Wow, we had a really safe year

[peek 20]

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2011 - 25, as far as my records indicate.

Could you look at my list above (in post #5, I believe) and let me know what additional one I overlooked?

My list included Ted Strong, which would probably be considered a military related death. For purposes of this thread I guess we should not include it.

[ianmdrennan 2]

Not sure why you're shaking your head. I don't see anyone saying that we need not improve on the statistics.

Every single year we should strive for a 0 fatality year. Although we do have to be realistic. It's extremely unlikely we will EVER have that - no matter how hard we try. To me, the important part is to keep trying, keep bettering ourselves, and keep passing knowledge along.

Ian

Performance Designs Factory Team

[obelixtim 100]

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Not sure why you're shaking your head.

350 people died since 1998 in the US alone.

I'm shaking my head at the simple waste of life, and then someone comes along, and says we had a really safe year.....

Yeah......right.......

My computer beat me at chess, It was no match for me at kickboxing....

[virgin-burner 1]

as usual, every other thread on dorkzone turns into a bickering on one or several posters; as was noted in another forum, that has a lot to do with the moderators and how they do their job. some even engage in said bickering. i dont mean you, ian.

“Some may never live, but the crazy never die.”
-Hunter S. Thompson
"No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try."
-Yoda

[popsjumper 2]

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Agreed that numbers can be played with to suit the study...

Yep. People can play with numbers all they want and come up the conclusions that make them seem like they know what they are talking about.

For deaths in our sport it's nothing more than a meaningless exercise in egoism.

The only number that matters is 24. Kinda hard to twist one number isn't it, gang?

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

[wmw999 2,116]

Folks, statistics are used, in part. so that one can discuss death without getting to individual personalities. Because if you try to legislate to prevent every single death in skydiving (or driving, or walking down stairs), then it will get impossible to engage in these activities.

By addressing causal factors dispassionately, and by identifying the ones with the greatest impact-hassle factor, some steps can be made toward reducing deaths.

But we cannot reduce them to zero. If nothing else, people will keep having heart attacks in the air.

You can't remove the individual people from death in skydiving, and you shouldn't. But there are times when it's more productive to think of these individuals as cogs in a machine, and try to identify how to improve the function of the machine.

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[5.samadhi 0]

great post wendy

[MikeJD 0]

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350 people died since 1998 in the US alone.

I'm shaking my head at the simple waste of life, and then someone comes along, and says we had a really safe year.....

Yeah......right.......

I'm going to stick my neck out and say: we're talking about jumping out of aeroplanes here. Given that, I think 350 is a pretty small number.

If you want to talk about a simple waste of life, look at the numer of people who are killed doing something as banal as crossing the street. There were around 120,000 pedestrian fatalities in the US over the same period. Of course I wouldn't be so foolish as to try and compare those two statistics directly - there's no doubt that skydiving is the more dangerous activity - it's just that people talk as though the jumper fatalities are less acceptable, in spite of the fact that to some degree we're deliberately putting ourselves in harm's way.

This is not to say we shouldn't be working to get the number of skydiving deaths as close to zero as possible - of course we should. But given the privilege of what we do, frankly I'm grateful that the current odds of survival are anywhere near as good as they are.

[airtwardo 6]

But there are times when it's more productive to think of these individuals as cogs in a machine, and try to identify how to improve the function of the machine.

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I agree to an extent Wendy...however~


Over Christmas we went to Rome, it was a week long 'lay-over' so we had Xmas dinner with the rest of the crew. During drinks afterwards the Co Pilot was intrigued upon finding out I'm a Skydiver and was asking just about every question in the book.

One comment kinda hit me hard when after explaining to him how the 'average' number of fatalities nationwide, in comparison to the number of jumps bla bla bla etc...

He asked me how many of the fatalities this past year I 'knew' personally...

Six...the number is six.

Six people that I, on some level 'knew' -lost their lives- doing something I love to do.

That 'revelation' if you will, really got me thinking about them and us and what we do and why...

It's not going to stop me from jumping, but thinking of them as 'friends' and the loss/hardships caused by 'our sport' will I believe make me even a bit more cautious and aware of the choices & decisions regarding my participation.

