Wrong or Right Call?

[gemini 0]

At Eloy last Saturday, I had my right brake line tied in a knot onto the tip of the toggle. Problem was the 16 inches of line in the loop to and from the knot.

Canopy deployed in a hard right turn that I immediately countered by pulling the left brake line to almost my waist.

I could see the knot after I release the brake, but couldn't lip it off the toggle tip because any attempt to reach over with my left hand started the hard right turn again.

I could turn the canopy to the left and right and stalled it with a full flare on the left and a 2-4 inch flare on the right. At this time I was at 1K and near the main landing area running South with a West wind.

After turning to final (West) I kept repeating to myself to gently flare right, gently flare right. As I flared I started the left flare slightly before moving the right to make sure I didn't start the left turn again.

About a foot off the ground the canopy did start to move to the left, but a good PLF was hardly felt.

With my pride bruised and huge grass stains on the right side of my jumpsuit and container I walked away from the landing.

At deployment I was around 2.5K and immediately saw the loop of line and knew it involved the toggle.

Had I not been near the main landing area I probably would have cut away because landing in the desert at Eloy under a main that wants to turn could be a very unpleasant landing since the ground is like concrete and every damn bush out there has thorns the size of knitting needles!

What would you have done?

Blue skies,

Jim

[mattjw916 2]

Not that I don't think you did the right thing (obviously what you did worked for you, since you are here and uninjured) but I would have chopped it and made a trip to the liquor store.

My thought in that and other similar situations is that I wouldn't want the problem to "clear itself" at 20ft and toggle myself into the ground because of the uneven flare. Plus I think the odds of me screwing up a landing with that kind of problem is higher than that of a possible reserve malfunction.

Just my $0.02.

NSCR-2376, SCR-15080

[freefalle 0]

Sounds like you did a good job dealing with a tough situation. Im not saying what you did was wrong, but I would have chopped. My decision to chop in the situation you were in comes from A) low jump numbers and B) an ingrained predetermined decision that if I can't fly it in the air without stress, I probably won't land it without breaking myself. You have a ton more experience than I do so maybe in the future my decision will mirror yours but at this point, Im buyin a rigger a bottle

[JohnRich 4]

It sounds to me like you handled it just fine. You're the one that checked the controllability of the canopy and determined that it was safe to land like that. I'm not going to second-guess your first-hand experience with that canopy.

The only thing I can think of that you might have tried different would be to put the good brake line in your teeth to hold tension and fly straight, so that both hands would be free to work on the toggle problem on the other side.

And you could always hook-knife the stuck line, and land with rear risers. But again, that's a judgement call about which is easier.

Those asymetrical flares can be worrisome, but when you take it slow and easy, and adjust as you go during the flare to keep the canopy straight, it's not too big a deal. The last one I had like that was from a broken steering line on one side, and I landed flaring with a rear riser on one side, and the toggle on the other side.

It sounds like you did a good job. Congrats!

[Praetorian 1]

fun giving advice to someone with 10X my jump numbers.... that being said.

Can/have you landed using rear risers?

In a situation like this I would have considered cutting the breakline with my hook knife and just landing on rears.

or was the knot in a place where you could not free the tail of the chute by cutting the line where you could reach?

Can Anyone tell me why this is a bad idea? if it is I'd really like to know as this is my current plan for such a situation

Good Judgment comes from experience...a lot of experience comes from bad
judgment.

[peregrinerose 0]

You have a hell of a lot more jumps than I do. I'd chop without a second thought... but I also don't have the experience level that you do, so wouldn't have the confidence of being able to safely land it that you have with 2000 jumps more than me

Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

[matthewcline 0]

Hey it was Square, Stable and Steerable (with a little effort).

I have had a simular thing and took the same actions. I did have to do 2 PLF's though.

It cuased me to rethink how I stow the excess brake line and that was it. I was on the next load.

An Instructors first concern is student safety.
So, start being safe, first!!!

