ringsight entanglement video

[pilotdave 0]

Not my video, but I think there's a lot to learn from it...

http://www.skydivingmovies.com/ver2/pafiledb.php?action=file&id=7005

Dave

[piahenzi 0]

How timely this video is. I just this past Friday finally had Laszlo attach the $200+ piece of equipment on my helmet.. fast forward to load 1 next day....spinning mal... I think the excess brakeline caught on the ringsight, caused a toggle fire and the rest is spinny line twist history...I made 1 jump with it - nylon screws - everything cleared beautifully, including the sight which is somewhere over the trees in Gardiner NY.... will be working for free for another weekend to pay for everything but those nylon screws were key I am sure.

[FrancoR 0]

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Not my video, but I think there's a lot to learn from it...

http://www.skydivingmovies.com/ver2/pafiledb.php?action=file&id=7005

Dave

And a lot of questions.

Did he have a cutaway on his helmet?
Did he have nylon screws?
And if not why do people still jump the ringsights that have a single metal post stickung out with no possibility for nylon screws?
If he did have nylon screws we need to think of something else.

This kind of thing keeps happening every once in a while and sometimes even kills people.

Frank

If it does not cost anything you are the product.

[JSE 1]

One thing i noticed immediately was how much excess brake line was flapping around. Thats a lot! Not stowing all that excess in some way (on the back of the risers, looping it around the stub of the toggle, something) is a problem waiting to happen.

[PhreeZone 15]

I also noticed he was looking up to catch the deployment of the canopy, even with out my cameras on my head I keep my head on the horizon and only look up once the canopy is open. Looking back to watch your canopy open is asking to have your side mounted camera to suffer a riser slap at some point. That line needs stowed big time and securely, not just shoved down the little loop on the back but lock it down like how UPT says to stow their Pin toggles. It keep the excess from ever blowing out and causing any issues.

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

[tetra316 0]

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I also noticed he was looking up to catch the deployment of the canopy

That's also the first thing I noticed. Never look up with anything on your head

[HSPScott 0]

I agree, I always keep my head down through opening shock. I also stow my brake lines a lot better than that.

[pilotdave 0]

So he commented that he did have nylon screws holding his ringsight on. He was unable to rip the sight off.

Anybody ever sacrificed a set of nylon screws to see how hard it really is?

Dave

[linestretch 0]

Really?....never look up? Even w/ the still & flash & video, I always look up. Maybe it's cuz I like to know what's comin. Also, I shrug my shoulders so the helmet sits on the yoke of the rig to support the weight. And to add....my ring site is huge and nasty and I don't have nylon screws. Yes, I know it's bad news.

my pics & stuff!

[tetra316 0]

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Really?....never look up? Even w/ the still & flash & video, I always look up. Maybe it's cuz I like to know what's comin. Also, I shrug my shoulders so the helmet sits on the yoke of the rig to support the weight. And to add....my ring site is huge and nasty and I don't have nylon screws. Yes, I know it's bad news.

You're just a little crazy

What about if you had a hard opening? Keeping your neck in alignment has to be better than looking up and taking the force with a bent neck....

[linestretch 0]

from my experience....the hard opening comes so damn quickly....you don't even have the time to look anywhere so you end up getting a shot of whiplash w/ your head slamming forward. So once that window of pain has passed...yes I look up and watch what's comin. My head isn't all the way back. And like I said, I shrug my shoulders to rest the back of my helmet on my rig. It works awesome and takes the rest of the load.

my pics & stuff!

[frost 1]

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Really?....never look up? Even w/ the still & flash & video, I always look up.

Maybe it's cuz I like to know what's comin.

Ever had a whiplash? :) Some of the best advice someone gave me - keep your chin on your chest. Also, as you know, looking up may cause asymmetrical body position and add unwanted input, not too good on smaller canopies.

With so many jumps you'd FEEL what's coming as soon as the dbag leaves the containder and the first stow is released, no? ;) If it feels like there is a problem, then it's time to look. But that's just me

As far as the jumper in the video... I wonder what kind of canopy and his experience level? It looked like from 2:24 do 2:32 he was flying fairly straight, not spinning much... Thats more then enough time to try to release the other toggle and attempt to even out the risers...

[980 0]

I wish the OP would comment.

It seems to me a lot of people are overlooking the fact that he was in a wingsuit.

I would guess a fairly inexperienced wingsuit pilot by his exit and losing his flock that quick.

