Harness syncope? Or nerves?

[Lialhoma 1]

Newbie looking for AFF advice. 

I finished ground training a few days ago. After rehearsing dive flow, emergency procedures, and corrective actions for canopy malfunction a few extra times with my instructors, I fess stoked to go for my first jump. 

Yesterday was (supposed to be) jump day, but I passed out before it was time to exit. I would like help figuring how to prevent the same thing from happening again.

For context, I am a 28 year old female, 5’2” and 102 lbs. While I am not a “star athlete” by any means, I am an active individual. No known cardiovascular issues. Overall in good health. 

I’m not entirely sure what to attribute the syncope to. A few possible factors came to mind: 

• Rig/canopy sizing: One of my JMs said that for wingloading 0.6-0.7, my canopy size would need to be 175-200sq ft. The rig and canopy available were a bit larger than what would be considered a “good fit”. Canopy 220sq ft. To compensate for the larger rig, the leg straps and chest strap were tightened as much as possible so that I wouldn’t have difficulty reaching the toggles once the main deployed. Seemed like a reasonable rationale to me. That said, I did feel pretty weak and tingly (especially in my legs) once I had my gear on (about 10-15 min before boarding the plane). I chalked it up to nerves and adrenaline. 
• Dehydration: Yesterday was a relatively hot day 85-90°F. A few other jumpers were effected by the heat too. 
• Mindset: I went into the jump feeling a mix of pure excitement, and a healthy level of anxiety. While I have never passed out from any “extreme” emotion in my life, it’s always possible the plane ride up was a first experience. 

My question to anyone and everyone with experience is this: How significant is the effect of a tight rig / harness on hemodynamic stability? Is it enough to consider it the primary cause of the syncopal episode? Or is the effect less severe, thus attributing the event to poorly controlled mindset? 

 

Weather permitting, my (redo) first jump attempt is this coming weekend. I want to make any corrections necessary now so I can jump into blue skies, safely. :)

 

[riggerrob 558]

Please tell us more about your general health and diet.

People falling unconscious in the airplane is exceedingly rare. Over 30-some-odd-years of teaching skydiving, I have never had a student faint in the airplane, though I have had a handful faint after their parachutes opened.

Back during the 1970s and 1980s, we used to suffer one static-line student per hundred jumps or one per thousand jumps fainting after their parachute opened. They ignored steering commands on the radio and wandered off to land in the forest. Then we spent the rest of the afternoon getting them out of the trees. For some silly reason, I am better than most at climbing trees, so I got tasked with extracting then from trees. NOT my favorite task.

We had to do tandems for a decade (1983 to 1993) before we started to understood the physiology of fainting under canopy. It seems that most of the fainters were city-slickers who were not very active in their Monday-to-Friday lives. The spent the morning on a hot, dry, drop zone doing physical exercises involving climbing in and out of the airplane mock up, rolling around on the grass, etc. They forgot to eat or drink, so were hungry and thirsty by the time they got near the airplane. The fear and excitement of an airplane ride burned through their last reserve of blood sugar. Outside the airplane, they relaxed as soon as they saw an open parachute over-head. They relaxed so much that they fainted and wandered off towards the forest. That is why most skydiving schools now insist on students doing a tandem or three before attempting static-line or AFF.

We now encourage all students to sip water, munch on snacks and visit the toilet before suiting up.

[IanHarrop 37]

I have no real answer for you but I've seen newbies really crank on their leg straps and tighten them to the extreme. This is not a good idea. You need to be able to fit two fingers in between your leg and your harness.

People need to be aware of Suspension Trauma. There's lots on-line about it, you can here 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suspension_trauma

[Lialhoma 1]

Follow-up: 

Thank you both for your responses. They’re informative, and helped me put the sequence of events into perspective. 

 

After last Saturday, the leg weakness and tingling seemed to improve for a day or two, but it never went away. From Wednesday onwards it gradually got worse; I became more fatigued, dizzy, and a little cloudy headed. I attributed it all to working longer hours (16 hour shifts, instead of my normal 12 hour shifts). By Friday night I felt like trash. 

 

Turns out I have COVID. 

 

I work full-time in the ICU and ER of an urban area hospital. 2.5 years into the pandemic, COVID finally got me. Despite working with high volumes of COVID patient’s, I clearly didn’t recognize the early symptoms as I began to develop them myself. Had to feel like crap [and get outside advice :) ] to finally put the pieces together.