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Diogenes

Manifest Dilemma - What would you do?

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Here's the situation. The Otter is boarding, and there are one too many people for the plane. The boarding guy pulls out the manifest list and calls out names. It is discovered that one person of a 4-way team is not on the manifest.

Calls go out by some jumpers to kick off a solo jumper to make room for the 4-way guy so the team can make their practice jump.

The solo jumper points out that he paid for his slot and is on the manifest, and shouldn't get kicked off and punished for someone else's mistake.

The engines are running and burning fuel, the pilot is anxious to taxi out and take-off.

Note that without the full 4-way team, their practice jump is worthless. Should the team go ahead with only three people? Or should they get off the plane with their non-manifested team mate? This would leave the plane with three slots empty. Should the 4-way team forfeit their jump tickets for the load? Or should the drop zone refund those tickets and absorb the loss from the empty seats?

Or, if you kick off the solo jumper, the 4-way team is happy and can pay for the extra slot when they land. The plane is full, and everyone is happy. Except for the poor solo jumper who feels like excess baggage...

What decision should the boarding guy make?

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Yep kick off solo jumper but put him on the next load, no extra charge. The plane was full so the DZ did not lose anything so no need to charge him twice. Just re-manifest him on next load, and the 4 way team owes him a beer or two at the end of the day.

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Divalent

Kick the solo off, but 4-way team pays for his slot on the next load. (It the team doesn't agree with that, go as originally manifested.)



Almost agree:
If the 4-way are any kind of decent people, they would offer to pay for the solo's slot and buy beer at the end of the day.

If they don't want to pay for the jumper's slot, they get off the plane and as far as I am concerned can remanifest - at the back of the queue
"That formation-stuff in freefall is just fun and games but with an open parachute it's starting to sound like, you know, an extreme sport."
~mom

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Here is the counter argument to that - why should the 4 way take priority over someone that followed the process and manifested correctly? If the DZ really is that busy that there are no open slots it might be several loads before there is another open slot for someone to hop on a load. Why should the solo jumper that got in line, waited and paid for his slot have to be the one that gets kicked off and now has to wait potentially hours more to get a jump in? I've been there and I've said screw it just leave the DZ for the day and then don't come back for a while. If the very next plane had slots open on it I'd ask if the solo jumper would be willing to step off to get on the next plane and would work out something with them at that time but if the next few planes were full already then I'd be telling the 4 way team one of them is off the plane unless they want to comp the solo jumper for their error and the solo jumper is willing to get off.

Part of being on a 4 way team is making sure that everyone is correctly briefed and ready to go for the jump. When I was training on 4 way I was told part of the video flyers responsibilities are typically to manifest the team as a whole on the planes that they want on so that the team can focus on their prep work like the dirt dive, getting some debriefing done or other things. If the team does not have a video flyer on the jump already then its not a serious enough 4way that they could not afford to scratch from the load and to properly load the plane.

Would this be any different if instead of it being a 4 way team the question was "What would you do if someone forgot to manifest for a fun RW jump but they planed an entire dive with that person in it?"
Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

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PhreeZone

If the team does not have a video flyer on the jump already then its not a serious enough 4way that they could not afford to scratch from the load and to properly load the plane.



My thoughts exactly. From the description given, I'm not seeing an error on Manifest's part, it was on tge 4 way group - so they should fix it, not you. If you're not manifested, you don't get on a plane, period. No special accommodations because your friends are on the manifest list, if someone in your group forgot you, it's on them.

A serious 4 way competition team (not just a 4 way group jump) would communicate their training schedule clearly to manifest, usually for the day or for the first few loads at least, and would most likely have a video flier.

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PhreeZone

Here is the counter argument to that - why should the 4 way take priority over someone that followed the process and manifested correctly? ...


It's more of a community thing:
1. DZs are a bit more financially stable if they run a full load, and a financially healthy DZ is more likely to stay in business and to be more generous with occasional perks (like, running a light load at the end of the day, buying paper towels to fill the bathroom dispensers, etc.)
2. the penalty for keeping the solo on the load is disproportionate to the error made. Yes, the team screwed up not manifesting 4. But either the DZ takes a hit running a light load, or the team takes a hit either wasting jumps or paying for slots not used.
3. Bumping the solo impacts only him, vs a team of 4 (or vs the DZO)

That's why I think the solo takes the immediate hit, but gets compensated. The team is happy, (and presumably they will also be grateful to the solo guy), the DZO is happy, and the Solo benefits from getting a free slot, and hopefully is at least not disappointed in the outcome.

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Competitive 4 Way flyer here...

First, how about asking the solo if the mind getting off and offering to buy their next jump. It's not a tell, it's an ask. Makes a pretty big difference on how that is received.

If solo says no, team gets off and remanifests. Just because we are a team doesn't mean anyone else's jump matters less.

Also agree to the statement of if the 4 way team didn't have video, can't be that serious of a team. And 3 slots ($75ish) should not make or break a dzs bottom line.