I think it is likely he still had his armwings zipped up during the entire episode, as you never see him unzipping or see his hands come up and try to clear the entanglement, or straighten out the canopy or try and hookknife the offending brakeline.

This would explain why he felt unable to rip a few piddly nylon screws off.

This also raises the question of why have a ringsight on your helmet for wingsuit?

Kinda makes sense if you are shooting stills, but not really for WS documenting.

I would be interested in knowing the experience level of this jumper in regards of total experience, wingsuit experience and camera related experience.

Not too mention leaving that much brakeline unstowed is asking for just what he got.

I would also love to see some pics of his ringsight setup. I see tons of jumpers not trim the posts and mount their sight miles away from their head. It seems quite logical that this would only make this kind of entanglement more likely.

That said, this video makes me think I should get a hookknife again, as this particular incident looks like it would've been easily remedied with one.

I'm posting a pointer in the WS forum, hopefully OP will then find his way here.

[DSE 3]

For the guy that jumps tandems, fun jumps, and wingsuits but has only one helmet, I can see needing a ringsight, but this is a perfect example of a removable ringsite like Schumachers.
Pia's post provides some good insight as well. Glad to hear about the nylon screws working as expected. It calls to mind JC Colclasure's entanglement with the camera that ripped the top from the bottom of the camera.
One comment he makes at the first of the video is that "there is no snag point on this helmet" until he mounted a ringsite. Actually, look closely at the ladder strap. My first camera jump with a friend's helmet that had a similar strap resulted in the riser striking the excess strap and giving my head a good toss, and unseating the chin cup from my chin. This was one of the reasons I chose to purchase a Tonfly, but I think that trimming excess strap is probably nearly as good.

As an aside, until recently I've always kept my excess stowed with rubber bands attached to the slinks. I've only recently started not using the bands in favor of the toggle keeps on the risers. Kinda considering going back to the bands, which keep the excess not only much tighter, but stowed much higher as well.

Thoughts?

[dragon2 0]

I jump my big camera helmet for wingsuiting sometimes, including the ringsite (non-removable and mounted with metal popnails) if I want to take stills. I do have hookknives and a helmet cutaway though, 2 things I'm missing on this video and 2 things that should be MANDATORY IMO.

He should have either cut the line or cutaway the helmet before cutting away his canopy, as this situation could've resulted in a more permanent horseshoe and/or neck injuries, he was real lucky the helmet came off the way it did.

Camera flying is not easy when things go to sh*t, you need the extra altitude/time sometimes (esp. with a wingsuit which may further complicate things), being properly prepared for trouble gear-wise (helmet cutaway, hookknive, suitable canopy, etc) is the least you should do.

ciel bleu,
Saskia

[bodypilot1 0]

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It seems to me a lot of people are overlooking the fact that he was in a wingsuit.
I would guess a fairly inexperienced wingsuit pilot by his exit and losing his flock that quick.

Dont you know you have to have a camera on your helmet to be cool? And I agree with your guess to inexperience. When he makes his turn,and I'm guessing it's back to the dz, the small open area you see below him is in the same spot. He seems to be covering absolutely no ground.

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I think it is likely he still had his armwings zipped up during the entire episode, as you never see him unzipping or see his hands come up and try to clear the entanglement, or straighten out the canopy or try and hookknife the offending brakeline.

I'd say it's because of the angle the snagged line is keeping camera at.

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This also raises the question of why have a ringsight on your helmet for wingsuit?

And why buy a snag free design helmet, and then add something to it to get snagged? With the wide angle lens, why use a ringsight?

www.WestCoastWingsuits.com
www.PrecisionSkydiving.com

[monkycndo 0]

I always stow the excess brake line going to the outer side of the risers & into the elastic keeper. Just to give a little more distance to any possible snag point on the helmet. I triple up the brake line in the elastic so very little is exposed.

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Jump an Infinity

[980 0]

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I'd say it's because of the angle the snagged line is keeping camera at.

I don't think so.

you can see the left riser cutaway housing end, white loop, yellow cable for a long time, which shows the helmet is still pointing in a relatively normal direction

[piisfish 136]

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Not my video, but I think there's a lot to learn from it...

from my experience the first lesson learnt is not that a wingsuit jump is not "just another skydive". A video jump is " not just another skydive" in the first place

yes indeed, a helmet cutaway would have been very useful, cutting away the wings too (not shown on the video, maybe he did).

also in my malfunction, my 1st priority was having a clear head, mythought was if the canopy opened, I'd have my head chopped off.

may the author of the vid try and break the screws now he has everything back ? what is the result ?

does anyone else think jumping with an RSL, of any kind, with a video is a bad idea ?

glad the jumper came down physically unhurt, could have had a permanent head on a swivel

scissors beat paper, paper beat rock, rock beat wingsuit - KarlM

[Jeff.Donohue 0]

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I wish the OP would comment.

