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Orange1

Riding the plane down

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Just idly wondering...:P

Option 2 for me (long ago. felt vindicated when of the 2 other students on the load one landed way out and the other got dragged on landing)

(and yes, I realise this poll is biased as a number of option 2/3s would have stopped jumping!)

Edited to add: in response to IanHarrop's post, please include under "had to" if you weren't intending to jump!!
Skydiving: wasting fossil fuels just for fun.

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There are more reasons.

The primary reason I've come down with the plane was because I was dispatching SL students and I didn't have time to pack before I had to go back up.
"Where troubles melt like lemon drops, away above the chimney tops, that's where you'll find me" Dorothy

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There are more reasons.

The primary reason I've come down with the plane was because I was dispatching SL students and I didn't have time to pack before I had to go back up.



I think that could go under the "etc" bit of the "had to" option ;)... i mean, i could also have had an option "when i was the pilot" for the diverdrivers i suppose...:D
Skydiving: wasting fossil fuels just for fun.

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I've ridden the plane partially down one time - the exterior door next to the camera step was open and we had to land to close it. That was the scariest freakin' thing ever!!! The plane just nose dived for the landing strip :S. Hence, I'd rather jump out of it than have to land in it anyday.

"Excuse me while I kiss the sky..." - Jimi Hendrix

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I've ridden the plane down a couple times, mostly because I intended to (just taking pics, stuff like that), one time because it was too low for me to jump (didn't have that many jumps, was 3000 ft or so), and one time because I discovered at 2000ft that I had put one riser on correctly and the other one upside down (i'm used to reversed risers, there weren't) :$:$:$
That's what you get for trying to switch canopies right before a call :SB|

ciel bleu,
Saskia

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I just had my first plane ride down last weekend.

My jumping buddy did a pin check on me and couldn't tell if my pc was cocked. I was pretty sure it was, but better safe than sorry. So I got to ride down with Rook in the cockpit. It was actually a very nice ride, quite interesting being on final in an airplane instead of under canopy! :)
When I got down I discovered that my pc WAS cocked, the color was just outside the window. Oh well.
"At 13,000 feet nothing else matters."
PFRX!!!!!
Team Funnel #174, Sunshine kisspass #109
My Jump Site

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Never had to. I have had the pilot inform me of the weather and giving me the choice. I came down fine, although that Falcon 300 didn't give me much penetrating power. ;)
HF #682, Team Dirty Sanchez #227
“I simply hate, detest, loathe, despise, and abhor redundancy.”
- Not quite Oscar Wilde...

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Just idly wondering...:P

Option 2 for me (long ago. felt vindicated when of the 2 other students on the load one landed way out and the other got dragged on landing)

(and yes, I realise this poll is biased as a number of option 2/3s would have stopped jumping!)

Edited to add: in response to IanHarrop's post, please include under "had to" if you weren't intending to jump!!



I have ridden down a few times. Clouds, storm coming in. ALways weather related...never lost my nerve.
Why yes, my license number is a palindrome. Thank you for noticing.

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I have done it numerous times due to student refusal in the door and never have liked but the most unnerving time was the 2004 Texas State Record when all seven otters fully loaded had to land in a downpour on an extremely muddy runaway -- and the windsheild wipers didn't work either ------------That Sucked!!!!!!!


The pimp hand is powdered up ... say something stupid

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Beer time I rode the plane down was as a S/L student - One of the other students on the plane had a bad case of nerves and wouldn't leave. I was due for a 30 second delay jump, but the instructor had two 1st time jumpers to dispatch first. Since one didn't want to leave, all three of us rode down.

Rode down again due to weather coming in suddenly.

Third ride down was with a student I was coaching - We were the last group out and I couldn't see the DZ due to a cloud layer. No way I was letting my student go.

Went on one observer ride while recovering from some bruised ribs after a hard opening. Had to get in the air somehow!

Easy Does It

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I have considered doing a ride along. I used to do some fun flights with a pilot friend of mine in a rented cesna. He was no jump pilot, but the landingw where still fun. When leaving the door and watching Travis nose the outer straight to the earth, I sometimes wonder who is haveing more fun. Me or him?


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I've been manifested, and pulled myself from the load due to that 'not feel right' thing. Once beside the plane, and once before walking to the plane, so geared up both times.

It's tougher to ride the plane down (or otherwise scratch from the load) than it is to get out and jump, I think.

Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

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It's tougher to ride the plane down (or otherwise scratch from the load) than it is to get out and jump, I think.



When I learned to paraglide, the instructor would not let you get your "P2" (think USPA "A") until he saw you walk down the hill when OTHERS were flying... It was an unwritten and unpublished requirement he kept track of in his mind, otherwise people could just "fake" the decision...

He told us often his story of being in a coma for 6 months after he told his students to walk down and he crashed when he thought "I can make it".

Clearly he knew it was harder NOT to fly, so he put it in his teaching progression....

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Three times that I can think of. First was a Cessna where the pilot informed us of some problem and we took it back down - I was a static line student and had no vote in the proceedings. The other two were fully loaded DC-3's that returned. One was for a nasty weather front moving in, the other was for a cowl flap that came off one of the engines shortly after takeoff (below a grand). And one time I took an observer ride while recuperating from an injury.

Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

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Once. Clouds scuttled a 20-way formation skydive attempt.



Beer!!! That was your first! :D When we were just about to land on that load, I slapped my head and thought to myself "damn, why didn't I think to ask the load if they wanted to do hop-n-pops from 4000 feet (cloud ceiling) instead???"

Other times I have ridden the plane down:

New Jersey 100 way attempts, severe storm front coming in with 40 mph winds, lightning, the whole works. We thought we'd beat it. At 8000 feet, the DZO after getting the latest weather report, aborted and not more than 3 minutes after everyone deplaned and got back in the hangar, the storm hit with a fury.

Mississippi Mardi Gras boogie, 25 way on the verge of launching from the Casa with the light on red. Couldn't see DZ below. Did go around... red light again. Almost went... it was soooo tense... called it off and rode back down.

Waaay back when I had 100 jumps... My buddy's Static-Lining a student out of the C-182. He pops the pin on the door handle, whoop! Resulting deployment gets his canopy caught on the rear stabilizer for a couple seconds before sliding off. Pilot was actually a stand-in for our regular who was sick. He panicked. We rode with him back down to keep him calm. Upon inspection of the rear stabilizer, the tip had been bent back about 6 inches and there were tears in the metal at the fuselage. I shudder to think how close we came to getting the stabilizer ripped off with me in the back of the plane... :S
"Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban

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