Teaching Flat Turns

[tombuch 0]

Please forgive me as I ramble a bit about some important teaching topics related to low turns. There was a fatality at The Ranch involving an IAF student who made a low turn, possibly to avoid landing on a runway. (See: http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=1316358;sb=post_latest_reply;so=ASC;forum_view=forum_view_collapsed;;page=unread#unread ) I have no direct knowledge of the accident mentioned in this thread, and these suggestions are NOT specific to the training the student received, but are a general package of training topics useful to all instructors in every skydiving program. It would be super cool if every drop zone took a brief time-out on Saturday morning to discuss these topics, or selected topics of your own related to landing training.


Point1 Research regarding emergency response suggests that humans facing stress frequently experience a period of “psychological block” or “freight paralysis” in which they are unable to access conventionally learned responses. Our brain has an important means of storing and retrieving stress responses that places these behaviors in a rapid recall area. A student who learns a specific response while stressed, will first draw on that knowledge when facing a similar stress experience. Thus, when we are under stress, knowledge learned or practiced while actually under stress will be more accessible than knowledge learned in a classroom environment. If we think of a students first few tandem jumps, the student will generally be significantly stressed, and steep turns near the ground will be placed in the stress-accessible part of the brain. When a jumper is facing a landing stress point later in his jumping career, “psychological block” may prevent access to his ground training about not making low turns, but if he made low turns on a prior tandem jump, his stress response will recall that experience. Suggestion: If you are training students with tandem jumps, avoid low turns and spirals near the ground.

Point 2 Students learn a great deal by “doing,” but they also learn through “observation.” Consider that a student who has made 15 jumps will have actually performed a landing 15 times, but will probably have observed (and learned from) hundreds of other jumps. When students watch us land, they absorb our behavior. If we make low spirals or fail to fly a pattern, our students will observe and learn that behavior. Of course experienced jumpers apart from the school program will sometimes make low “performance” turns, and students should know the difference between these “hook” turns and conventional landing techniques as soon as they begin observations near the landing area. Suggestion: All instructors (especially tandems) should model consistent landing patterns and avoid low turns or spirals near the ground. We should try to make observed training consistent with classroom and practical training.

Point 3 Students need critical information available to them in their short term memory. We are generally very good about quickly briefing emergency procedures and handle touches prior to boarding the airplane and prior to exit, but many instructors fail to brief low turn and flat turn issues prior to each jump. Most of our injuries and fatalities are the result of low turns, so this information should be stressed. Suggestion: Every instructor should make it a point to discuss low turns and flat turns with every student, prior to every jump. Placing this knowledge in short term memory will aid recall, and repeating the information on every jump will assure the students understand it is important

Point 4 Students learn best through repetition. The BIC and Coach material suggests a student should practice a skill a minimum of 25 times in order to make it permanent. Flat turns are a critical life skill that should be practiced on just about every jump. The more exposure to the skill, the better the recall and application of the skill will be. Suggestion: Students should practice flat turns at some point on every jump, and should do flat turns with an instructor on every tandem, including first tandem jumps. Make flat turns part of your training package on every skydive.

Point 5 Canopy control has become one of the most important skills we teach. Students should be trained and debriefed in depth on their canopy control following every jump. It is far too easy for us to focus on the fun parts of freefall, but the canopy skills are the real life saving training. Radio people need to be good observers and great teachers, rather than simply directors. Instructors should carefully observe a students canopy flight and provide a complete debrief following every jump. Suggestion: Instructors should renew their focus on canopy control training. Make it a top priority on every jump.

I hope the above ideas help instructors to rethink their emphasis on canopy control, and prevention of low turns.

Tom Buchanan
Instructor Emeritus
Comm Pilot MSEL,G
Author: JUMP! Skydiving Made Fun and Easy

[riggerrob 561]

Suggestion: If you are training students with tandem jumps, avoid low turns and spirals near the ground.

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In other words: devote the first few tandems to painting a picture of the perfect landing approach: down wind, base leg, final, etc.

[jman 0]

As usual, Tom makes some excellent points. I always learn something from his posts. I recently took the Scott Miller course at the Ranch. I did not realize the importance of flat turn skills with over 90 jumps when I took the course. On my next jump after completing course, I landed out. Skills learned...Skills used. I would encourage any low time jumper to learn and use flat turn skills. They work...Period!

