Cypress Fire, 2 out, 2 cutaways, one near tail strike and 2 reserve rides

[Bolas 5]

I'm an idiot. An extremely lucky idiot.

I'm also a longwinded idiot.

What a weekend.

Background
I had been doing lots of wingsuit flying, mostly flocks, but some acrobatics in a Tony Suit Super Mach One I was demoing. When jumping my wingsuit, I deployed around 3000 feet or higher because I needed to give time to unzip and deal with mals. Whenever I did a non wingsuit jump, my deployment altitude was about 2500ish or lower "because I had full arm and leg motion." Somehow I got it in my head that my landing accuracy was better because rather than have to burn off altitude under canopy I'd pretty much fly straight to my 1000 foot point after loosening the chest strap, stowing the slider, popping the brakes. I also had had 0 cutaways except for a skyhook demo rig. My worst mal was line twists where the canopy stayed flying level.

I was down at Palatka for the Hog Flop Boogie. All that week I had been in Florida and was doing a few freefly solos or wingsuit flocks. A bunch of my friends had been practicing their back flips for the Hog Flop.*

* The Hog Flop is a random draw 4-way RW team of different levels of experience, you are videoed and timed from when you break the round, each person does a backflip at the same time, and you come back together. It's a lot of silly fun and a good time.

Saturday
Knowing my friends had been practicing so much and not wanting to be showed up or make them lose if I was on their team, I decided to just do a solo to work on my backflips. As I was getting on there was another guy who was doing a solo that had 100 or so plus jumps so we decided to do a 2 way hog flop practice.
We agreed to break off at 4000, but I never changed my audible which was set for 5000.

We exited first from the Deland Skyvan in a front flip and then I attempted to fly to him. I was flying like shit. I was having trouble docking and even funneled him once. We got together and the back flip went great and BAM we were back together. I keyed it again and BAM we were back together. And again. We were having a blast. I never heard my dytter nor looked at my alti and my internal clock was still set for wingsuiting. He lost awareness as well.

I saw my altimeter at 2500 and I guess the reaction on my face caused him to look at his and he dumped. I backed off a little bit and dumped pretty quick after. In my mind I wanted to give him a little space since I kinda felt responsible for putting him in this situation.

I threw out and my canopy seemingly sniveled, and sniveled. I thought to myself, "son of a bitch, if my Cyp..." and felt the reserve pop off my back just as the canopy became fully inflated.

I thought about chopping it right then and there but didn't know where the reserve was. Last thing I needed was a ball of shit above my head or my reserve tangled around my feet. So I decided to wait and see what would happen.

My main is a Stiletto 150, the reserve is a PD 218. I knew they were probably not going to play nice together. I left the brakes stowed on both canopies. As the the reserve opened above my head it was bumping endsails with the 150. I was remembering my training while watching the canopies. I remembered that for a two out other than a downplane, little to no steering, don't release the brakes, and PLF your ass off. Looking down at where the canopies were taking me my landing choices were:

* The barbed wire fence around the airport
* The relatively busy road
* Tall trees

I watched as the reserve fully inflated and the 150 was in front of it, then behind it all the time thinking my landing choices suck.

Suddenly the 150 went back to a side by side and I saw a gap that was getting bigger between the two of them. Seeing it had clean air I chopped it. The people on the ground later told me it was starting to downplane and they cheered when I chopped it.

Okay. Back to one canopy and now I can choose where to put it down. After releasing the brakes but staying in them I looked at my available options and chose an empty gravel/asphalt parking of the used tire place next to the road as my best choice which I think may have been a downwind landing. I flew over to it conserving as much altitude as possible and lined up my approach. I don't think I ever got back to full flight so the landing was a PLF roll. I'm not even sure I fully flared. I tore my jumpsuit and road rashed my knee but was other than that fine except for my heart which was now beating 278178147812786134 times a second.

My main landed right next to me. I held onto my cutaway handle and never pulled the reserve. I found my freebag across the street on the airport side.

I got all my stuff, bagged it up and grounded myself for the day. I turned in the wingsuit demo as well. I borrowed a hotel room to shower up and decompress a little.

