New Exit Order Category?

[CanuckInUSA 0]

Normally when we talk of exit orders, we talk of belly fliers first (largest, to smallest), freefliers (largest to smallest), AFFs, Tandems and other high pullers. But I'd like to propose a new category to be inserted into the exit order. Lately my DZ has seen a number of newer jumpers show a desire to get into freeflying. But for most (if not all) of the new freefliers, they all go through their growing pains in learning how to sit and go headdown. Of course these new freefliers aren't really freeflying, they are pretty much like a belly flier with brief moments of flying fast vertical speeds (hey we all went through our growing pains learning to freefly). And thus tend to drift down the jump run much like a belly flier would (mainly because they are exposed to the upper winds longer than a freeflier). In fact I had a close call with one of these jumpers on Saturday. I was doing a two-way headdown jump (I'm no freefly rock star, but it was a good solid headdown jump) and upon breakoff and deployment, I hear the sound of a canopy opening and about 20-30 feet behind me I see the guy who jumped after my group opening up. Now numerous things could have happened on this jump. The guy following my group may not have given us proper separation, he may have been backsliding (as he is currently known to do) into our airspace. But I think one of the main culprits for this close call was that he was drifting horizontally across the sky much more than I was because he wasn't able to stay in a freefly sit (in otherwords he's still in his floppy stages of developing as a freeflier). So instead of chewing him out for almost killing me (as well as himself), myself and some of the more experienced freefliers at the DZ are going to try and include this new jumper category in the exit order. So here goes:

Belly fliers (largest to smallest groups)
Floppers (people learning to freefly but still flopping)
Freefliers (largest to smallest groups)
AFFs
Tandems
High Pullers

We need to convey to the floppers, that it's okay to be stuck in this stage (everyone flops when they first learn to freefly), but they need to be honest with us when we ask them how their sit is and in some cases the floppers should have to make a two-way jump with a more experience freeflier to ensure that they are not corking all over the sky before they be allowed to be included in the freeflier groups.

Once again I am no freefly rock star, but I do maintain a stable sit and am coming along nicely with my headdown skills and I write all of this in the name of safety. There's been way too many close calls happening around the DZ and we might as well try and reduce the risks where we can reduce them.

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

[nightjumps 1]

Excellent recommendation. Seen what happened to you more than once.

[Hooknswoop 19]

Great idea. This has been done at some level at different DZ's, but should be the standard.

Hook

[Professor 0]

Definitely a good idea. A good way to think of exit order is probably "slower fallers out earlier". At least for upwind jump run.

Ted

Ted
Like a giddy school girl.

[Jimbo 0]

Quote

Belly fliers (largest to smallest groups)
Floppers (people learning to freefly but still flopping)
Freefliers (largest to smallest groups)
AFFs
Tandems
High Pullers

Funny, I was talking about this very subject over the weekend (and a few beers so the details are a bit fuzzy). Anyhow, I think we came up with was the following:

Floppers - you're never quite sure where they'll end up, but you can be reasonably sure they'll get there before the belly flyers. I think having the floppers down and open first is better than having them backslide into a belly group below them, make sense?

Belly fliers (largest to smallest groups)

Freefliers (largest to smallest groups)

AFFs

Tandems

I don't think that high pullers should go out last, I think that they should go out according to the dive they're doing. The name of the game here is horizontal separation.

Comments?

-
Jim

"Like" - The modern day comma
Good bye, my friends. You are missed.

[Hooknswoop 19]

I cant think of two reasons not put floppers out first:

1) They fall faster than belly fliers, which is the same reason belly fliers go before free flyers.

2) They tend to not have a lot of jumps and pull high, so it sets up a dangerous situation with a flopper going out ahead of a belly flier group, backsliding under them, then pulling high.

The bottom line is plenty of separation between groups. Having the free-flyers help the floppers on exit spacing could help prevent them from leaving too early.

Hook

[Jimbo 0]

Quote

1) They fall faster than belly fliers, which is the same reason belly fliers go before free flyers.

They fall faster, but there's usually no way to tell where they're going to fall. Someone doing/learning solo headdown jumps, for example, where will he end up? There's a part of me that doesn't think it's such a great idea for them to be out over other groups. You can say that people shouldn't be donig HD jumps until they have enough awareness to recognize that they're sliding all over creation, unfortunately most don't wait that long. Otherwise, I agree, this is all about horizontal separation.

-
Jim

"Like" - The modern day comma
Good bye, my friends. You are missed.