[skyyhi 0]

Thanks Tom. . .for the last 70 or so skydives I have been practicing flat turns and braked approaches. . .learning the nuances of "less is more" technique when adding toggle or riser input. . .

Great information Tom.

________________________________________
Take risks not to escape life… but to prevent life from escaping. ~ A bumper sticker at the DZ
FGF #6
Darcy

[kallend 1,651]

Point 4 ... Flat turns are a critical life skill that should be practiced on just about every jump. The more exposure to the skill, the better the recall and application of the skill will be. Suggestion: Students should practice flat turns at some point on every jump, and should do flat turns with an instructor on every tandem, including first tandem jumps. Make flat turns part of your training package on every skydive.

Is this suggestion just for students, or for all jumpers? I do a couple of flat turns on pretty much every jump, just for fun (I have 1530 jumps right now) and when it's not crowded I often make my final turn before landing a flat turn.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[JohnMitchell 14]

A lot of good things to think about there, Tom. Under point #1, maybe we should insure that, during training, we get the students "spooled up" a bit, to 1, see how they handle strees and 2, cement the things being learned into the "under stress" part of their brain. I think most instructors try to do that instinctively. Maybe it's more important than we realize.

I sure miss the days when everyone jumped a fat 7 cell and we all would take a run at the peas on every jump. The canopies were low performance, but everyone could handle landing in a tight place. Flat turns, braked approaches, and landing on target were part of everyone's repetoire. I guess I don't really miss the canopies, I just miss some of my friends that have gotten killed on the new stuff.

[ChasingBlueSky 0]

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I sure miss the days when everyone jumped a fat 7 cell

But this death at the Ranch proves that even with a 280 Manta you can die performing a low turn. IMHO, its not all about canopy selection - its also about respecting the canopy.

BTW - Great article as per usual Tom!

_________________________________________
you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me....
I WILL fly again.....

[tdog 0]

I could not agree more with Tom's points. I am new to skydiving with only 7 jumps, but I have a hundred or so paraglider landings. (For those who are unfamiliar with a paraglider – imagine a parachute that is designed to have a great glide slope so you can fly across country just using thermals for lift where you launch on a hill with the wing fully inflated. My paraglider had a surface area of 354 sqft or a wing loading of 0.5 lb per square foot. This means wind and thermals greatly affect your landings and flying.)

Both of my “ouch” landings on my paraglider were when I was a student with little flying experience. One was in a steep turn that could have killed me - just to avoid landing in an empty road when the wind and a thermal took me off my spot by a good margin (stayed up on final in a thermal)... I also landed into a fence once – same issue with the thermals, but I did not want to do a 90 degree turn 20’ off the ground. I will choose a PLF with 5 MPH forward movement (assuming a flare) into a fence any day over landing on my side at 30MPH in a steep turn. But, please don’t take my novice opinion as advice.

The concept of what is learned in stress works in stress is important. When learning my emergency procedures for skydiving - in the back of my mind thought, great - I can do it on the ground - but what happens when I get a fast spinner? I did it in the simulator hanging from the roof being pushed around, but I still did not feel 100% “muscle memory.” On my AFF4 - the instructor had me put on the mockup harness and show him a pull. Every previous instructor just watched me pull and described the malfunction to react to. He was behind me and grabbed me and started throwing me around the hangar after I pulled my main. I had to relearn the cutaway move while trying to keep my balance on my feet. I asked him to do it again. I think I might owe this instructor my life some day – it was the best thing that happened to me in the training – because I was caught off guard, whereas in the simulator I knew they would throw me around! I encourage all instructors to try to throw the most wicked curve balls at your students – as it really works to teach control in stressful situations.

How can one teach obstacle avoidance and low turns? Simulating it is hard. I know I am going to work with an expert at canopy control pretty early on – as I feel it is so far the weakest link in my training so far – where “never turn low” is taught with perfection but “there is a plane landing on the runway and you are blown that way due to a wind shift – now what do you do?” is not taught as well.

My two cent novice opinion is that there are way too many skydiving and paragliding fatalities that are due to the inability to train for the worst on landing. I just saw on TV “Impact: Story of Survival” where a very experienced skydiver with a video rig fought a line twist which came undone enough to cause a fast spin. He cut and his reserve had three twists on the reserve. He came out of the twists with a perfect canopy overhead – but then was heading straight for the trees with no room to spare – and 4 seconds latter he hit the ground in a hard turn causing serious injuries and near death. I realized I am ill prepared for obstacle avoidance in such a situation too. You could tell he had the “the worst is behind me” feeling and then realized where he was at and panicked.