Sunday
The plan was to just do a jump or two to "get back on the horse." I had a few people offer to loan me their gear but I for some reason had a feeling I'd have a bad landing and didn't want to mess their stuff up. I asked Art if he had a student rig or something I could rent. He showed me this beautiful Mirage G4 with no AAD or RSL and a Stiletto 150. I told him of my concerns and he said "You can jump this free, if you get it dirty, I'll just charge for the cleaning." That worked for me.

I got it packed up and really wanted to jump. I decided to do a Hop n' Pop from their Caravan. On the load I saw a guy with a film camera on his head (I found out later that it was Joe Jennings) He asked if he could film my exit. I told him fine. When the red light came on we were at about 6000 feet I opened the door. I was gonna do a back out exit so I could geek the camera. Once the light turned green I waited a second while Tony got his camera ready and tried to climb out. I was nearly pulled off the plane. I tried to do my exit but basically fell off.

I got stable and threw about 4000 and after loosening the chest strap, stowing the slider, and popping the brakes, felt that this 150 seemed zippier than mine. It flew great. I even kicked the accuracy football on landing.
When I got to the ground I was told that I came about six inches from hitting the tail. When they do Hop n Pops here they don't cut or stop climbing so you have to dive down. Had I not been trying to be a camera whore I probably would have done that.

I wanted to do one more jump. Jump 899. I didn't want to do 900 that weekend. It just didn't feel like a milestone weekend.

I was planning on doing a jump with a few people but they decided to wingsuit instead. That was the last thing I wanted to do. It was getting late in the day so I decided to do just do a solo sit/stand. I had packed the rig and would have had to have them repack the main anyway.
There was quite a few big groups ahead of me, there was only one other solo freeflyer and then a wingsuiter.

When I exited I saw we were pretty far off the airport. I did a few transitions some stand and went to my belly at 6000 and waved off and pulled about 5000.

When the canopy opened it had 3 line twists. No big deal, I've had them on my Stiletto 150 before. The past weekend I was wingsuiting and had a leg wing come off. I had line twists from my risers through my slider and all the way up. It took a while to clear but it flew level the whole time.

Then it dove, no big deal, I've had canopies dive before and they came straight back up. Then it started to spin me around. As I'm trying to relax and make sure my legs are even while being flung I look down and see that there is no good place to land (big forest) even if I do try to "fix" it. Then I remembered my line twist rule I decided: If it's flying straight and level and I've got the altitude I'll kick out, the minute I start diving, you're out of there.

Either I didn't look at my altimeter or the altitude didn't register in my brain because I was high. I yelled, "Oh you have got to be fucking kidding me!!!" as I put my hands on the handles as it kept swinging me around. Cursing my luck I chopped and fired the reserve. I had a half line twist on the reserve which came out quickly. I had wanted to wait a second between cutting away and firing the reserve, but I always practice a fluid motion so that's what I did.

As I pointed the PD143 back towards the airport and stowing my handles in the jumpsuit. I saw the canopy tumble down. It looked like it had a lineover, but that may have been caused by the cutaway. It looked like it was heading for the factory and I thought with my luck, It will land in a smokestack.

Thankfully it drifted back to the airport and I had a beautiful stand up landing in the main landing area. But I did lose the freebag since I fired the reserve high and was over a forest.

So in one weekend:
One skydive with a low pull, Cypress fire, biplane, side by side, downplane, cutwaway, reserve ride, off field landing, PLF crash but got back all my stuff.

One skydive with a near tail strike.

One skydive with a spinning mal, cutaway, reserve ride stand up landing on the main field but lost the freebag.

I was told later on the ground that making sure the risers are even will sometimes stop the spin.

It will be a little while before jump 900.

Conclusion
The Cypres fire scared the crap out of me. Had my Cypres fired and I had nothing out I'd never jump again because at that point I owed my life to a $1500 piece of electronics. The only way I'd allow myself back in the air would be if I was knocked unconscious or for some other reason physically unable to pull at all.

As it is, I'm unsure if the Cypres didn't save me. Not from death, but from injury. I was not in the best area for landings. I would have had more time to find a landing area but that 150 obviously loses altitude much faster than the 218 or the 368 I had at one point above me.

Flame me, ridicule me, but learn from me.

Stupidity if left untreated is self-correcting
If ya can't be good, look good, if that fails, make 'em laugh.

[ladydyver 0]

thanks for the post and sharing your experience - glad that you are safe my friend.

