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steve1

stopping a down plane

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If you get a 2 canopy out and get to a downplane, CUTAWAY! A cutaway will be your best bet of survial in this type of sitution. As for CReW downplanes, you can move them back to side by sides or dragplanes once you learn CReW.
I want to touch the sky, I want to fly so high ~ Sonique

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Basically, there's two issues:
1. Are the canopies clear of each other? If not, don't cut away, because they may entangle and you'll go from 2 working canopies to none. If they are clear (as they usually are in a downplane) you are more likely to clear the main when you cut it away.
2. Will the stuff over your head land you safely? If you have biplane or side-by-side, and it's somewhat controllable, it's generally a good idea to mess with it as little as possible and land beneath it. CRW jumpers initiate downplanes by pulling hard on an outside toggle or rear riser, so avoid doing that. Very gentle turns and no flaring will generally get you down in one piece.
If it's not going to land you safely (i.e. uncontrollable) you may want to force a downplane so you can chop the main. Make sure your risers are clear before you try - in rare cases the main risers "trap" the reserve risers, and cutting away will guarantee a collapsed reserve.
-bill von

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I have read that it is good to know how to stop a downplane, when you have two canopies out. Can anyone elaborate on this further? What downplane scenario would you want to cut away from?


The only way I know of to safely(relatively) stop a downplane where YOU have two canopies out is to cutaway the main....as Bill stated, make sure the risers are clear......but, chances are you will cutaway from ANY downplane you encounter due to a 2 out, because your descent rate will not be survivable and you will probably not stop the downplane without causing a nasty entanglement..
If you want to stop a downplane with your main and somebody else's main.....just release grips.. ;)
Mike

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Thanks for all the great input on this guys. I was also wondering what would be a minimum altitude to cut away from a downplane. I was on a load last summer at Lost Prairie where 8 or 10 people went low and a couple of cypresses fired. One guy finally cut away his main a couple hundred feet above the ground. For some reason his main then collapsed and he really messed up his back. The ambulance hauled him in to town. So I don't think cutting away at 200 feet would be good. How about 500? I suppose at any altitude something could happen. Thanks, Steve

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"what would be a minimum altitude to cut away from a downplane. "
If the canopies are clear of each other and you go into a downplane at a low altitude, cut away as long as you have time to plan out. About the same altitude that a hook turn is done would be the absolute minimum. I've seen video of someone landing a downplane and it did not look nice, he did live though.
René

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For some reason his main then collapsed and he really messed up his back


I'm assuming you meant his reserve collapsed.
To answer your question - the minimum to cut away from a downplane? Why? It goes into a downplane, cut-away. There's no sense saying "well, it just went into a downplane at 150 feet, and that's below the min, so I should just ride this in" You realize that in a downplane, you're screaming at the ground at 60 mph - you won't live through that. Cut away, and hope your reserve planes out (maybe help it a little)
I ain't happy, I'm feeling glad
I got sunshine, in a bag

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I was also wondering what would be a minimum altitude to cut away from a downplane.


Mininum? Guess I might not bother if I only had 10 or 12 feet until impact. :)You have 3 possible situations if remember correctly so we're all using the same terms:
Side by side - two canopies are out but flying side by side. If controllable, don't cut away and don't flare on landing.
Biplane - two out, one in front of the other. If controllable, don't cut away and don't flare on landing.
Downplane - two out, one will be below you the other above. They are working against each other and are probably causing you to dive at a high rate of speed. Disconnect your RSL and cutaway.
You might want to buy the video "Break-Away!", it gives video examples of what each situation looks like and how to respond.

