AFF 4 : Very humbling experience.

[Chubba 0]

Well today I jumped my AFF4, it had been 1 month exactly since AFF3.

All I can say is, HOLY SHIT, I have a newfound respect for skydiving.



Here's how it went down, it was a Cessna 182 exit, linked at the shoulder. On my way out, my rig hit the door (didn't know that till debrief) and viola, upside down
I go to look at my altimeter and then suddenly, BAM! I start to spin like a rocket (no exaggeration), my AFFI grabs me instantly before I can do 1 rotation. Stables me and releases again... ok, feels good... look at my altimeter, start to turn left a little then I correct it.

4000ft I wave off, I go to reach my pilot chute and I start turning... this is made worse by the fact that I fumbled (something I never did on AFF 1 - 3). The chute opens and OUCHHHHHHH! My right shoulder, extreme pain. I then look up at my canopy and it looks strange... to be honest, I didn't know what was going on and at one point thought I had both my main and reserve out (I know, stupid, but adrenaline does stupid things). After I calmed down I realised the left end cells were closed, grab my toggles and pump... no problem. I fly directly back to the DZ from 3000ft in a straight line and come into a perfect tip toe landing.

Right now, I'm not to sure about my shoulder, it is damaged to the point where I'm still feeling it now but probably it will heal in under a week... just makes me wonder, if I had a harder opening it could have broken/dislocated.

My AFF1 - 3 went perfect, beyond perfect... I didn't even have any fear, I felt unstoppable like I was going to cruise through AFF flawlessly like some sort of prodigy skydiver. I didn't give ONE thought to injuries of any sort (whether openings, landings, in the plane, in the sky) or any of the problems that could of arised.

So after this experience I have come away with these points.

1. Skydiving IS dangerous
2. Skydiving IS hard
3. I am a complete noob that knows practically nothing

[calledisrael 0]

get your shoulder looked at. just to be safe.

i injured mine once jumping and didn't think it could be that bad, it was better in a few days. what had been one dislocation became 3, and it got worse, not better. be safe and get it checked out, for your skydiving future.

just saying...

life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all.
(helen keller)

[jtval 0]

Well, At least you lived to learn the lesson.

One day I'll tell you about my AFF7.

one thing you need to do is be sure that your shoulder isn't F'd BEFORE you jump again.

I won't get into all the things you could have done to correct the freefall. I'm positive your instructor did that.

ok, maybe today is the day...
I quick summary of My AFF7
It had been 3 weeks I had lived in Ga but I was on vaca to NY. when I came home I drove to FLa to do my "graduation jump"

YEA, RIGHT!!!
In the video, the instr. and vidiot were talking me up about how well I did up to this level. So I made a cocky statement about confidence. I was in gest but it looks totally stupid now that I F'd the jump. LOL



I exit. Lots of clouds. we had a hole but I couldnt see my usual heading point.
I basically turned CCW the whole jump. I didnt know how to get a heading (using ONE cloud would have made sense) so I decided to try to do my backflip while spinning. DUMMY!

So, Now I'm on my back I pull my arm in and get back to my belly. the whole time My Instr is just a few feet away.

I even give him a "hold one I'll get this" hand motion.
it was probably around 8 or 8.5k feet that I started a faster spin. (i was tryin gto counteract but I instead made it worse by doing the exact opposite of what I should have.)

the Inst grabs me I start to flip over. He LITERALLY shakes me out like a carpet to get me on my belly and I see 6k ft on my alti.

I figured it would be ok to pull a little high so I wave off and dump.

The Canopy ride went well.So I redid my Graduation jump the following weekend and had no issues.
but, It was stupidity and probably over confidence that made me F up.


I've been a lot safer since that jump though.

My photos

My Videos

[blackout 0]

I went through AFF what in a fashion that I thought was excellent cept for the barrel rolls. I was a bit of a flailer on exit but have since gotten better.

Just stick with it, it only gets better.

[pontiacgtp00 0]

I was wondering about the difficulty of AFF compared to static line, since I am a static line student. It seems like the first few AFF jumps are easy for the student, but when they go to jump solo for the first time there is some difficulty. I've never had any problems with spinning, but some of the other S/L students at my home dz are having big trouble with it.

I think my biggest area of difficulty came from the hanging exit out of the c182. For the first couple jumps (IAD) I was having a tendency to push off the strut, putting me on my back. Even now I'm shaky coming off the strut. Then I learned the superman exit and its easier than the hanging exit in my opinion.