DPH # 2
"I am not sure what you are suppose to do with that, but I don't think it is suppose to flop around like that." ~Skootz~
I have a strong regard for the rules.......doc!

[NWFlyer 2]

Thanks for sharing all that - what a story! As always, kudos for owning up to mistakes - we see too little of that.

So ... I think I got the lessons on 1 (altitude awareness altitude awareness altitude awareness) and 2 (don't let the presence of a camera cause you to forget the basics of the skydive. What about 3? Any ideas on the cause of the mal?

Any thoughts to all of this occurring within 3 jumps? Any thoughts to whether there's any level of comfort/complacency involved in all this given your time in sport and previous mal-free existence? You're not one of those jumpers who is laser-focused on one thing (you seem to hop around from discipline to discipline ... if the jump sounds like fun, you're down for it). Not that there's anything inherently wrong with that, but it also means that it does require constant vigilance since you're regularly resetting your body clock from RW to wingsuit to freefly, and also that you be careful about how you use your tools like your audible (again, wide variety of jumps ... wide variety of settings). Wonder if that was a contributing factor?

How rested were you? Hung over?

"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

[wightout 0]

Glad you didn't Die go sit through an AFF class with some newbies to remind yourself of the basics and then get back in the air and don't do that shit no more

Oops this is Catfishhunter (John) Not lora posting she was logged in and I didn't notice

To borrow a line from Squeak...MY LIFE ROCKS!! HOW'S YOURS??!!!

[Bolas 5]

Quote

Thanks for sharing all that - what a story! As always, kudos for owning up to mistakes - we see too little of that.

So ... I think I got the lessons on 1 (altitude awareness altitude awareness altitude awareness) and 2 (don't let the presence of a camera cause you to forget the basics of the skydive. What about 3? Any ideas on the cause of the mal?

It was a fairly new canopy and my standard packing method (put the fabric over the top of the center versus underneath) didn't work getting it into the bag so had to go back to standard propack roll under. I had also just done alot of freefly transitions including some front and back flips so the rig might have shifted some.

I'll have to admit I was super aware that day and may have normally been able to fix it, probably even more likely on my own gear.

Quote

Any thoughts to all of this occurring within 3 jumps? Any thoughts to whether there's any level of comfort/complacency involved in all this given your time in sport and previous mal-free existence? You're not one of those jumpers who is laser-focused on one thing (you seem to hop around from discipline to discipline ... if the jump sounds like fun, you're down for it). Not that there's anything inherently wrong with that, but it also means that it does require constant vigilance since you're regularly resetting your body clock from RW to wingsuit to freefly, and also that you be careful about how you use your tools like your audible (again, wide variety of jumps ... wide variety of settings). Wonder if that was a contributing factor?

Those are all possibilities. Had the first event not occurred, I probably wouldn't have had the next two, but no telling.

One the first jump I never heard my audible. I have it set to constant beep at 2500 and flatline at 2000. I know it worked because according to it, I wasn't under canopy until 223 feet. I know that is way off, I'm sure I chopped my main long before that.

Quote

How rested were you? Hung over?

I was fairly well rested. I lost "Jaegermeister awareness" the night before and "cutaway" all the alcohol and food in my system. Was in bed shortly after midnight.

Stupidity if left untreated is self-correcting
If ya can't be good, look good, if that fails, make 'em laugh.

[WhuffoNoMo 0]

uh.. that was Joe Jennings who filmed you. and yes, we cheered :)

[lilchief 0]

Nice post!

Good luck in the future

"Once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been and there you long to return." - Da Vinci
www.lilchief.no

[popsjumper 2]

You didn't mention it here but when we talked on the ground...

Lesson Learned:
Gadget dependence can hurt you...

Audibles are nice but nothing to depend on since they sometimes fail and sometimes go unheard.

AADs are nice but when they automatically fire after your main is already deployed they make a bad situation even worse.


How about that adrenaline, eh?????
Kick-ass stuff!

My reality and yours are quite different.
I think we're all Bozos on this bus.
Falcon5232, SCS8170, SCSA353, POPS9398, DS239

[fmmobley 0]

What a crazy weekend ! I am glad you came through all that with just a skinned knee !

Thanks for posting. When I hear stories like yours they scare the shit out of me and remind me of what can happen when we are not careful (and even when we are careful).

I enjoyed flocking with you at the Halloween Boogie.

