S-turns on final

[peek 20]

yoink

... can we do away with the need for S-turns if we start teaching canopy accuracy earlier?

Perhaps we can, but having S turns in their bag of tricks in case they really need it would be nice.

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Braked approaches and the Accuracy Trick of finding the unmoving spot on the ground aren't that complex of an idea.

Agreed. I am seeing a reluctance to teach deep brake approaches now too. I'm not sure what would satisfy everyone.

[dthames 0]

peek

***... can we do away with the need for S-turns if we start teaching canopy accuracy earlier?

Perhaps we can, but having S turns in their bag of tricks in case they really need it would be nice.

Quote

Braked approaches and the Accuracy Trick of finding the unmoving spot on the ground aren't that complex of an idea.

Agreed. I am seeing a reluctance to teach deep brake approaches now too. I'm not sure what would satisfy everyone.

Good planning and good execution can go to pot in a hurry and it not even be your fault. I want every trick that I can carry in that “bag”, just in case.

Instructor quote, “What's weird is that you're older than my dad!”

[pchapman 261]

The difficulty these days is to be able to learn a whole bag of tricks, while at the same time larger DZ's become more regimented in their way of doing things, to stay safe with more jumpers in the air.

Those two ideas sometimes create conflicts:
Hypothetical experienced safety guy: "Skydivers should learn to downwind land a canopy. An important skill for safety and before downsizing. ....But by the way, downwind landings are absolutely prohibited at this DZ! Follow the pattern!"

So there is a need to allow practicing things in some manner, with hop and pop loads or small airplane loads only, or separated landing areas, etc.

[yoink 321]

The reality is that students can only absorb so much information at a time. We'd love to teach them everything immediately, but obviously that isn't possible so we need to prioritize what we teach.

With that in mind, I'd see S-turns as a skill they should learn, but later in their progression before they get their A.
Honestly, I think they're taught so early now not because they're the best tool, but because they're easy to teach.

For me, Braked Turns are FJC material. They're a survival skill.
The Accuracy trick is from jump 2 or 3 onward...

Students should be encouraged to practice both of these on every jump.

S-turns can be taught as part of a predeclared landing requirement for the A-license as an option for landing, but by that time the student should have a basic awareness of deconfliction and the hazards of other parachutes.

Of course, this requires an commitment to ongoing training by the DZ above the usual AFF stuff.

[headoverheels 291]

stayhigh

You shouldn't do them unless you are over 60 and fly 170+ sq parachute.

Okay, if I have two out, I can do S-turns, otherwise not.

[tikl68 6]

Way glad to hear. Good job for asking a good question, and taking that information and practicing it. Ok that is the basics. One thing i dont hear about braked turns that i discovered is that DEPENDING on how low you are when you have to pull this tool out of your bag-o-tircks and how deep the input was,try not to let the wing back into FULL FLIGHT if you were SUPER LOW. The recovery surge is the same as a low turn. After you make the turn ease up a little then full flare. If you dont have the altitude for that then you will come pretty much straight down if input is deep, feet and knees together,PLF full flare. Triatlons are fun and pretty forgiving for the most part. Remember practice up high.

[DrewEckhardt 0]

Steel808

Just want to get people opinions on S-turns during final approach

It's dangerous because it makes you unpredictable and could lead to a canopy collision.

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Are there instances when it is nessasary?

Not planned situations. At drop zones you don't need to be that accurate. In tighter landing areas you're prudently jumping a rectangular seven-cell canopy and can adjust the glide ratio with brakes for much better accuracy than you could achieve with S-turns.

When you screw up and land out you might need to.

[JohnMitchell 14]

yoink

The reality is that students can only absorb so much information at a time. We'd love to teach them everything immediately, but obviously that isn't possible so we need to prioritize what we teach.

With that in mind, I'd see S-turns as a skill they should learn, but later in their progression before they get their A.
Honestly, I think they're taught so early now not because they're the best tool, but because they're easy to teach.