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PhreeZone

Here is the counter argument to that - why should the 4 way take priority over someone that followed the process and manifested correctly?



Absolutely!

The 4-way team fucked up. The solo shouldn't have to reorganize because of that...
The LO should remove the jumper without the ticket and if the rest of the 4 way get off the plane, fine. They lose their tickets.

If the solo OFFERS to stand down, fine, but otherwise the 4-way is SOL in my book.


I'm surprised by how many responses here are giving priority to the team.

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yoink

I'm surprised by how many responses here are giving priority to the team.



Yeah, and yet the vote is going the other way. Weird.

One of the bad things about giving the team priority is the precedent it sets. Any time any team screws up, they always get precedence over any solo jumpers. Solo jumpers are screwed. And therefore, the teams don't have to worry too much about getting themselves all manifested, because they know they can always kick someone else off during boarding.

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I would ask the solo if he is OK to jump on the next load for free.
If not, any other solo on the plane.
If nobody, the RW team jumps a 3 way...

After that, responsibility would need to be taken, and find out who screwed up, is it the RW team or the manifest ?
scissors beat paper, paper beat rock, rock beat wingsuit - KarlM

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I would say the post is written in a bit of a dramatic fashion. I don't know the DZ but I have seen many otters go up that are not full. So moving people around shouldn't be a big deal. Also, usually when teams are training, manifest and ground crew know them(at least in my limited experience). They should see these kinds of things ahead of time so it can be worked out ahead of boarding.

So I would say the solo person isn't at fault and should stay on. The plane can go up still and the 4 way team can move to the next flight.

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Long-time competitor here.

If its that crowded, usually my team volunteered to get off the plane! The rest were happy to have the extra space, we could usually be on another plane right away, and this gave us time at manifest to figure out who screwed up. Sometimes it was another group, a tandem and camera, or even manifest itself. Whatever the reason, it just wasn't worth being crammed on a plane to altitude.

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some variations of that happen to me relatively often (I mean, like once or twice per season), given that I mostly do hop and pops I am the last one boarding the plane, even if I try to be there as early as possible, and I normally volunteer to be taken off the load because, with the engine running, it's simply the easiest thing to do, rather than taking someone off the back of the plane.

That being said: I am not going to pay for the slot I can't use, since it's not my fault if someone else boarded the plane improperly and now there is no seat belt for me. I'll let them figure out what happened exactly and who to charge for it, not my business, but it's not going to be me: this is not in question, this much is *expected*.

But, generally speaking, the DZ managers who see this happening are extremely appreciative of my understanding, and throw something in there for me as a thank you, I've been offered a free jump on next load etc, sometimes I accept, sometimes I say the gesture is enough.

Taking the solo jumper off, charging the fourth person for the slot, and remanifesting him on next load, maybe for free if it's a super busy day with many tandems and manifest can be "generous", is the most efficient thing to do.
I'm standing on the edge
With a vision in my head
My body screams release me
My dreams they must be fed... You're in flight.

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why should the 4 way take priority over someone that followed the process and manifested correctly?



Invariably, when this has happened to my teams, the error happened in manifest (we give manifest a list of our personnel for the day, then manifest as a chunk of five people). I'm not saying that this is how every DZ does it, but... I'd vote bump the solo jumper (if he/she is willing), and the team thanks that jumper with frosty beverages or a packing ticket or some other nicety.
** I'm also not dissing manifestors - that's a thankless job. Sometimes mistakes like this just happen. They're pretty easy to work out when everybody acts like adults.

No team I've been on would ever go do a three way when the plan was, until loading the plane, a four way training jump - that has zero value training value, and just costs money, if it wasn't the actual plan for the jump. So on one occasion, when there was a cluster in loading/manifest, and nobody else was willing to bump, all five of us pulled off and bumped to another load. Sometimes you've just got to be the bigger person (or, five bigger people :D).

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First, how about asking the solo if the mind getting off and offering to buy their next jump. It's not a tell, it's an ask. Makes a pretty big difference on how that is received.

If solo says no, team gets off and remanifests. Just because we are a team doesn't mean anyone else's jump matters less.




Of the thread so far, I think this post here is the most correct.
=========Shaun ==========


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That's how it works , your getting off gets you a free jump , the team can afford to do that , and you go enjoy it . Two for the price of one , nice . Most people I have seen that happen to have been pretty cool about it , where I am , If manifest gets it wrong ( and that's rare ) we buy you a jump.when you have 3 aircraft flying , and you try to get on the wrong one , your fault , welcome to experience.😎

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Same here. I have been the one to get off when I was not on a solo and was not the one who screwed up, but understand the importance of a 4 way jump not being turned into a 3 way. Sometimes in my experience it is manifests fault and they just put me on the next plane I want to get on. And yes it was a request not an order, and I have also been the one requesting a solo jumper catch the next flight as an LO due to manifests bungle, and yes, beer is bought.

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