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MaStAdJ

Is skydiving really worth entertainment even though that you can get killed?

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I fell in love with the thrill and the experience of the freefall and the parachuting.



I vote troll. Speaks good english, lists his DZ as "Santa Rosa", so I assume California. I know the DZO there and he wouldn't take a 14-year old.
Trapped on the surface of a sphere. XKCD

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I've been out of the sport for about a year and a half now. Money problems. Not a day goes by when I don't think of the jumps I've made -- I remember every single one of them. Every time I think about stepping up to the open door of an airplane at 15,000 feet I get chills and my heart-rate elevates -- see, it just did it. :P

Is it worth it? I think the real question is, "Is it worth living for a century, only to look back on your empty life?" Most people would answer 'No' -- even the "safety always" types. I think the only answer that counts, though, is your own.

My own personal question, at times, has been, "Was it worth learning your passion, only to deny it to yourself for over a year?" I almost always answer yes... Sometimes, very, very rarely, I feel like I'd be better off having never jumped.

Then I kick myself in the ass and force-feed myself skydiving-related material -- movies, pictures, websites :P -- until it sinks in that I'm still hooked, I'll always be hooked, and that I know DAMN WELL it's worth it!

Besides. I'll jump again. Even my absence from the sport will not shake my addiction.

Thanks, Chad, for this opportunity to voice how I feel without starting a new thread. :P I hate looking like I'm trying to get pity, but I likewise hate not being able to talk about it.
--
Skydive -- testing gravity, one jump at a time.

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it definitely is and you get less chance being killed than when driving your car or crossing the street !



False.
"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334

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it definitely is and you get less chance being killed than when driving your car or crossing the street !

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False.



i guess you've never seen how they drive in france :ph34r:
anyway, at least this way you die happy...

O
"Carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero."

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Just a thought--when I was about 14, I became addicted to the idea of taking flying lessons. I read every copy of Flying, Plane and Pilot, etc I could get my geeky hands on and became something of a groundbound "expert" at flying. I knew all the planes, the avionics and safety lessons from the accident reports. I could talk-the-talk . . . .

When I finally DID take lessons at 15, my instructor didn't believe that I'd never flown a plane before.

Sounds like this "kid" is driven to learn all he can about this great sport (right on!!) and--BTW--I used to read about the early skydiving pioneers when I found a skydiving book in my junior high library back in the early 70's. I made my mind up than and there that I WOULD jump someday. I did--despite parental disapproval--in college. So, all I can say is . . .

KID--GO FOR IT!!!!
“Keep your elbow up!"

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Keep in mind almost all DZ's require you to be 18 before you can make a jump. I have heard of some letting you go if you have parental consent. Is it worth it???....you know I ask myself that all the time. Matter of fact if you asked that yesterday i'd say hell ya, but today...I just dont know. I know that sounds funny but I'm fairly new to the sport and dont think I will ever quit..but dont think I'm addicted like most people on here.



I feel the same way. I'm extremely new to the sport (1 tandem and 6 AFF jumps), but I get really uneasy thinking about it sometimes. Like tomorrow I'm gonna go do my level 6 jump, and I have horrible anxiety. Usually the night before a jump I get real uneasy, but during the day when I see the sun I feel better and handle it.

Sometimes I think about quitting, but it's been so expensive to get started I'd feel bad flushing my investment down the toilet since even these last 7 jumps have been expensive.

Then again, after I jump and make it down safe I feel alot better and forget about it. I guess it's just newbie syndrome.

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I don't think I'm happy when I'm going to bounce... B|. I agree with Ron. I do agree I would die doing something I would never have wanted to mis, even if that would be the ending, so be it.
The trouble with skydiving; If you stink at it and continue to jump, you'll die. If you're good at it and continue to jump, you'll see a lot of friends die...

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Skydiving is so worth the risk! I don't even own a license yet, but I can tell you that right away I knew skydiving was for me, and I don't want to experience live without it. I am not afraid of dying, nor dying from skydiving for that matter. Nothing in this world worth living for comes without a heavy price.
Enjoy the skies!

--Longing to fly


Mother to the cutest little thing in the world...

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Chad,

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I would say to start hanging out at the DZ, learn to pack, make some money, and learn all you can. I still learn a few new things everytime I go to the DZ.

As for the parents thing, I called my mom AFTER I made my first tandem. When I started skydiving (a few months after my tandem because of money issues), she was very nervous, and I had to call her after every day that I jumped (I was away at college). Slowly, she warmed up to the idea, but it still made her very nervous. Then last summer, I got her a tandem for her birthday. She got to hang out at the DZ, experience the skydiving atmosphere as well as experience her first jump. Since then she has been much more understanding and now knows why I am addicted. :) I know most parents won't do that, so I consider myself lucky, but having them go to the DZ is a good way to see what it is all about.

As for the windtunnel, I have done a total of 60 minutes on a couple of occasions. I have seen kids in there as young as around 5, so that is not a problem. Yes, it is very expensive, but every minute you spend in there is like a skydive (you also don't have to worry about exiting or pulling your parachute). Some experience in the tunnel could get you through student progression a little faster, but only in the sense that hopefully you wouldn't have to repeat levels.

Good luck in your endevours!

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Find a local DZ and go hang out for a few weekends. Learn to pack parachutes and make some cash while you learn about skydiving.
You will become what is known as a dropzone rat. Some of the best skydivers were dropzone rats.
Is it worth it? Hell ya.



Well, I'm the wrong one to ask about this in the first place, since I don't have others pack for me, I do it myself, but...
Do people really want to (pay to) have someone who has never even jumped pack their main?? I know I sure wouldn't. I did not think it worked that way, where a person was not already learning to skydive before he learned to pack a parachute. Isn't it best to gain some of the more first-hand knowledge of the function and form of the parachute anatomy before you go packing it for someone to use?

Anyway... to the original topic.

It sounds as though mastadj has the spark of interest he'll need to get really into the sport, but I'm confused about one thing. At the start of the post, it seems as though he's done a jump (mentioned about the thrill of the freefall, etc.). Has he done a jump, or just was talking about how he imagines it would feel?

Man, I would not like to be back in the position of being too young to skydive.

My advice to you, mastadj, is this:
TAKE FLYING LESSONS.

You can sign up and take those at any age, just about (you're old enough), as long as you can reach the controls and pedals at the same time you're looking out the windscreen. In the U.S., you can actually fly SOLO at 16!! You can get your pilot's license at 17!

Little can better prepare you to be a well-rounded skydiver more than flying airplanes can. You will arrive at a DZ already understanding weather, wind, principles of flight, airport patterns, landing patterns, flight and airport operations... You will also have little or no apprehension about being aboard the jump plane, or looking down from that beautiful beautiful doorway...

Blue skies,
-
-Jeffrey
"With tha thoughts of a militant mind... Hard line, hard line after hard line!"

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