... Marion

[Andy_Copland 0]

Good Job not dying Bolas, as for you being well rested... i call BS and want video evidence.

On a serious note though, dont be too hard on yourself.

1338

People aint made of nothin' but water and shit.

Until morale improves, the beatings will continue.

[lippy 765]

Thanks for having the balls to post that and thanks for not dying
What's the plan for 900?

I got nuthin

[BillyVance 34]

I remember one weekend at Moss Point during one of the Mardi Gras boogies, I got on a very high end 10 way (average experience 2000+ jumps each). On the ride up in the Casa I asked the organizer what breakoff is. He gave me a sheepish grin and said 3500 feet. I stared at him. In retrospect, I probably should have gotten off the dive and gone solo, but no... just felt like I had to go along with it. Shit hot jump, turning lots of points, until about 4500 feet and it goes to shit with people flailing everywhere. I was just getting my bearings when I noticed everyone started tracking like hell, so I do the same thing, only there were 2 guys below me going the same direction. Shit, not wanting to pull and have myself snivel into one of them in case they pull and open quicker, I waited until they both pulled and shot up then I dumped. Just about reached for my toggles when I felt the reserve pop off my back. Fuck. I instantly chopped my main before the reserve had a chance to escape the d-bag. Yep, Cypres fired.

Well, I was able to get the rigger onsite to repack it and replace the cutter overnight so it was ready to go the next morning, but we got weathered out with solid cloud cover.

There was an opening that afternoon so we sent a full load big way up on the Casa, I think about a 25 way. Then the hole closed up while we were on jump run and all set ready to go off the ramp, just waiting for the green light. It was pretty tense. Light never came. We ended up riding the plane back down.

Probably a good thing we did. Better to nip a bad weekend in the bud before another bad thing happens.

"Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban

[lauraliscious 0]

Thanks for posting all this, Bolas, I didn't know about that almost tail strike. I call BS about Joe Jennings though, I got to hold his camera helmet on the way to altitude and he filmed me falling off a plane in Montana and I didn't see him at the Hog Flop (but maybe I just missed him).

Anyway, as for helping understand maybe why you had that mal...

I was packing next to you when you were packing that Mirage after your 1st jump on it, before the diving line twists/cutaway jump. I seem to remember you having some trouble stowing your lines with the split d-bag (typical on Mirages, just like my d-bag). Maybe the line stows became uneven or possibly twisted?

Enemiga Rodriguez, PMS #369, OrFun #25, Team Dirty Sanchez #116, Pelt Head #29, Muff #4091

[NWFlyer 2]

Quote

Thanks for posting all this, Bolas, I didn't know about that almost tail strike. I call BS about Joe Jennings though, I got to hold his camera helmet on the way to altitude and he filmed me falling off a plane in Montana and I didn't see him at the Hog Flop (but maybe I just missed him).

No, no, the guy in Montana was someone different - that was Joe Fucking Jennings, aka Chunx.

I think Bolas' original idea that it was Tony Hathaway is more likely given the location of the boogie ... at any rate, regardless of who it was we have learned two things 1) Bolas has no clue who actually took his photo and 2) he's a camera whore even if he doesn't know that it's a well-known professional photographer.

"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

[mouth 0]

Yes, I cheered.

Yes, you were that low.

Yes, you scared the hell out of me.

Yes, you screwed up.

Yes, we love you so we want you to be safe.

I am sorry I chewed you a new one Sat night but now I wish I had been there to chew you another new one for the second one.

DAMNIT...be careful.

--
Hot Mama
At least you know where you stand even if it is in a pile of shit.

[Bolas 5]

Quote

Anyway, as for helping understand maybe why you had that mal...

I was packing next to you when you were packing that Mirage after your 1st jump on it, before the diving line twists/cutaway jump. I seem to remember you having some trouble stowing your lines with the split d-bag (typical on Mirages, just like my d-bag). Maybe the line stows became uneven or possibly twisted?

Maybe, the reason I took so long to stow my lines was the top band broke. It had a little tiny opening so it was hard to get the old band off and the new one on. I had to thread it with a pullup cord.

Since I packed it myself I can choose between bad pack job, body position, or both.

Stupidity if left untreated is self-correcting
If ya can't be good, look good, if that fails, make 'em laugh.