[aresye 0]

Part of the problem is definitely the spacing between your AFF3 and 4 jumps. I almost had a month break between my level 6 and level 7, and when I did my L7, I was almost as bad as when I started. Flat arch, legs out and tense. Easily corrected on my L8, which was actually the jump where everything clicked.

Spend some time practicing your arch. I would always make sure I had it down before I went up. During the actual skydive, relax. I find when I tense up, that's when my muscles tense up, and that's when I'm not stable. I've never gotten into a spin, but I do rock back and forth when I'm unstable.

So if you feel yourself getting into a spin again, instead of freaking out and tensing up, just relax your entire body and let your pelvis sag down. I've always recovered to a perfect, stable arch when I do this.

Now, I'm not an instructor, far from it. I thought I'd share what worked for me, since I just graduated from my student program and most of my problems and solutions are still fresh in my head.

Good luck on the rest of your training! I'm sure you'll do fine.

Skydiving: You either learn from other's mistakes, or they'll learn from yours.

[Chubba 0]

Quote

Part of the problem is definitely the spacing between your AFF3 and 4 jumps. I almost had a month break between my level 6 and level 7, and when I did my L7, I was almost as bad as when I started. Flat arch, legs out and tense. Easily corrected on my L8, which was actually the jump where everything clicked.

Definetely, I took the month off on purpose to save up the money for 4 - 9, I was planning on doing 3 dives today and 3 dives in a weeks time.

My masterplan failed me obviously :) Here's hoping my shoulder is good in a few days so I can head back. It's pretty much better now in the joint, pain free.. it's just the front deltoid/pec muscle is MASSIVELY bruised.

If my instructor wasn't such a cainer I doubt I would have come back after this dive... catching my spin in probably less then 0.5 second gives me great confidence in his abilities.

[minmal 0]

well i had a wild aff course was awesome and will be working on my a soon

aff 1 loved it exit was great felt good all the way down.

till i opened my chute and found out i had line twists
fixed that up easy enough (still got me going nicely) ps i didnt get put in the harness like i was meant to but i did before my second jump.

aff 2 awesome jump loved my delta wow what a feeling
all went perfect till i opened my chute

end cell closure just one end no biggie i flared and it popped open then as i did my second flare both 8 and 9 close up on me and i started to spin abit flared again and all good :) landed on my bum happy as

aff 3 best jump so far all went well chute even opened up like it was meant to woot it can happen on landing i was blown back wards abit by a gust but land fine even on my feet

aff 4 all good np sweet did it all right and loved it

aff 5 same again went off with out a hitch

aff 6 still good even did a cross wind landing and landed on run way

aff 7 cant believe it and loving it

aff 8 well this is where i learned about down wind landing trust me hit the shed into wind better then landing down wind :)

aff 9 nothing like a hop and pop till you find out that your wrist isn't all that good after a down wind landing 2 hours before and land off drop zone in a steel yard still stuck it and landed with out hurting my self

but found out i had dislocated my wrist and compressed a bone in my hand

havent jumped since took 5 weeks for my hand to get better and just havent had time (right weather time) to jump yet

laters

[ryan_d_sucks 0]

Quote

I was wondering about the difficulty of AFF compared to static line, since I am a static line student. It seems like the first few AFF jumps are easy for the student, but when they go to jump solo for the first time there is some difficulty. I've never had any problems with spinning, but some of the other S/L students at my home dz are having big trouble with it.

I think my biggest area of difficulty came from the hanging exit out of the c182. For the first couple jumps (IAD) I was having a tendency to push off the strut, putting me on my back. Even now I'm shaky coming off the strut. Then I learned the superman exit and its easier than the hanging exit in my opinion.

Just out of curiosity- where are you at now in your progression? I did not have any spinning issues either, until I started hitting terminal + a few seconds. Nothing serious, but still some spinning that needed to be ironed out with more jumps. So are you still on delays, or are you jumping from 'up top?'

[pontiacgtp00 0]

I'm at full altitude now 11.5k, the past 3 jumps I made have been from full altitude.

[Chubba 0]

Well I went to the doctor this morning, he thinks it's purely muscle with maybe a bit of connective tissue damage... should heal in a few days... it is bruised as hell.

Hurt this morning, massive pain, worse then yesterday... but right now (12 hours later) I'm not even noticing it.

/fingers crossed, I might be back to the DZ for AFF 5 in a week. Thanks for all the replies, this is my first "proper" post on DZ and I'm happy people are accepting even though I'm a noob.