,500 where i started deployment. Opening went fine and looked up and saw something wasn't right. Main was open and flying fine but looking back i found that the reserve pilot chute had wrapped around my main pilot chute with the reserve still in the freebag trailing behind me with just the two locking stows holding it in place. Was in two minds as to whether to chop or not and eventually went with staying in deep brakes to keep air speed slow. Didn't want to pull it in in case i disturbed the stows and and the reserve came out and was hesitant on cutting away due to the way everything was out. Final action was staying in brakes until close to ground going into drive just enough to build up speed for an effective flare and had my best landing up til that point. Anyways just thought id share my experience and see what other peoples opinions are on the matter as have had many different responses from people when hearing about it. BSBD Nick.

[D22369 0]

wow... an awesome shit sandwitch there...one I honestly havent ever thought about.

screwed if you do... or dont, you jumped you lived and since it was your butt in the saddle you made a call and it worked, were the lines on the reserve twisted badly? if so you may have never gained a good reserve once you chopped, if they were untwisted you probably would have had a clean reserve deployment. was it ever determined what caused the reserve to fire?

keeping it was chancy at best, but it worked.

Roy

They say I suffer from insanity.... But I actually enjoy it.

[fcajump 153]

The only thing I might consider would be keeping the slow flight and do you best ever PLF. You kept the reserve in the freebag that long, I would not want to disturb at that point.

Glad it turned out OK, but definite possibilities for bad results no matter what you chose...

Thanks for sharing! Keeps the brain thinking ahead for the things that one might face one day.


JW

Always remember that some clouds are harder than others...

[Programmer 0]

That was a thought-provoking post. I'm not sure I would have had the presence of mind to evaluate the situation like you did. I might have just chopped it; which probably would have been the wrong thing to do. Thanks for the info.

[JohnRich 4]

Quote

That was a thought-provoking post. I'm not sure I would have had the presence of mind to evaluate the situation like you did. I might have just chopped it; which probably would have been the wrong thing to do.

Hence my standard "robot" speech:
http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=3929468;#3929468

[rygon 0]

nice post johnRich. I liked that a lot, maybe be worth posting under the safety tab?