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dninness

A successful demo jump tale..

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[This is long. If you're not interested, read something else. You've been forewarned. Now go get a cookie and a cup of joe and read on..]

About 2 weeks ago, I posted looking for a plane & pilot in Northern KY for a demo jump. Thanks to everybody who PM'd me on that. I'm writing this up as a cautionary tale to anybody who is considering doing a demo jump. If you're an experienced demo jumper, you'll probably read this nodding and saying "yep, uh huh.." to yourself. If you haven't done one, think hard about the preparation and factors that go into one.

I work with an Army cadet organization that purchased a former military school last year and is in the process of turning it into sort of a "hub" for training for all sorts of cadet organizations in the US. The 25th of April was the activation ceremony for the new training center as part of the 100th anniversary of the organization.

At the end of last year, when it was clear that we'd be doing this activation along with the 100th anniversary at the new facility, I spoke to our chief of staff about jumping the flag into the ceremony, and he was enthusiastic and gave me the go-ahead.

By way of a little background, I've been in the sport about 15 years, I have a little over 700 jumps and about 5-6 of those have been demo jumps. Nothing requiring a PRO rating, but some nice, low-pressure demos, Open Field & Level I, some bordering on Level II.

Starting out, I got a little photographic reconnaissance of the HQ facility from one of our officers, and we immediately determined that landing in the ceremony was out of the question. The ceremony area was in front of the HQ building, and would be surrounded by spectators, cadets in formation, wires, trees, other buildings and a gigantic flagpole. Yeah, no.

On the other side of the buildings, however, was a good sized football field. Perfect. Make a nice pass by the ceremony with the flag, land in the football field. That works for me.

I did a fair amount of research: terrain evaluations, historical wind direction & speeds, weather patterns, obstructions, outs, local Farmer McNastys, etc. As the HQ is nearly 1000 miles from home, the chances of me getting down to do a personal survey were slim, so I relied on one of our officers who had been to Air Assault School to give my DZ a good once over. He diagrammed the place out for me, and sent that along so I could include it for my request for a certificate of authorization.

In March, I filed for the Certificate of Authorization with the Louisville FSDO. The ops inspector I worked with there, Matthew, was very professional and helped us out a lot. It didn't hurt that the request I'd filed included a 2 page narrative of the jump operation, complete diagrams of the DZ and likely approach paths based on estimated winds for that time of year, etc. As he said (and I've heard this from other ops inspectors, too): "We usually get something that was scratched on the back of a napkin.."

At the same time, I started looking at building up a flag rig. I had a small 5 x 8 flag that I felt would be suitable for the demo. I wanted to "keep it simple, stupid." My first flag demo involved landing a Sabre 190 with a flag sewn into the bottom skin of the parachute dead center on a flight line for a graduation "pass-in-review" parade. What can be simpler than a flag like that, right? Unfortunately, I wouldn't have that rig available.

I did some research and didn't want to deal with the complexities of a "drop" flag with a weight and all that. I'd read about drag from the flag changing flight characteristics and such, and decided that it probably was going to take more practice to be familiar with it than I was going to be able to come up with early in the season here in New England.

After talking to my local rigger and a couple folks, I elected to build a simple rig that basically flew the flag directly behind me. Top of the hoist would be about shoulder level, and the bottom would be about 5 ft below, with a lanyard looped loosely over my boot. I had thought about somehow clipping the flag to a connector link on a riser, but I decided that in the event of an emergency, I'd want to be able to cut away and not be attached to the main in any way. (yeah, never mind going back into freefall with a 5x8 flag trailing behind you.. uh huh..)

So I jimmied up this simple flag rig with a cutaway and test jumped it a couple times to see how it worked. First time out, I couldn't get the bottom lanyard over my shoe and I didn't want to get the flag out of my jumpsuit until I was sure it was secured, so I landed with the flag still stowed. Failure! After some more fooling with the setup, I took it up again and this time, after connecting the top lanyard, I accidentally let the flag stream behind me and realized that the drag created by the flag was actually fairly manageable. I was able to get the lanyard over my shoe easily and I flew the whole thing down. Win! Did it a second time, just to validate some procedures, but I felt I had a fair chance at success with this. Hell, I actually felt comfortable with the whole operation. If only we had a plane....

