Freezing your face off

[Maggotry 0]

It's cold up there in the winter. Was -22F at 13k today.

I did a freefly jump and came down with very cold hands and face. Got warm again and then did a pre-birdman training tracking jump. When I was about to land after that jump my fingers were so numb I had trouble telling whether I was holding on to the toggles or not. And I'd gotten the frost bite bug in the face too - now there's a clear demarcation marking where my goggles have been. Rest of the face is reddish with some nasty looking woundish things.

Then did my beer birdman jump. Cold wasn't as bad but it didn't exactly help to improve my face.

I've tried wearing a balaclava (sp?) but my goggles fog up (got several; the ones that fogged up the least are the cheap and reliable Flex something ones.)

I'm jumping a normal FF helmet and ain't planning on buying a full face one, especially after a friend having a cypress fire after an icing up of visor/dislodged reserve handle incident.

What's your tips for keeping your face if not warm then at least free from these ugly and uncomfortable frostbite things?

Dude, they're gonna laugh at me at work tomorrow...

[katiebear21 0]

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I'm jumping a normal FF helmet and ain't planning on buying a full face one, especially after a friend having a cypress fire after an icing up of visor/dislodged reserve handle incident.

I jump my fullface when it's really cold for birdman and ff jumps. If you're worried about the visor icing then just buy one that flips up; or, do like I do and remove the visor and jump with glasses. Either way, your face will be much warmer than just jumping a ff with a bacalava.

As far as your hands, slip some latex gloves on under your regular gloves around 10,000 feet. If you do it much before then you'll get sweaty and even colder.

Katie
Get your PMS glass necklace here

[GTAVercetti 0]

Plain facemasks are worthless to me. I got a Serius brand Neoprene mask that works beautifully.

For hands, if it is really cold, I wear a pair of thin fleece liners, then put latex OVER them and the my gloves. My outer gloves are slightly big so this does not get too bulky but not too big so that I cannot grab handles. The key to that is definitely the latex. Shit is lifesaving.

Why yes, my license number is a palindrome. Thank you for noticing.

[Unparagoned 0]

I was about to post on how cold it was today. My hands and nose are still sore from the cold, and my last jump was over 5 hours ago

[nael 0]

My hands got so cold on a jump I did last year that it hurt to move them. The trouble with that was that when I landed, it was windy but I physically could not collapse my canopy because my hands hurt to much. In the end I had to bite the bullet and deal with the pain to collapse it (in preference of getting dragged into a fence), but by then they'de driven over to where I had landed because they though I was hurt since I sat on the ground so long (trying to warm my hands up).

That was the last time I jumped without gloves in winter. As far as I'm concerned (regardless of the pain and uncomfort when hands get cold in skydiving) it's a safety issue.

www.TerminalSports.com.auAustralia's largest skydive gear store

[Superman32 0]

-22 That's some cold shit

Inveniam Viam aut Faciam
I'm back biatches!

[bch7773 0]

to keep your face from getting frostbite, you have to get blood into it. So after you open, or even in freefall, excercise your face. Smile, frown, grimace, etc.
It should get the blood going to your skin, which warms it up. anyways it can't hurt.

MB 3528, RB 1182

[Bdog 0]

where did you jump at? that IS cold. the latex will block the wind but your hands will begin to sweat quickly. it would be best to have a layer of fleece between your skin and the latex...

_________________________________________

---Future Darwin Award recipient-

[JohnRich 4]

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My outer gloves are slightly big...

I only wear gloves when I absolutely have to, because of cold. I prefer the sense of touch for grasping handles, toggles, etc.

But I had a problem this weekend with the thick warm gloves I was wearing. I wedged my hand into another's leg strap for an exit grip, and when I went to withdraw my hand to go to the 2nd point, my glove wanted to stay under the leg strap! I managed to extract both my hand and the glove, but my glove was about half-off, with loose fingertips flapping in the breeze. Hah! While flying to my next point, I put my wrist up to my mouth, bit down on the wrist end of the glove, and pushed my hand away from my mouth, to get my hand shoved back inside the glove.

Fortunately, no one noticed this action of mine, or the dive would have been spoiled with hilarity.