[Rick 67]

just blame it on the packer

You can't be drunk all day if you don't start early!

[Squeak 17]

just out of curiosity did you let anyone jumping after you know you were going to dump out at 5000 feet, 2500 feet above your standard non wingsuit opening height?
Or am i the only one that see this as a safety issue

You are not now, nor will you ever be, good enough to not die in this sport (Sparky)
My Life ROCKS!
How's yours doing?

[Bolas 5]

Quote

just out of curiosity did you let anyone jumping after you know you were going to dump out at 5000 feet, 2500 feet above your standard non wingsuit opening height?
Or am i the only one that see this as a safety issue

Are you talking about the second reserve ride?

There was only a solo sit flyer who said he was going to pull at 6000 and a wingsuiter behind me.

Stupidity if left untreated is self-correcting
If ya can't be good, look good, if that fails, make 'em laugh.

[micduran 0]

Thanks for sharing. Thanks for letting us ask you so many questions Saturday night. Thanks for staying alive.

I knew about the near tail strike. I did NOT know about the 2nd cutaway!!

Don't wait too long before jumping again. You may never do it.
Keep your lessons learned top of mind and be careful.

Be patient with the faults of others; they have to be patient with yours.

[Bolas 5]

Asked in a PM:

Quote

Was the gear the issue of this weekends misfortunes? From what i read i didn't see the gear having anything to do with the issue, except for the not hearing the audible. And also did anyone talk to the other guy you were jumping with about losing altitude awareness??? Someone with that low amount of jumps should NOT be losing altitude awareness. I know he pulled high, but did he have a cypress? I mean what would have happened if say both of you went low or something and couldn't pull.... sorry but that just gets into another whole error...

Although my gear was not a major cause, having a 150 with a 218 reserve is not smart for two out situations.

Not wanting to depend on electronics, but if I had had a second audible I may have heard at least one.

I talked with the other guy. He knows he screwed up just as much as I did but was luckier. He told me he did not have an AAD. I never asked if he had an audible.

Anyone of any level can lose altitude awareness. Should they? No, but it happens. That's one reason why people use audibles, for a backup system. I'd be lying if I said I'd never been on a jump where having an audible beep jolted my awareness.

I lost altitude awareness on my 3rd jump. I was so focused on getting stable (kept getting the legs sign) that when they went to one finger (for pull) I thought I had one leg right and just needed to fix the other. It wasn't tell my AFF JM dumped for me that I got it.

Stupidity if left untreated is self-correcting
If ya can't be good, look good, if that fails, make 'em laugh.

[HUSHPUPPY 0]

Shake it off, learn from it and come to the FloraBama again soon!

Looking forward to jumping with you again! (I'll wear 2 altimeters!)

"You made my panties wet!" Skymama (Fitz 09)
"Never argue with an idiot. They will bring you down to their level and beat you with experience."

[jtval 0]

Holy Crap. that sounds like an exciting weekend.
I'm glad you did everything to save your ass.

I like to tell people usually after their first chop that
just because you had a reserve ride doesn't mean your next jump will be perfect. You are always capable of having a malfunction and you shouls awlasy be ready for it when you put your gear on."


Thanks for telling the story. and thanks for making it a link in your sig line. I wouldnt have found it other wsie.

My photos

My Videos

[dannydan 0]

Quote

You didn't mention it here but when we talked on the ground...

Lesson Learned:
Gadget dependence can hurt you...

Audibles are nice but nothing to depend on since they sometimes fail and sometimes go unheard.

AADs are nice but when they automatically fire after your main is already deployed they make a bad situation even worse.


How about that adrenaline, eh?????
Kick-ass stuff!

I concur with all!

Quote

How about that adrenaline, eh?????
Kick-ass stuff!

I absolutely LOVE the way that my ADREN works for me.... Even at a mere lads age of almost 45, I am becomming MORE in tune with it! HEY Bo... YOU da man, I dont know you unless we met at the WFFC 04-06 CASA or party tents, but DUDE I am seariously glad that you did what YOU felt that you had to do to SURVIVE man!! Blessings to you on yr 900th+ man! Lookin forward to jumpin with you someday! : DD dannydan

[Bolas 5]

Bumped for another low puller.

Stupidity if left untreated is self-correcting
If ya can't be good, look good, if that fails, make 'em laugh.