We had set about looking for a plane & pilot earlier in the year, and I exhausted a number of my avenues early on with no avail. I always say with these demo jumps that the *hardest* part is the plane.

A member of the team putting together the activation ceremony knew a gent with a plane who might be willing to fly. So I emailed him and he was enthusiastic but guarded. He's an Air Force officer and an airshow pilot. Probably forgot more about risk assessment and risk management than I ever know. :) The reason for his guardedness became clear immediately: his aircraft was a Beech T-34 Mentor. Hmmm. Probably not the best jumpship I could find.

Now like most skydivers, I look at a plane and go "Yeah, I can get out of that!" (or at least, look at it and say "How would I get out of that?"). I'd never flown in a T-34, but I knew the basics. Probably not the best plane to use, certainly has a few hazards to mitigate, and I sure wouldn't want to use it again and again, but as a "one-off," opportunity, sure! He was amenable, but after he'd spoken to a friend who is a DZO near where he lives, he was a little less enthusiastic, so we went looking for other aircraft.

As I mentioned in my other post, we were trying to keep this "on the cheap," and it was a "proof of concept" for our budding demonstration parachute team idea. The HQ and training center renovations are really sucking the cash reserves of the organization, so anything we could do to keep the costs down for the jump, especially with all the costs surrounding the anniversary celebration & activation ceremony, was probably going to make our CO happy. We reached out to some of the nearby DZs and it was just going to be too darn expensive to ferry a plane in, etc. I felt uncomfortable asking a DZ to forgo a morning of tandem revenues for our gig and then asking for a price break, so we were still kind of stuck. (note: next time, we line the plane up first, and its just part of the cost of doing business. I'm done with the nickle & dime BS. No plane, no demo, no kidding.) By the first part of the week, we were still w/o a plane. Not fun.

Finally, I spoke with the original pilot again, and after talking over the risks, potential issues with the aircraft, how the whole thing would be executed, etc, he said "hey, lets give it a whirl." *whew* We're back on. My CO was excited (and he hardly *ever* gets excited). We got the NOTAM filed within the 72-48hr prior window and we all felt pretty good.

I arrived at the facility and checked over the DZ. What was not clear from some of my terrain analysis, or at least, was not entirely obvious, was that the football field was 60-80ft lower than the ceremony area. It was a huge hill down to the field. Bonus! I could screw up, go a little low on my flag pass, and still win. :) I briefed up the guys who would be my ground crew and then got a surprise: my girlfriend who is also a jumper had driven down with my buddy's wife for the gala ball the night before and to be my ground crew. Excellent, a jumper on the ground.

The conditions approaching the ceremony, however, were not pretty. The winds the day before had been above marginal. 15-20 mph gusting to 25-30. Ick. Definite no-jump.

I spoke with the pilot the night before and the forecast for the 25th was crap. Winds 15mph gusting to 30. (the whuffos on our staff were all saying "What? The weather is supposed to be clear and sunny tomorrow!" and then I'd say "Yeah, but the winds.." and they'd all go "uh, yeah, the color guards are not going to be happy.." Yeah, screw the color guards guys!)

That morning, I spoke to him again. Still marginal, but at 8am it was fine, forecast to get worse by noon. I reminded the pilot of one of my golden rules: "Screw the forecast. Get to the DZ and look up." We both agreed to meet at the local airpatch at 1000 for the 1115 ceremony and give it a shot. It was going to be marginal, but it could be marginal to the good side, too! I had good eyes on the DZ for wind direction & speed, and even had good backup visual signals visible from the plane. Holy crap, we're on! I hung up the phone and dashed for the latrine to take care of some pre-jump issues. :)

I consulted the available winds aloft, and quickly calculated the spot and figured out the jump run direction. Holy crap, at 3000 ft the predicted winds were 220 @ 42, and a shear at 2000 out of 230 at 30. Who am I kidding here? I figured for a little bit longer of a spot to accommodate the winds and cranked in a little fudge factor, too. My brain kept going back to the wind at 3000ft. 42. Crap! That's cross country winds! I don't want to wind up 3 miles downwind! I scribbled down the lat/long of my IP and spot and headed to the airport with my buddy's wife driving his Porsche 944. Sweet!

