USPA update: Be Prepared for a Forced Landing

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A forced landing in an airplane is nobody's idea of a good time. If you were in an airplane that suddenly lost power at 300 feet, would you be ready? While a successful outcome will largely depend on how your pilot handles the situation, each jumper also has a responsibility to properly prepare for every takeoff. That means properly loading the airplane by sitting in an assigned spot, wearing a correctly adjusted safety belt and fully securing your helmet. And this all needs to be done before the airplane begins to taxi. If the airplane loses power at a low altitude, there will only be seconds to prepare for a forced landing. Make sure you are ready for every takeoff. You can find the Federal Aviation Administration recommendations for safety belt use here
http://www.uspa.org/Portals/0/files/misc_AC_105-2E.PDF

I Jumped with the guys who invented Skydiving.

[riggerrob 558]

Been there.
Done that.
Dislocated my shoulder.
Dislocated my knee.
A judge recently concluded: seat belts might have reduced injuries.

[Jumpdude 0]

I thought each and every time we jump, it's a "Forced Landing"! Unless someone comes up with a way to defy gravity and levitate eternally!

[riggerrob 558]

A lesson worth repeating for each new generation of jumpers.

Back in 1992, American skydivers learned bloody lessons after a pair of fatal crashes (Perris Valley, California and Hinkley, Illinois) Bless their hearts, because USPA changed attitudes over the winter (of 1992-1993) by making seat-belts fashionable.

Fast forward (16 years) to 2008 when I was injured during an engine-out forced landing.

During lengthy court proceedings, a lawyer stated: "There is no evidence to support the notion that seat-belts save lives." I promptly found accounts of 18 jump-plane crashes (between December 2014 and the fall of 2016). Only one of those crashes was fatal. Annette O'Neil published those findings (on dropzone.com last year). Damage was minimized by well-trained pilots and most jumpers wearing seat-belts. The other change was the recent proliferation of cameras provided in-cabin footage during several crashes, confirming that belts reduced flail arcs.

Bottom line: ever new generation needs to learn the same lessons, which is why magazines - like 'Parachutist' - repeat articles on a 3 or 4 year cycle. Junior jumpers can read about bloody mistakes made by their predecessors .... or they can learn the hard way .......