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Wild Blue,
Sorry for the mistake. I did mean that his reserve collapsed rather than his main. I probably should buy a malfunction video. I didn't realize that a down plane on your main would create such speeds toward the ground. Wouldn't a fully inflated reserve slow you down, if you had two canopies out. Sorry for the dumb questions. Most of my 400 jumps are on rounds in the olden days. Thanks for the info. Steve

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"Any insight about two canopies out when the reserve is round??"
I think you HAVE to cut away the main. I have seen a couple reserve rides on -1C but they only have 8 knts forward drive. I don't think a square and round would fly well together.
"I got some beers....Let's Drink em!!!"
Clay

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I cant be bothered to look up the reference, but as I remember, round and square is a very stable configuration. You do not need to cut away, although the reserve will be flying behind the main and will probably not interfere if you do cutaway.
Remster
Muff 914

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Steve,
Here's sorta what a downplane would look like:
http://www.kaybee.org/~kirk/pics/skydiving/crw/downplane/
In this case, it's two jumpers (two mains) creating the downplane. What's we're talking about is the same looking thing, except imagine one of those mains is your reserve. And though it doesn't quite look like it in the picture, they flying almost straight down. Take the wing off an airplane, point it straight down... think it's going to slow you down any? Not a survivable configuration.
Hope that helps.
I ain't happy, I'm feeling glad
I got sunshine, in a bag

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>Any insight about two canopies out when the reserve is round??
If you are going to have a dual deployment, and/or are using a cypres in case you get knocked out, a round reserve is the thing to have. We used them in NY and had several people land under two canopies. The main sort of floats out front, not doing much, as you come down under the reserve. And if you're unconscious, a round has some obvious advantages.
-bill von

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I have seen a situation where the jumper had both canopies out in a downplane and was unable to release the main.
He was able to pull on the rear risers of the main canopy (presumably the fastest/most ground hungry canopy) and slow the descent for a bit. He did this several times and timed the landing to flair the rear risers and walked away.
Unfortunately 'helpful' people messed with the gear and no determination was ever made for why the main won't release.
Red, White and Blue Skies,
John T. Brasher D-5166

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"jumper had both canopies out in a downplane and was unable to release the main."
I saw one that had trouble getting rid of the main after a low pull FXC fire. It took him 20 seconds probably to untangle the risers after he pulled the cut away handle.
"It's the cans..they're defective. Stay away from the cans"-Steve Martin
Clay

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Any insight about two canopies out when the reserve is round??


Never seen by myself as I'm quite new in the sport, but what I've been told is that round reserve is the more dominant, and the main will collapse or just "float" behind. And it is quite stable combination.
So no need to cut-away. And besides, why would one want to cut-away if there are two fully inflated canopies out (assuming you're not in the downplane)? Cutting away just creates a huge risk of entanglement.
j.

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If you have biplane or side-by-side, and it's somewhat controllable, it's generally a good idea to mess with it as little as possible and land beneath it. CRW jumpers initiate downplanes by pulling hard on an outside toggle or rear riser, so avoid doing that. Very gentle turns and no flaring will generally get you down in one piece.

I've read this in more or less the same wording in lots of different places. What I've been wondering is do you release the brakes on none, one or both canopies. I can easily imagine lots of things going wrong when releasing the brakes from deployment setting due to the increased drive of the canopy, but then again I don't recall having seen explicit instructions not to release the brakes...
Could anyone enlighten me on this?
Thanks,
:)Ramon :)

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"Could anyone enlighten me on this?"
This I can tell you from experience! I released the brakes when I had two out. I released the ones on the main(it was in front) I only did this because I saw I would have to make a turn to stay out of the trees! Of course as soon as I released the brakes the front canopy started to "run" away from the reserve in the back. I ended up bringing in about half brakes to keep them together. Made slow easy turns and kept myself away from hazards. In retrospect...now that I have a lot more jumps I wouldn't unstow anything. Just use the rear risers to make slight course adjustments and DONT MESS WITH FLYING CANOPIES!!! People get all upset thinking they HAVE to cut away one of them. It's not necessary and I think ups your chances of having MAJOR problems. Take the slow easy ride down and PLF. I actually flared the front canopy when I was at about 10 ft off the ground and just slid in on my butt. Very soft landing and only slid about 3 ft. To be expected with about 455 sq ft of canopy over head. Now...once my feet were on the ground I got pissed!! WTF was that Crap!!!!! I didn't pull low! WTF did my reserve come out!!!! :D
"It's the cans..they're defective. Stay away from the cans"-Steve Martin
Clay

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