The pilot & his steed arrived at the nearby airport at 1000 in fine style: high speed down the runway centerline, landing lights alternating, smoke on. Pitch up into a tight overhead, hang the gear, off with the smoke, squeak it on the mains like he'd landed there hundreds of times before. What a ham!

We spent 20 minutes or so going over the airplane and the exit. The climbout didn't look too bad, and there was even a handle on the side of the plane. We briefed on timing, radio calls, the ground station at the DZ, configuration for jump run, airspeeds and emergency procedures. Winds at the airport 8 miles from the DZ were still under 15 kts with occasional short gusts above that, but not badly so. Very jumpable. We tried to put the GPS coordinates in for the IP and the spot, but I'd scribbled down degrees, minutes, seconds coordinates, and his GPS was in degrees, minutes and decimal minutes. Grrr. No worries, the Mark I, Mod 0 eyeball will do just fine.

During the practice climbouts, the pilot hit me with a humble request: "Do you think you could close the canopy and lock it from outside?" He's limited to 130kts with the canopy open, and he was going to fly straight home after kicking me out, so if I couldn't close it, he'd have to return to our departure point, land, close the canopy and then take off again for home. I practiced that a couple times and agreed that I thought it could be done.

At the appointed time, we hopped in the plane, tightened the straps, cranked and taxied for the end of the runway. The pre-jump jitters hit me at that point. I wasn't able to fully enjoy my first flight in a tandem-cockpit airplane because I was pretty amped up about not screwing up the jump.

(mind you, the exit wasn't worrying me, but every-friggin-body was an expert. Once they knew what kind of plane, they all said "Oh, is he just going to fly upside down and you fall out?" Due to any number of factors, including being witness to a fatality a number of years ago where the jumper did not cleanly exit a bi-plane flying inverted, there was absolutely no way that kind of exit was even in my head. Zero.)

Once airborne, we started talking to Indy Center, LEX tower, and ground. We made the necessary radio calls (a little late due to frequency changes) and finally it was time to get established on the jump run. We turned in for our pre-established initial point, a large water town just downwind of the DZ.

As the aircraft slowed to under 100kts, I slid the canopy back and hung my head out for a look. Wow, the slipstream on this plane is tremendous. We were still way short of the IP and missing our timing mark by a little bit. Oh well, they're gonna have to wait. :) Finally, I saw the water tower, then the DZ with the visual markers laid out on the field. Man, there are some people down there, I need to make this look good. In the immortal words of Alan Shepard: "Please god, don't let me f**k up."

I consulted the airspeed indicator. 80 kts. The plane lurched a little and I saw the gear indicators go to barber-pole, the green. Ah, yeah, a little more drag, just like we briefed. Behind the flap, I saw the first part of my spot. Time to get out.

I stood up in the cockpit and was greeted by a 75 kt slipstream augmented by the prop blast. Darn it, I forgot to brief on the need for a cut. An experienced jump pilot would have done that automatically, but I neglected this bit of info. None of the hand holds I'd practiced on the ground worked with the relative wind trying to strip me off the plane. I even wound up pushing on the aft canopy frame, which we'd decided was a bad idea, but it was the only way to get 'forward' enough in the cockpit opening to get out.

I got my leg over the side, Pappy Boyington-style, and marveled at just how damn much wind their was. I was reasonable sure that I wasn't going to be able to hang on well. My brain said "Get small, bonehead" so I did and found myself outside on the wing walkway, holding on for dear life. I reached up, grabbed the canopy handle and slid the canopy shut. Had to try twice to secure the handle, but the 2nd time was the charm. I leaned back, looked over the trailing edge of the flap. There's my spot. I'm a little long. That's fine. I turned back to the pilot, flashed him a thumbs up, let go of the handle and relaxed against the relative wind.

