will a canon ball position get you out of a flat spin

[minmal 0]

will a canon ball position get you out of a flat spin

canon ball = legs pulled up to your chest so you are like a ball yes a fetal position would be the same thing ty

[jimmytavino 16]

....
Talk to your instructors , about how to AVOID a flat spin in the first place.....
and how to stop one,,, should you encounter it.....


jmy

[Airgump 1]

You will most likely stop the spin and increase fall rate and swap the spin for a tumble. My AFF instructor out in Perris used the "canon ball exit" as an easy unstable exit from the AC.

Try using a slight delta (track) to stop your spin. This way your fall rates does not drastically increase.

Had the spin problem when my instructor had me make my first floating exit. Went in to a vicious flat spin straight away from the AC. At the cost of failing a lesson, another instructor taught me how to throw a little delta influence in there for just a second or two. Remember arch, and to check your arms and do some toe taps to trim up your body, something had to make you spin in the first place.

blue ones,
gump

[wmw999 2,146]

Cannon ball exits are fun.

That said, yes, talk to your instructor about getting out of a flat spin. Video can really help you see why you're getting into one in the first place. And you're thinking right about the fact that if you really can't control your spin, a radical change in position might just do the trick.

Wendy W.

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)

[JENNR8R 0]

I'm not sure what your definition of a 'flat spin' is as a student, but I went into one on a wingsuit jump one time. I had read that if I went into a 'fetal' position, I would get out of it. It worked like a charm. When I opened up my wings again, I could continue the skydive as if nothing had ever happened.

When I would start spinning as a student, all I did to get out of it was to drop a knee.

What do you call a beautiful, sunny day that comes after two cloudy, rainy
ones? -- Monday.

[divnswoop 0]

Talk to your instructors....

For those of you offering advice who are not coaches or AFF-I's.....

There was a trouble student at our DZ who had done 5 level fives before he got turned over to me.... He couldn't control his turns and couldn't figure out why. After a long ground prep and watching him I figured out that he was dropping a knee on his turn. I asked why and he said that he learned it from 2 guys at the bonfire one night(who had 70 and 150 jumps) This poor kid payed out his ass cause of someone who "thought" they were helping by teaching him centerpoint turns......

....And watching a student go into a cannonball on level 4 would be great.....

[JENNR8R 0]

Talk to your instructors....

For those of you offering advice who are not coaches or AFF-I's.....

Quote

I no longer have instructors, and I'm not offering advice. I'm posting what my personal experience was.
p.s. The subject is flat spins, not centerpoint turns.

What do you call a beautiful, sunny day that comes after two cloudy, rainy
ones? -- Monday.

[BIGUN 1,069]

Quote

For those of you offering advice who are not coaches or AFF-I's

And even C's or I's reading these types of questions should only offer the advice of talking directly wiith their Instructors.

Nobody has time to listen; because they're desperately chasing the need of being heard.

[diablopilot 2]

At your stage in the game it will cause more trouble than good. While it may stop the spin, you'll now be tumbling and loosing altitude at a greater rate, plus there is no guarantee that you won't just re-enter a spin when you flip back to your belly.

The lesson that you're supposed to be learning is how to control your heading.

Some tips.

You need to be able to recognise a turn before it starts so keep your attention out on the horizon. You don't need to pick a specific point like a house or tree, but know when you're starting to turn away from "west" for example. Stopping a turn before it gets too big helps alot, so therefore recognition is key.

When you see that you're beginning to turn away from your heading, turn back to it. Dip your elbow closer to that heading. Make sure you're not tensing up the rest of your body, that's where your spin starts.

If you start spinning, stop trying so hard to fix it. Fix one thing at a time. ARCH first. Then wait a moment. Breathe.

If you arch, and you're doing it properly, the spin should slow to just a turn since your body is symmetrical.

And talk with YOUR instructors. Do not take advice from the internet and implement it without discussing it with them first. They can only assist and teach you if they know what you're up to.

----------------------------------------------
You're not as good as you think you are. Seriously.

[Andrewwhyte 1]

No one has a perfectly symmetrical body position. The reason we don't all spin is because the friction from the air dampens out the imperfections. When students get into a flat spin they tend to stiffen up as they try to correct it. This tends to make matters worse as the rigidity just increases the effect of whatever is causing the spin in the first place.
If you have a persistent flat spin remember this: you can still see your altimeter and you can still reach your handles. Now take a deep breath and as you exhale relax. This may not stop the spin but will almost always slow it down. From there you can work on countering the spin.

[Fast 0]

Quote

You will most likely stop the spin and increase fall rate and swap the spin for a tumble. My AFF instructor out in Perris used the "canon ball exit" as an easy unstable exit from the AC.

Try using a slight delta (track) to stop your spin. This way your fall rates does not drastically increase.

Had the spin problem when my instructor had me make my first floating exit. Went in to a vicious flat spin straight away from the AC. At the cost of failing a lesson, another instructor taught me how to throw a little delta influence in there for just a second or two. Remember arch, and to check your arms and do some toe taps to trim up your body, something had to make you spin in the first place.

blue ones,
gump

Thanks, not exactly great advice here! Mostly because you could be screwing some poor AFF-I who has to work with this person. Not that I would imagine them being unable to deal with the situation, but it sucks to make life harder for someone! Please be careful about what advice you give to a student, especially if you are not an instructor!

~D
Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me.
Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

[billvon 2,426]

> will a canon ball position get you out of a flat spin

In most cases, yes. However, that is not the best way to get out of a flat spin. Learning to not start one, and then learning to stop one (which is the same skill you need to turn your body) is much more important. As always, talk to your instructors about how to do that before you try something like a "cannonball."

[The111 0]

Quote

No one has a perfectly symmetrical body position. The reason we don't all spin is because the friction from the air dampens out the imperfections.

A bit off-topic, but I don't think it's air friction that stops us from turning when we hold a heading. You are right that nobody can be perfectly symmetric, but you don't have to be perfectly symmetric to hold a heading, you just need to be in such a state that the sum (resultant) of all of your heading inputs is zero. This is basically like a static physics problem. If you are putting out more "right turn input" than "left turn input"... you'll turn right. If the inputs are even, you'll hold a heading... even if you're not perfectly symmetric (the inputs come from multiple places). Notice that it's a dynamic process too, you have to continue to keep your inputs balanced through the whole skydive (or at least as long as you want to maintain heading), since nobody can hold perfectly still, anymore than they can be perfectly symmetric.

Air friction may make it easier to balance out these heading inputs, too. But air friction is where we get the inputs from in the first place, so it's sort of a circular logic.

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[Programmer 0]

I agree. It's kind of like balancing on a unicycle. Even though the platform is inherently unstable, it is kept stable by constant small inputs. Some modern, fly-by-wire jet fighters use the same principle. Without constant computer input, they will go unstable in an instant. Skydivers learn "muscle memory" so they don't have to think "I'm turning right, I need more left turn input." They make the small corrections without conscious thought - at least, if they are relaxed in freefall. That's why some of the posters here have said that stability is easy. It really is if you don't over-think it.
Now back to the original question. A cannonball would stop a flat spin by turning it into something else, but then what are you going to do? I hope you are only asking this out of curiosity and not as a survival strategy. Your instructors will help you learn to stop a spin and get stable, and I feel sure the word "arch" will be part of the conversation.