It didn't analyze it on a 'personal' level thinking of these fatalities as just numbers...it was a real wake up call to see them in my minds eye as friends, as 'family' so to speak...we kinda need to remember that during these discussions ~ ...each of us do.

~ If you choke a Smurf, what color does it turn? ~

[rrmtopo 1]

Good posts by both Wendy & Airtwardo. Tragic as the loss of our friends will always be, lets not let their deaths be in vain. I personally would like to see better annual breakdowns by fatality type (I did not see this on the USPA website); I'm new back to the sport after a lengthy layoff but being able to see the annual trends of what are killing us should be a good indicator for jumpers to focus continued training.

Maybe "sticky" in the incidents forum would be a good place to post these data.

[wmw999 2,116]

True dat. I´ve been extraordinarily lucky, in that the number of close friends who have died is small, although definitely not zero.

One of the most important jobs in skydiving is post-accident investigation. It takes someone who can both think of the person as a real human being, who was probably terrified in the last few seconds of their life, but who can also think of the errors and other conditions dispassionately, looking for them, and aligning them with other incidents and fatalities.

Because it´s our friends´ skydiving legacy. Because of Dave O I never wanted a belly-band throwout. Because of Kathy H I focus far more on other jumpers when tracking, rather than on where I am on the ground and whether I should dump high to make it back. Etc.

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[DaVinciflies 0]

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There were around 120,000 pedestrian fatalities in the US over the same period. Of course I wouldn't be so foolish as to try and compare those two statistics directly - there's no doubt that skydiving is the more dangerous activity - it's just that people talk as though the jumper fatalities are less acceptable, in spite of the fact that to some degree we're deliberately putting ourselves in harm's way.

I would say that skydiving fatalities are more "acceptable" than pedestrian fatalities because we all choose to participate in what we know to be a risky activity. Most people have no option but to cross the road many times each year.

Of course, I am not saying that we shouldn't try to reduce our fatalities, but equally we should not be surprised when they happen. We got less than 24 hours into 2012 before we lost our first.

In terms of how safe a year it was, I think deaths per 100,000 jumps is really the best measure. Absolute numbers like 24 deaths are really not that useful in terms of calculating safety/danger on a like-for-like basis.

[DBlank 0]

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I personally would like to see better annual breakdowns by fatality type (I did not see this on the USPA website); I'm new back to the sport after a lengthy layoff but being able to see the annual trends of what are killing us should be a good indicator for jumpers to focus continued training.

Maybe "sticky" in the incidents forum would be a good place to post these data.

I think this will show up in one of the next few issues of Parachutist, the safety day issue maybe? If i recall that's when they normally have the report?

"Do you really want to take advice from the guy we call Tarmac?"

[spikes2020 0]

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He asked me how many of the fatalities this past year I 'knew' personally...

Six...the number is six.

Six people that I, on some level 'knew' -lost their lives- doing something I love to do.

I know this isn't 100% the same but i know 10 to 15 people that have died in car crash, not this year but over 10 years.... and i dont love driving

Cheers

Jon W

[airtwardo 6]

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He asked me how many of the fatalities this past year I 'knew' personally...

Six...the number is six.

Six people that I, on some level 'knew' -lost their lives- doing something I love to do.

I know this isn't 100% the same but i know 10 to 15 people that have died in car crash, not this year but over 10 years.... and i don't love driving

Well you & I probably 'know' at least 10 times more people that drive than skydive, so imagine that 60 people you KNOW, are now -DEAD- because of driving in the last 12 months...wouldn't THAT make you be a at least a bit more cautious and aware behind the wheel?

You're right, yes everybody dies doing 'something'...but to me anyway ~

it's not really the 'same' at all.

~ If you choke a Smurf, what color does it turn? ~

[Rick 67]

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True dat. I´ve been extraordinarily lucky, in that the number of close friends who have died is small, although definitely not zero.

One of the most important jobs in skydiving is post-accident investigation. It takes someone who can both think of the person as a real human being, who was probably terrified in the last few seconds of their life, but who can also think of the errors and other conditions dispassionately, looking for them, and aligning them with other incidents and fatalities.