For me, Braked Turns are FJC material. They're a survival skill.
The Accuracy trick is from jump 2 or 3 onward...

S-turns can be taught as part of a predeclared landing requirement for the A-license as an option for landing, but by that time the student should have a basic awareness of deconfliction and the hazards of other parachutes.

I think that's a pretty good syllabus you made there. S-turns should never be used in traffic. But if you're landing out and it's the only way to make it to a safe landing area, sure. So it's a survival skill that should be taught.

Deep brakes to shorten your flight path don't work on today's wonderful, flat flying ZP canopies the way they did on the old F-111 7-cells. Since our canopies glide so well, it's even more important to fly a decent pattern that enables us to land where we want, safely. I see people coming back from long spots, straight in, that use S-turns to lose altitude. Why not fly upwind until you can join the pattern, at some point, at the proper altitude? Much safer.

When making my turn to base and final, I vary between using toggles and using front risers to turn, the latter using more altitude, of course. That's one way I think is safe to use up extra altitude. It also allows me to do my "old man" swoop on my Stiletto 150. It's not that impressive, but I'm able to walk in every time.

[skyjumpenfool 2]

Entering the Pattern at a predetermined point at the correct altitude is the first step to flying a pattern. Plan/know the exact point you want to enter the pattern and do so at the correct altitude.

Birdshit & Fools Productions

"Son, only two things fall from the sky."

[riggerrob 558]

Good point John,

I used front-riser dives to earn my Exhibition Jump Rating on a Stiletto 135 and Ariel 150 (Sabre 1 copy). It worked batter for me than the old accuracy approach (deep brakes, letting up, then flaring for landing).
I would be reluctant to teach the front riser approach to junior jumpers for fear that they fixate on the target and forget to let up on front risers or flare. I have seen both under big docile student canopies.

For junior jumpers, I prefer to teach the method that has them flying a standard down-wind and base leg, then having three options for where to turn from base to final. Then the lesson becomes all about matching different angles to different winds.

[JohnMitchell 14]

I agree.
And for the newer people, when using front risers on base and final, here's a big safety tip:

Use all 4 fingers to hold onto your steering toggles. Use only the middle and index fingers to pull down on your front riser dive loops. This will ensure you can let go of the front riser dive loops and still safely hold onto the toggle loops to make a timely flare for landing.

I'm afraid there have been some very serious accidents from people who did front riser approaches and dropped one or both steering toggles while going very fast close to the ground.

[Jiggs 0]

Hi TK,

Like your explanation and guide to use on the coaching side of thing for jnr jumpers. One question, for example 7 – I am guessing that you also explain to jumpers the problems that this kind of approach can cause to others in the stack?

E.g. less predictable, it takes up more of the space of the landing area (or lanes within the landing area), etc

When you get jumpers to try this, how do you propose they do it? And not mess with other people? Do you just limit the pass numbers on the hop and pop? (I would be a bit reluctant to propose this on a course with a lot of low time jumpers with similar loadings)

And thanks for hosting the WM – it was good event!

"Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain."

"In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

[tkhayes 125]

I am not sure that the picture is 'to scale' in figure 7 and I am not suggesting that the distance past the target is that significant.

And generally by the time they get to that stage of the exercises, they are already getting better at seeing the transition. they can also opt to 'widen' the pattern, i.e. the base leg is crosswind, so turn out a bit to increase the distance to the target, before you get to the wind line.

But sure, all these are meant to be training and practice exercises, you have to be aware of other canopies in the air or get out on your own and go at it whatever way you want.

[tristansdad 0]

would you want to be behind someone on final doing S turns? especially it they're wearing a gopro and they have less than 200 jumps? thats every jumpers worst nightmare.

[yoink 321]

Lets not complicate matters with unnecessary stereotypes.

I've seen lots of hugely experienced 'old timers' doing S turns in the pattern and lots of people with less than 200 jumps doing great approaches.