I know obstacle avoidance was a low priority on the paragliding syllabus – stalls and other malfunctions were taught well, and even were practiced over bodies of water for extra margin – but most paragliding fatalities occur under a perfectly good canopy – canopies that are much bigger and much less aggressive than skydiving rigs. I have been told that more than half of all skydiving fatalities are under a perfectly good canopy too. That being said, I ask, wouldn’t it make sense that if half of skydiving deaths occur on landing with a good canopy, shouldn’t half the basic (AFF or similar) training be devoted to canopy work and worst case landing procedures, even if it means more time and/or training equipment? Again, the opinion of a novice, take it for what it is worth.

[billvon 2,435]

>That being said, I ask, wouldn’t it make sense that if half of skydiving
> deaths occur on landing with a good canopy, shouldn’t half the basic (AFF
> or similar) training be devoted to canopy work and worst case landing
> procedures, even if it means more time and/or training equipment?

The problems are:

1. The appropriate equipment is expensive. It's all well and good to say that DZ's should pay for it and/or pass the costs on to students, but if half of them do it and half of them don't, the half that do it will be at a competitive disadvantage and will lose money to the more lax DZ's. A USPA-wide policy could help this.

2. The training is more risky in the short term. It's more risky to put students on Stilettos even with good training, because on occasion you get someone who simply loses it - and losing it on a Stiletto will kill you a lot more often than losing it on a Manta does. So does the increased risk at first justify the decreased risk later?

I agree that such training is sorely lacking in today's student programs though.

[chrisgr 0]

Tom, great post!

Tdog, you also have an excellent point.

Considering that most student training disciplines teach skydiving AND some canopy control, the time that is provided to acquire and practice canopy control skills is limited to the brief period of time after the freefall and before entering the landing pattern.

After completing most or all of the program, students usually do one(1) hop-n-pop from a lower altitude that still does not give them enough time to really work on their canopy control skills.

From Tom’s Point 4 …
Students learn best through repetition. The BIC and Coach material suggests a student should practice a skill a minimum of 25 times in order to make it permanent.

IMO …
Student training programs should include at least one hop-n-pop from a higher altitude to work exclusively on canopy control. The student would not be thinking about the freefall objectives other than to safely get out the door and under their canopy.

Get an instructor in the air with them or ensure that one is watching from the ground. Either way, you could provide radio assistance to the student and give them feedback as they work on their canopy control / survival skills.

The student would have the time to focus on specific drills and apply the feedback provided by the instructor. This feedback, together with the repetition of the skill, would help the student build a positive memory of the task and improve their odds of being able to use that skill in an emergency situation.

Of course, students would still work on their canopy control / survival skills on every jump. I just think that it’s worth committing the time – and resources – for students (and the rest of us on a routine basis!) to do at least one hop-n-pop from a higher altitude to work exclusively on canopy control.

[tdog 0]

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The problems are:

Give me solutions not problems. You are now entitled to give me the same look my coworkers give me. ;-)

I know this is a hard issue - but I also would pay a lot more to know I had a lot better safe training. I lost a friend in paraglidng - and what hurt me is that the loss was because of training.

AFF school - $2,500 - not killing yourself on landing - priceless.

[billvon 2,435]

>Give me solutions not problems.

Implement the canopy restrictions we described in PARACHUTIST. They basically require education before you can downsize quickly.

[bob.dino 0]

Not being a USPA member, I don't get copies of Parachutist. Are you referring to the Downsizing Checklist also posted on dz.com?

[kelpdiver 2]

Quote

Quote

The problems are:

Give me solutions not problems. You are now entitled to give me the same look my coworkers give me. ;-)

Bill is as big a part of the solution as there is. But as he says, there are tradeoffs.

[chrisgr 0]

Tdog, Bill frequently provides solutions to many problems through these forums (and I’m sure through direct teaching with other skydivers).

Remember what he said …

“I agree that such training is sorely lacking in today's student programs”

and …

“Implement the canopy restrictions we described in PARACHUTIST. They basically require education before you can downsize quickly.”