[prepheckt 0]

That exact scenerio happened to me. It has resulted in my only (knock on wood) cutaway to date. My rigger got a nice bottle of Jack Daniels out of it.

"Dancing Argentine Tango is like doing calculus with your feet."
-9 toes

[ladyskydiver 0]

With my jump numbers and even though I know how to PLF really well , I probably would have chopped.

Life is short! Break the rules! Forgive quickly! Kiss slowly! Love truly, Laugh uncontrollably. And never regret anything that made you smile.

[Hooknswoop 19]

"I walked away from the landing."= Right call.

Hard to argue with sucess.

Derek

[councilman24 36]

Sounds good to me. Why use your LAST CHANCE to live? Reserves do malfunction.
Judicious use of a hook knife (as stated above) might have made the landing less touchy.

I'm old for my age.
Terry Urban
D-8631
FAA DPRE

[joebud321 0]

id say you did a great job!...problems like these take a little bit more thinking about but are no less stressfull than a total...

i had a break line knotted on the velcro tab!..i let go ov the knotted toggle,compensated on the other with my opposite hand and cut the tab off with my knife..pretty stressfull around a grand...

glad ur ok !!

• Quote

[AndyMan 7]

I am not a big believer in the "you did the right thing" approach to malfunction debriefs.

I believe that for most malfunctions, there is a set of actions that will stack the odds in your favor, and a set of actions that will stack them against you.

The fact that somebody walks away from a malfunction does not necesarily indicate that they followed the former path. Some follow the latter, yet get away with it. Also, stacking the odds in your favor is not a guarantee of success, either.

To answer your question,

What would I have done? I prefer to be in the former group. I would not attempt to land a main canopy with a brake line knotted to the point of it being 16 inches shorter. I would first try to cut the brake line with my hook-knive and land on rear risers, and if I couldn't manage to get it cut, I'd cuttaway and pull my reserve.

I have absolutely no doubt that I'm about to be flamed to Hades.

_Am

__

You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

[rushmc 18]

Your post is interesting.
Quite frankly, I have no idea what I would have done. (Hind sight being what it is you can always second guess any decision.)

Having been around a few student chops (and watching the "you should have" discussions) and having one of my own, I truly believe only "you", the person under the canopy knows what you are dealing with. (I know you are not a student) Keep or loose it? I have decided not to second guess anybodies choices. You obviously made an OK (correct?) choice for you at that time and place. Nice job by the way.

But you know what I think the best part of you posting your experience here? You have given eveyone that reads your post a chance to go through the situation you had in thier head. Most of us will think about it and make a mental note as to what we will do should the situation ever arise for us. What is that worth? Altitude!!! Those that have read your post through now have an idea what they will do now and most likely it will be a more automatic choice.

So, what would I have done. I don't know. But I know what I will do in the future should the same situation ever present itself to me!

Thanks

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[billvon 2,407]

Personally?

I would have cut it away if:

-I was under my Nitro
-Landing area wasn't good
-winds were light.

If I had moderate to strong winds, I could land with minimal flare without a problem. Also the landing area makes a difference; if it's grass and fairly large that increases the margin for error.

[gemini 0]

Ah the old hook knife!

Unfortunately in the chain of events, I removed it from my chest strap because I carried the rig on board the aircraft when I left Houston.

Of course, I failed to put it back on when I got to Eloy starting the whole chain of events.

Blue skies,

Jim

[artistcalledian 0]

i would have quietly filled my underpants with shit, then i would have gone where the canopy took me... finally ending up in a crumpled mess on the floor... covered in my own poo

________________________________________
drive it like you stole it and f*ck the police

[Belladonna 0]

I had the same thing happen to me. I packed in a knot on my brake lines, and when I unstowed my brakes, I realized I had a problem. I cut away and got to the ground safely to find that my main landed in a creek...

Glad you're here to post about it.