Hey, look, that's the bottom of a T-34 with the gear extended. Neato! Stop gaping like a tourist and pull, idiot.

The canopy, my girlfriend's Safire I 209, took its darn sweet time about getting open. Finally, the slider the size of Luigi Cani's main slid down to meet me. Quick altimeter glance. 3300 ft. Little lower than I expected. Riser tug to get into the wind while I dink with the flag. No need to wind up downwind 'cuz I'm not paying attention.

The flag deployed with no hitches and the lanyard went on the boot with the first try. I stowed the slider and unstowed my brakes. 2800. Nice. Look straight down. I'm penetrating into the wind just fine. 42 knots @ 3000ft, my ass. I own this one.

Following the old "half-way down, half-way back" guidance, I set myself up a little closer to the campus and the crowd. I'm looking to cross my windline at just below 1000ft to start my approach. I hit it nearly exactly, and I turn on my downwind, the most visual part of the demo, at around 750 ft, just outside of the crowd area. People are waving and I think I hear the crowd cheering. Not sure, maybe its just in my head. :)

As I pass over the gym building, I realize that I wanted to pass on the upwind side of the HQ building and ceremony, not the downwind side. Whoops, lets hope my inattention doesn't screw me for landing

Ceremony behind me, its time to land this mother. I'm turned toward the target now, crabbing hard, looking at the treeline below me with the power lines alongside. Oh, come on, you can't pull off a demo like this just to eat it in the power lines. There is a fenced ball diamond that's my pre-briefed out on this side, I can make that easy, if I decide now. I elect to crab a little harder and land on the field. Frickin' hero. That wind is really cooking down here and I'm going more down than forward. The power lines are getting bigger in the field of view, not sliding behind me. Too low to go for the ball diamond now, I'm committed to this little area just short of the goal post on the football field. A quick check down shows the powerlines have stopped getting bigger and have started moving behind me. *whew* Mind that stupid soccer goal post now, and put this thing down.

I'm vaguely aware of a couple spectators outside my landing area, and my girlfriend is on a dead run toward me to grab the flag. I flare hard a little late and slide in, happy to be down and not busted up about 30 yards short of my intended target. Grrr, no PRO rating with accuracy like that!

"Whoo hooo!" I shout, as I scoop the flag off the ground (sorry, Old Glory, but it happens. Can't always land right on your catchers). Off comes the rig, and my other buddy's wife is there with a big cup of water and my beret. I bolt up the hill past a photographer from the local paper to make it to the ceremony. As I landed, a cavalry trooper rode with a flag (not mine) up from the field to the awaiting ceremony, and then took that flag to the waiting color guard to raise it over the installation.

Unfortunately, I made it to about 25 yards short of the ceremony when the cannon went off and the national anthem started to play. Oh well, next time.

Overall a highly successful demo and a rather excited and impressed commanding general along with the entire town of Millersburg, KY.

Lessons learned?
Get the plane first.
Pay attention on downwind.
Get the command to cough for the plane.
Find a more normal "flag rig."

:)

Thanks again to the folks who PM'd me with airplane help.

(Attached is a photo from Janine Jordan shooting for the Bourbon County Citizen. I'm just about to land.)

or http://photos-h.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs035.snc1/3277_72663107827_653742827_1827935_1583642_n.jpg
NIN
D-19617, AFF-I '19

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thank you for not making a tuba fly in the sky..actually, that would be funny to see again =D. btw i didnt read your long post, but i did look at your picture.



No kidding. I was glad there wasn't a band!
NIN
D-19617, AFF-I '19

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I read the whole thing a couple days ago, just didn't feel like posting.

Sounds fun! Good story, too. I'm glad it worked out well, even if it wasn't perfect. I loved how you mentioned forgetting to brief "the cut."

Congratulations!
Brian

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