[councilman24 36]

Not only do floppers flop, but they don't exit "head down" into the relative wind. Which means they don't get thrown as far an experienced freeflyer flying the relative wind. I've whatched lots of exits where the order made since on paper but not in the air. As a flopper, and someone who could keep track of others in the air, at WFFC I'd usually try to go out last when I was trying to learn, knowing my limited abilites in free flying and better skills at avoidance.

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

[CanuckInUSA 0]

It's important for all new floppers to be doing their jumps perpendicular to the flight line. Of course it's easy for people to tell the floppers about this, but once in the air, you've got no control as to how the jump goes.

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

[billvon 2,391]

>I think having the floppers down and open first is better than having
>them backslide into a belly group below them, make sense?

Except newbie freeflyers (i.e. floppers) don't tend to pull at 2000 feet, and if you put a faster group out first they will tend to slide beneath the slower following group - and experienced 4-way jumpers _do_ tend to pull closer to 2000 feet. I could see you wanting to do this if you didn't trust them to provide a safe exit separation, but then the first RW group would need to take a much longer than normal delay before exiting to ensure safe separation.

[billvon 2,391]

I can see a few problems with the proposed exit order:

1. You have to get a skydiver to admit they're not that great, and that they have to exit in the "incompetent" position in the lineup; that's very difficult to do. (I know, you didn't present it that way, but that's the way they will see it)

2. The problem with new sitflyers/headdowners is not (in my experience) that they cork but that they track all over the place. If this is the issue the only thing that will protect against collisions is greater separation from other groups - putting them before the 'regular' freeflyers will give them no more protection unless that extra timing is in place.

[ixlr82 7]

2. The problem with new sitflyers/headdowners is not (in my experience) that they cork but that they track all over the place. If this is the issue the only thing that will protect against collisions is greater separation from other groups - putting them before the 'regular' freeflyers will give them no more protection unless that extra timing is in place. 

-------------------
Speaking from personal experience, an inexperienced freeflier can cover an insane amount of horizontal distance accidently. I think it's great to tell us/them to sit-fly perpendicular to the line of flight, but I don't think that level of awareness is abundant in many newer freefliers. In my opinion extra long separation times are required. Maybe sometimes requiring a second pass. I suspect many DZO's are not terribly interested in that prospect. I enjoyed jumping at Elsinore. They seemed to take an occasional second pass. Is that common?

__________________________________________

[Clownburner 0]

Elsinore often makes second passes, especially if the uppers are strong and the otter is full.


I've worried about this when trying to learn to sit fly. I know I'm corking and sliding all over the place, but there's not a lot I can do about that at the moment. I try to give extra time to the group in front of me, and let the people behind me know to give me extra time too. I'd happily leave in a different order to improve safety - how do I get the other people on the load to agree to let me go before the rest of the freefliers? Tell them I'm a belly flyer?

..And I open at 4000 when I'm "sit corking."

7CP#1 | BTR#2 | Payaso en fuego Rodriguez
"I want hot chicks in my boobies!"- McBeth

[Push 0]

I'm one of those floppers. I'm learning to sit, and according to all the explanations I'm probably backtracking like no tomorrow. Plus, an excellent coach (David Brown) jumped with me on Saturday and said that my fallrate goes from 140mph to 110mph on a dime as I'm doing cartwheels and what not, all unintentionally. I believe him. However, I can't see anything that I can do about it. I have no control over my sit whatsoever yet, and I can't turn perpendicular to the flightline. I have enough awareness to find the direction I need to be pointed, I just can't face that direction. Exiting between the belly and the freeflyers sounds good, but the only thing I can really think of that will help is another pass.

-- Toggle Whippin' Yahoo
Skydiving is easy. All you have to do is relax while plummetting at 120 mph from 10,000' with nothing but some nylon and webbing to save you.

[callahan 0]

I think you guys are right on with the other pass . I've had two close ones that the people didn't have a clue with what was going on . I think people should get out after the tandems and pull high until they can stay perpendicular to the line of flight .I'm alot more careful to quiz the guy before and after me to size up the situation . I realized that if I had done that before , a different result could've turned out from better planning .

[freakydiver 0]

Good ideas Canuck! If I may add in one comment, two weeks ago I was at Mile Hi. There were NO uppers whatsoever. Time and time again I saw solo headdowners giving 5 seconds. Thats a recipe for disaster. I think alot is to be said for seperation times and people really need to be educated on what sufficient seperation "seconds" are. I'd be willing to bet more often than not, people just plain do not give nearly enough seperation.