[jumperconway 0]

Welcome back unbroken Brother!
What you did worked. With my unfortunate multiple experience in similar circumstances, one brakeline unable to unstow the settink not the toggle itself. Take as much wrap as needed on the free brake line to even the settings and land using rears. Saved my ass on my hanky the second time it happened.
See ya this weekend 2500!

[darrenspooner 0]

Hey, you made it back without injury. Good call, damn good call.

[Jackpunx 0]

Quote

At deployment I was around 2.5K and immediately saw the loop of line and knew it involved the toggle.


What would you have done?

due to my lack of experience.. I would have chopped..
Thats not to say tha I have an oppinion with regards to your decision.
This is the question I have..
If you deployed around 2500, depending on your canopy that puts you under canopy around 2000 and your in a turn.. so your burning altitude.. .. So you find yourself at 1k' with a canopy thats not acting right;..
they say you should be able to open a reserve in about 300'?
..
My question is .. what is the lowest you will cut away at?
I just got my A.. so in AFF they said if Im below 1k.. and start to have issues with my canopy I should not cut.. just deploy my reserve.. I know this is not AFF anymore.. and my pull altitude has changed.. as a result of that .. my deck has changed..
but.. whats the bottom line?
thanks

[brianfry713 0]

I've had a similar problem twice. I was under a very docile canopy (Falcon 215 at 1:1, with Dacron lines). I pulled around 4k, so I had time to work on it.

When I tried to unstow my brakes, one toggle released and the other was knotted up. I needed two hands to untie the knot, but I didn't want to try to work on it while spiraling down. What I did is put my right wrist through the toggle and that way I could maintain level flight with my right arm/wrist while I used two hands to untie the knot. After some work, I got it out and was still above my hard deck.

Another time on the same canopy, I had the brake line wrap itself around two fingers tightly and cause a tension knot. I didn't have a hook knife with me, and couldn't cut away in that situation. I was able to use my other hand to release the tension and get my fingers out of the knot.

I would have landed that one for sure and probably the other one too if I couldn't have got the knots untied in time.

BASE 1224, Senior Parachute Rigger, CPL ASEL IA, AGI, IGI
USPA Coach & UPT Tandem Instructor, PRO, Altimaster Field Support Representative

[Eule 0]

Quote

At Eloy last Saturday, I had my right brake line tied in a knot onto the tip of the toggle. Problem was the 16 inches of line in the loop to and from the knot.

Caution: low jump number here.

I had a somewhat similar thing happen somewhere around my 6th or
7th jump. On my first few jumps I was quite paranoid about the
canopy and would spend a little time looking it over after it deployed
and before I unstowed the brakes. On the next few jumps, I got a
little lax about it - I would glance up and if it was square and stable, I
would quickly grab the toggles and see if it was steerable.

On this jump, I glanced up, then looked out in front of me, unstowed
the brakes, and noted that the canopy kept wanting to turn right on its
own. It wasn't violent, but it always wanted to do it. I found that by
pulling the left toggle down to between my shoulder and waist, I could
make it fly straight. I could turn left by going all the way down on the
left toggle, and turn right by letting the left toggle all the way up and
optionally pulling down on the right a little. I could flare it as well, so I
figured I was good. I wrote off the funny behavior to the fact that I
was jumping in slightly higher winds (~10 mph) than I had before
(calm to ~5 mph), not realizing that it wanted to turn no matter what
my angle to the wind was. Also, since this was relatively early in the
training, I didn't know about tricks like riser turns.

I flew it on down, listening to directions over the radio. I could tell
that the voice on the radio sounded a little annoyed, but I figured
that he could have just been arguing with somebody on the ground,
or whatever. I remember one turn direction in particular where I
heard "turn left... OK, stop turning.... (long pause) (quietly) damnit!"
I still didn't connect this with something being wrong with my canopy.