Because it´s our friends´ skydiving legacy. Because of Dave O I never wanted a belly-band throwout. Because of Kathy H I focus far more on other jumpers when tracking, rather than on where I am on the ground and whether I should dump high to make it back. Etc.

Wendy P.

I think looking at it this way kind of honors our friends. If we can look at why they died and try to lessen the chances of it happening again maybe we can find some kind of comfort or... I'm not sure of the word i am looking for here. Just that maybe there can be something positive from our loss.

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

[jrjny 0]

What's the year by year # if we don't count swoopers. They could have avoided death by not swooping. Practically speaking - they create needless uncontrolled risk that distorts the trend.

[NWFlyer 2]

What's the year by year # if we don't count swoopers skydivers. They could have avoided death by not swooping skydiving. Practically speaking - they create needless uncontrolled risk that distorts the trend.

You'd be surprised at how many whuffos would make a similar statement to yours, with a few substitutions.

"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

[airtwardo 6]

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What's the year by year # if we don't count swoopers skydivers. They could have avoided death by not swooping skydiving. Practically speaking - they create needless uncontrolled risk that distorts the trend.

You'd be surprised at how many whuffos would make a similar statement to yours, with a few substitutions.

You beat me to it...

Swooper are Skydivers too!

~ If you choke a Smurf, what color does it turn? ~

[jrjny 0]

No I disagree - you're treating it like a SAT logic game but it's really not.

We are segmenting fatalities out by whether our not an element of additional uncontrolled risk was introduced at some point during the dive.

If you hold constant the routine risks such as slow and high speed mals + dealing with them in addition to the plane crashing, collisions on straight in approaches, low pulls, etc...has anything changed?

I understand one is a subset of the other I'm just reframing the argument along the cleanest lines possible. If you want to be cute you can add janitors, investment bankers, astronauts and fat bakery men to the word substitution game being played, maybe the bon fire is a good place to post?

Jeff

[DaVinciflies 0]

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We are segmenting fatalities out by whether our not an element of additional uncontrolled risk was introduced at some point during the dive.

Who said we're segmenting it like that?

And if we are, what about people who don't leave enough exit separation, pull at an altitude different than the one specified, track poorly, track in the wrong direction, backslide up jump run as they learn to sitfly etc, etc, etc

All of those are situations where "an element of additional uncontrolled risk was introduced at some point during the dive" and you haven't allowed for those. At least the swooper is planning to swoop. Those others are unintentional.

[obelixtim 100]

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I would say that skydiving fatalities are more "acceptable" than pedestrian fatalities because we all choose to participate in what we know to be a risky activity. Most people have no option but to cross the road many times each year.

I can accept the inherent risk we take flinging ourselves out of an aeroplane, and then opening a main parachute or reserve (if necessary) to cheat the reaper.

I find it a bit more difficult to accept someone saving their life by opening a parachute correctly, only to die under that good canopy on touchdown.

Its not really necessary, is it.?

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My computer beat me at chess, It was no match for me at kickboxing....

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[jrjny 0]

When someone is landing can you tell they were backsliding while doing a bad sitfly?

When someone is landing can you tell they were swooping/attempting to swoop?

Jeff

[ianmdrennan 2]

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Its not really necessary, is it.?

Nope, skydiving isn't. That said, we all do it because it brings something to our lives. Something we can't explain to others who haven't tried it. Yet, the outside looks at us like a bunch of nut jobs in the "Who would want to do that" category.

It's sad that, even WITHIN the sport we all so dearly love, our own kind display the same types of attitudes to each others respective disciplines - along with the same lack of understanding the outside world gives our community as a whole.

Blues,
Ian

Performance Designs Factory Team

[DaVinciflies 0]

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When someone is landing can you tell they were backsliding while doing a bad sitfly?

Are you drunk? What does any of that have to do with the prevalence of fatalities in a given year?

This is not a discussion of landing fatalities, but of all skydiving fatalities in the US in 2011 and how it compares to other years.

I think I am done responding to you.