The educational message is 'yes. They're a tool and you should have them in your repertoire. BUT they're not appropriate for everyday situations.'

[tristansdad 0]

I was actually being sarcastic and adding nothing of value to the conversation.

But if I was to give my 2 cents worth, I would say doing S turns on final is a complete violation of canopy flying ethics and should be discouraged at all skill levels.

[DvK 2]

Steel808

What if the person doing it was last to land, or flying with people that knew their behaviour. And it wasn't being done for landing accuracy, but rather for fun, as a last second adrenaline rush before landing?

If you're jumping because you get the "adrenaline rush" , chances are you haven't been around that long and don't have a decent amount of jumps under your belt. This means you have no clue what's really going on around you and should not be doing unpredictable flying like S-turns.

That being said: you should never fly unpredictable. Not saying you can't have fun in your landings, you can, but in a predictable way. Want to get more out of your landings? Go work on HP/swooping. Get some coaching and start training.

I don't see any reason to perform S-turns anywhere in the pattern. Not for students, not for sporties, not for tandems. If you can't fly your canopy decent enough as a TM to land next to the van or video guy, maybe work on your flying, instead of the consequences caused by the lack of skills in flying. Don't fight symptoms (S-turning), fight the cause. The cause of the 'need' to S-Turn starts way back, likely before the pattern.

[gunsmokex 1]

tkhayes

some stuff on S-Turns in there as well - good practice tool, but only used as practice, not really a great way to fly your parachute in normal patterns. learn the accuracy tricks and never have to do that.

Just wanted to say thanks for the .PDF file in post #32 TK. I used it my last few jumps and I have to say it helped tremendously! I was worried about getting my 20M landings for my progression card but I've been nailing my landings lately, spot on! (well at least 20M or less every time).

Using the base and eyeing the target now it just seems natural to turn in for final when I see the target stop moving. Still though on no wind days and high wind days I will have to see how it goes. On the student canopies on high wind days I have come literally straight down with little to no forward drive (that was on a 7 cell F111 though). And on my last no wind day I overshot (that was on a 9 cell ZP though). However after mainly using the same F111 7 cell, I've gotten used to it and its easy to transition to hit the target.

Honestly about the S-turns though, I'm really not a big fan of them. I guess mainly because I want to keep as stable under canopy as possible and don't really like the rocking feeling going back and forth. My last day of jumping I got to experience thermals coming off of the ground, had I been doing S turns I really can't say what my canopy would have done and I really don't think I want to find out either. I still hit my spot even with the thermals though using your technique and feel a lot more confident in my patterns.

As for 1/2 brakes, I did have to do a 1/2 braked approach as part of the A progression card and it actually worked pretty well for me. Again however that was with an F111 canopy so I'm not sure how differently as ZP would react.

I will be finding out soon though as my 'new rig' is being put together by my rigger for this weekend. Its a PISA Hornet 170. I plan on testing out the canopy as much as I possibly can to see what it does ie: glides better for long spots with 1/4 brakes or with rear risers, finding the sweet spot in the flare, braked turns, reverse turns, etc. I will be going to my first boogie in 2 weekends so I want to get my canopy down for traffic for sure

I'm thinking of eventully trying flare turns as I get more comfortable with my canopy as I do want to have that in my arsenal just in case someone jumps out in front of me on the ground when I least expect it. I doubt that I'll be trying them soon but any advice on flare turns would be much appreciated. Either way if I do try them I'll definitely be trying them above 2500' to get a feel for them.

Anyways thanks for the PDF on the accuracy seminar TK, I know it helped me a lot I'm just glad that I ran across it.

[yoink 321]

Glad you're practicing this stuff! It's important.
Regarding braked turns and flare turns - the time to start learning them is now. They're a survival skill. If you can practice them often enough up high then eventually when you really need it, you won't have to think. It'll just come naturally.