-- (N.DG) "If all else fails – at least try and look under control." --

[tbrown 26]

I'm an old time belly flyer who's going to be taking the plunge into all this sit flying and head down stuff pretty soon. I expect to go through a floppy stage, or "ugly duckling", as I've always called it. I'm wondering if some intentional tracking off the windline, on exit would help. If most of these people are low timers, then tracking's a skill they all need to learn on anyway. If they're leaving the plane at 13 grand, then tracking for the road at the far end of the property shouldn't be too big of a deal before they sit up, stand up, head down, or do the moonwalk, which they should have plenty of time left to do. They have to maintain altitude awareness (whether with a visual or audible alti, or both) anyway don't they ? I found myself doing some solos a few weeks ago and enjoyed the heck out of a high long track with some snap rolls. By pull time I could watch the 4 way I'd followed break off and open, only I was so far off the windline and away from them it didn't matter. Today's squares seem to be up to the job of getting us back from a long spot, so why not start a floppy dive by tracking off the windline ?

Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

[PhillyKev 0]

Hmm, then if you introduce tracking out the door, where do you place them? Because now you've got even more drift (at least at the start of the dive) then an RW. And if their track sucks (b/c they're a newbie)...

I think it's getting too complex. My guess is that the original issue was caused by not leaving enough time between groups. That's probably the more important parameter here. Especially when you're getting to the end of the load, people start rushing to get out the door.

[DJL 232]

Here's a good example. When I got off of AFF but didn't have my A license, I thought belly flying solo was pretty boring so I tried to sit fly. I saw or heard somewhere that you should stay perpedicular to the jump line so I did just that. This was about jump #12, and I didn't know a thing about sit flying, was using the DZ student gear. Thinking back, it wasn't a sit that I was in so much as lying on my back and trying to sit up enough to look down between my feet. I was probably all over the place but was very cautious to stay perpendicular to the jump line.

So, there will be people like me who just do it because that's what they see on the good after-hours video, so I think it should be part of the DZ's training (Not USPA) that new jumpers get told about jump separation and who should go where and why. I was, and so were the surrounding groups, lucky that I just happened to run into it.

"I encourage all awesome dangerous behavior." - Jeffro Fincher

[frig 0]

Sitting perpendicular to jump run helps, but I agree we could modify the exit order a bit. Why do we not want to send out the solo free flyers first and then the groups after that? This would take care of all the floppers, and the experienced solos should not be a problem for the group exiting after them.

[dsbbreck 0]

Canuck and I were talking about all of this last weekend, and what I like most about this plan is now the more experienced freeflyers can help the newbies with the seperation issue. We can show them what proper seperation times are and then we can give them proper seperation as well and then nobody ends up on top of everyone else.

At a big DZ it's hard to keep track of who is new to freeflying and is therefor who is a flopper, but at a smaller DZ like Mile Hi, everybody knows everyone and if you, as an experience freeflyer, haven't jumped with them, then the chances are they are a flopper and we should inquire as to their skill level. Besides, this just helps brings skydivers closer together. Perhaps we can teach them something to make them better freeflyers and then there are just more people to jump with.

Pass on your knowledge sky gods. The more you teach, the less dangerous those newbies will be.

David

"Socrates wasn't killed because he had the answer.......he was killed because he asked the question."

[jurgencamps 0]

"Floppers can drift in all (360 °) directions. They will drift only in 1 direction. So I follow Hookswoop. Just keep a fair distance between the groups and keep the normal exit order.

Jurgen

[kyros1 0]

Quote

.... Now numerous things could have happened on this jump. The guy following my group may not have given us proper separation, he may have been backsliding (as he is currently known to do) into our airspace. ....

A good separation is something that will help. As I remember when I was getting freefly coach jumps we were jumping before experienced freeflyers.

[78RATS 0]

I noticed Heath Richardson doing this a lot at WFFC a few years ago. If he saw a solo freeflyer - he would assume he was learning and would put him out before himself. This gave him total control over the seperation between him and the learner.

He also told us at a seminar to treat a beginning freeflyer like a ten way. Give em plenty of space.



(Not trying to speak for ya Heath. Just somethin I learned from ya)


ps: I personally do not like putting out high pullers anywhere in front of me - horizontal seperation or not. That's just me. I know others disagree.

Rat for Life - Fly till I die
When them stupid ass bitches ask why

[lazyfrog 0]

you always have to see what the exit axis is compared to the wind... Was in Empuria last week and the order is : Tandems, Big Groups, Small Groups, Solos, AFF (groups are first freefly, then flat).
The major problem is to have people understanding that Speeders HAVE to go first... They fall much quicker, don't usually pull very high and mainly have quite small canopies...
At my DZ tandems go last, always.
And we usually recommend to have a good horizontal separation (7-10 sec depending on who is jumping) and also to have people trying to keep a work axis perpendicular to jump run

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Fumer tue, péter pue
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ourson #10, Mosquito Uno, CBT 579