I believe that the most important element in this proposal is not the downsizing restriction, but the education that the skydiver must receive. This process could ensure that even if someone isn’t interested in ‘high performance canopy flight’, they will get the education and training necessary to safely fly their canopy of choice.

Bill and others have developed a good solution that would still allow the skydiver to progress to the canopy of their choice.

[Randy_H 0]

I am a student and was never aware how important flat turns are. I will definitely be practicing them, at altitude, on every jump.

Question for all, is a flat turn the same thing as a brake turn?

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[kelpdiver 2]

Both terms are a bit imprecise.

I think of a flat turn as one with a minimal altitude loss. In full flight, say on final approach, you would hit one toggle but as soon as the turn begins would hit the other as well like in a flare. Akin to pulling down the stick while turning in an airplane. Big increase in lift and g forces on you. Very fast turn.

Brake turns I think of as slow flight with the toggles down half, 3/4s, or nearly full. On many rigs I've rented, you can't stall even at full brakes. Then to turn you let up on the opposite toggle. Turns are slow and a bit wobbly when you pull down again to straighten out.

[billvon 2,435]

> Not being a USPA member, I don't get copies of Parachutist.

Here's a letter sent in by several of us moderators/instructors on this board:

----------------------------------------------

Over the past few years, we have watched as more and more skydivers injure and kill themselves under high performance canopies. In 99% of the cases, this happens to a jumper who does not have the education and experience to fly his canopy safely. In the majority of cases, a larger canopy would have prevented the fatality or mitigated the injury. We, the undersigned, call on USPA to increase their role in canopy training to help prevent these sorts of fatalities in the future.

It is our position that only education can prevent accidents like these. Modern, heavily loaded high performance canopies can be flown safely only after sufficient education and/or experience has been obtained by the jumper. We ask USPA to do the following:

-Develop canopy skills requirements for the “B”, “C”, and “D” licenses that build upon the initial "A" license canopy skills. They should include canopy control classroom training, practical exercises, and a written and practical test. Once these are in place, add canopy type/wing load restrictions based on the “A” through “D” license, with a grandfather clause so this does not affect people currently jumping high wing loadings. As with other skills, restricted licenses would be available for jumpers who choose not to demonstrate HP canopy skills.

-To prevent exceptional jumpers from being held back unnecessarily, allow any instructor, I/E or S+TA to waiver these requirements based on a demonstration of canopy skills.

-Develop a Canopy Instructor (CI) rating which focuses on skills required to safely land heavily loaded high performance canopies. Currently, many jumpers receive no practical HP canopy training at all; it is possible to progress through the ISP jumping only a 288 square foot canopy. With the rapid development of very high performance canopies, canopy skills are as critical for skydiver survival (if not more critical) than freefall skills. The intent of the CI would be to teach the canopy skills required for the new licenses, and to waiver those who demonstrate the skill required to progress to small canopies more quickly than their jump numbers would ordinarily allow.

We recognize that any additional restrictions placed on skydivers should be considered very carefully; skydiving has never been a sport of heavy regulation, and regulations alone will not keep anyone safe. However, new regulations are falling into place already. Individual DZ's are implementing canopy loading restrictions with no education, no commonality and no way to "waiver out" of the requirements. We feel that USPA could implement a canopy training program that will educate more jumpers, be less restrictive and keep even pilots of very high performance canopies alive and jumping.

William von Novak D16479
Chuck Blue D12501
Derek Vanboeschoten D18847
Lisa Briggs D14633
Scott Campos D25931

[CanuckInUSA 0]

Quote

is a flat turn the same thing as a brake turn?

At your experience level, let's not confuse things. Yes you can think of a flat turn and a braked turn as the same thing. We could analyze this to death, but in the end the purpose of flat/braked turns is to execute a turn with minimal altitude loss. Learn the slow flight characteristics of each and every canopy you fly and practice these skills up high before you bring them low to the ground. And if you are serious about your canopy control skills (once you're off student status), dedicate jumps towards learning your canopy. Too many people concentrate on the free fall aspects and not enough people spend the time to properly learn their canopies.

People should NOT be afraid of turns low to the ground if they've done their homework up front and know the characteristics of their canopies. But this homework usually requires hundreds and hundreds of jumps on each canopy before we can truly say that we know all that there is to know about them.

Finally, be subtle yet deliberate with you canopy control inputs. It's the abrupt maneuvers low to the ground which kill and maim.

Try not to worry about the things you have no control over