At landing, I let the left toggle up some before flaring, because I had
it in mind that "flare" meant starting with both toggles up. I didn't let
it all the way back up, though; I started the flare with the left toggle
maybe a foot below the right one. The canopy did turn right on me
as I landed, and I landed a little rough, but wasn't hurt.

One of the video guys came out on the golf cart to pick me up and
asked if I had noticed anything wrong with my canopy. I mentioned
that it wanted to turn right but it passed the tests so I kept it. He
then told me I had a pilot chute over (ripcord+spring pilot chute rig)
and was amazed that I hadn't noticed that. I told him that all I
noticed was the turn. When we got back to the hangar, my instructor
told me "that was almost a cutaway". I explained that it passed the
tests, which was why I kept it, and that seemed to calm him down a
little. Still, we had a long discussion about the proper amount of
inspection of one's canopy after opening.

I can think of a few reasons why this wasn't exactly like your situation:

- Different canopy. This was on a 280 ft^2 student canopy loaded
at about 0.77 lb/ft^2 with both ZP and F-111 fabric; things probably
happen a lot slower on that than on what you jump.

- I had a lot more time. On this jump I pulled at either 5500 or 5000
and was in the saddle above 4000 so I would have had a lot more
time to get a reserve out if I had decided I needed it.

- What I had was probably less likely to clear itself. Talking to the
people on the ground, the pilot-chute-over was pretty close to the
middle of the canopy. This probably accounted for the gentler turn
it made, but since it wasn't just barely hooked over the corner, a
flare or sharp turn up high would be less likely to clear it. You saw
your knot and I didn't, but I agree with the previous post that there
was probably a non-trivial chance of it coming un-knotted down low.

- I probably had a more forgiving landing area. There are trees,
hangars, and runways, but all of the grass is fine to land in, even
if it hasn't been mowed. See:
http://terraserver.microsoft.com/image.aspx?T=1&S=12&Z=14&X=875&Y=4975&W=3&qs=%7ccushing%7cok%7c

Also, I tend to agree with AndyMan's idea that surviving is not equal
to having taken the best course of action. On a different jump, I
managed to get unstable in free fall as I approached pull time. I
tried to get stable again before I pulled; just before I pulled I got
back belly-to-earth, so the pull was uneventful. When I got on the
ground, I told my instructor that "I was unstable, but I did X right
before I pulled, which flipped me back over" and he told me "yes,
you did X, but doing Y was actually what flipped you back over." I
didn't realize that I had even done Y. So, hooray for pulling stable,
but it bothered me a lot that what I thought I did to get stable and
what actually got me stable were two different things. In the world
outside of skydiving, I think there are lots of things like this: you can
get away with it, but it isn't necessarily a good idea.

Eule

PLF does not stand for Please Land on Face.

[GravityGirl 0]

Quote

>>In a situation like this I would have considered cutting the breakline with my hook knife and just landing on rears.
<<

I would really hope that you would NOT do that.

Next time you are flying your canopy, look up and see how much of your parachute is controlled by your break lines.

But cutting them with your hook knife, you are giving up nearly a third of your fabric over your head.

I would rather take a wrap on the opposite toggle, test the stall point, and prepare for a good PLF, than to give up ANY of my parachute that is still working.

That being said, on my 89, I would likely cutaway and pull my reserve.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Peace and Blue Skies!
Bonnie ==>Gravity Gear!

[Hooknswoop 19]

Quote

I would really hope that you would NOT do that.

Next time you are flying your canopy, look up and see how much of your parachute is controlled by your break lines.

But cutting them with your hook knife, you are giving up nearly a third of your fabric over your head.

I would rather take a wrap on the opposite toggle, test the stall point, and prepare for a good PLF, than to give up ANY of my parachute that is still working.

That being said, on my 89, I would likely cutaway and pull my reserve.

It is a very viable option. Look at the line-over mod for BASE. Toss the steering lines and fly the rear risers. Works fine.

Derek