I'm the OP.

Going through the questions that have been asked both here and on skydivingmovies.com:

Background

Let me start by saying that if I was in elementary school, I would be writing, "I will not be a dumbass" 100 times on the blackboard. I consider myself very lucky to have not killed myself by cutting it away the way I did.

This video was filmed in November 2007. The video was posted to my YouTube account, http://youtube.com/user/huxley71 in January 2008. I had not planned on posting it to skydivingmovies because, quite frankly, I think I committed every mistake known to man (and some novel ones that I am considering filing a patent for). I was encouraged to post it by a fellow jumper on the odd chance that it might help someone else.

Me

At the time, I had very few wingsuit jumps (as was noted, you can clearly see that I don't fly forward very far/fast and I drop like a stone out of the plane). I had about 40 RW camera jumps at the time. I have had a few more wingsuit jumps since then. However, I was and am a rank newbie, although every so often I like to think I am progressing.

As I will explain below, the mal had very little to do with it being a wingsuit dive and a lot to do with it being a camera dive. While I think my statement that "wingsuits are not just another skydive" is true, I think it would have been more relevant to say, "camera jumps are not..." Wingsuiting was the newer of the two things to me, though.

As an aside, I got a video camera to take clips of friends and because I wanted to share our sport with friends and family. I don't consider myself a videographer (even an aspiring one), but rather "someone who jumps with a video camera, too". I will leave wingsuit video to guys who do a great job at it, like Scotty Burns or Matt Hoover.

The helmet had a cutaway mechanism (the picture at the beginning of the video is not of my helmet but of a "stock model" FFX that did not have a cutaway).

I did not carry a hook knife at the time. I do now.

What Worked

I was flying (badly) a TonySuit Mach 1. I was able to unzip my arms normally; I did not need to cut my wings away. The suit created no issues for me, other than a dry cleaning bill after the jump.

What Didn't

In retrospect and after thinking about it for several months, I think that the malfunction had far less to do with it being a wingsuit jump and a lot more to do with my inexperience and dumb decisions relating to flying a camera helmet (putting a ring sight on there in the first place when I really didn't care so much about the video, looking up to watch the pretty canopy colors go "whoosh" over my head, etc.) combined with sloppy toggle stowing.

Ironically, I got extensive training (thanks, Flock U) on how to fly a wingsuit (even though you wouldn't know it from my poor flight performance in that video -- I've got better with experience). On the other hand, I got no training (didn't seek it out) on how to fly a camera helmet. Dumb.

For what it's worth, I normally stow my excess exactly as recommended by UPT, however it only takes one moment of being sloppy to create a problem like this.

To answer one question: the steering line did indeed pull my head back while I was struggling with it.

How I Dealt With It

In short: wrongly.

My procedures for dealing with an entanglement were utterly out of sequence. I should have cut the helmet away (and, if necessary because it was still entangled, removed the RSL hook and cutaway the main). Why didn't I? Probably panic. Fear makes people do dumb stuff.

The "duress" I referenced had to do with personal life stuff. The skydive (malfunction and all) was actually one of the better things that happened to me that day. However, it is clear to me in retrospect that my stressed out mindset (plus the fear I mentioned before) had a bad influence on my responses.

I had a Skyhook RSL. I am not going to wade into that controversy, but I had one.

The canopy was a Sabre2 210. It was wingloaded at roughly 0.9. Even "big floaty canopies" can spin up.

[PharmerPhil 0]

Hey Jeff, Thanks for the info and insight into this mishap. (And thanks for posting this on youtube too, I hate sights that require you to sign on just to view stuff.)

For what it's worth, I almost always use packers (even Christian ;-)), but I always stow my brakes and excess lines on the landing field as soon as I land so I don't have to count on a packer to do that for me Doing it on the field ensures they get stowed even if someone else shleps my rig into the hanger. It is just too important to leave to chance. How I stow the lines depends on the risers I use. My newer Sunpath risers have a stow that works great, but if I have to jump a rig with a riser that isn't too secure, I can usually fold and stuff the lines into the same pocket that the toggle stow goes in to, actually using the toggle tab to push the lines into the pocket.

[Jeff.Donohue 0]

Hi Phil.

Yeah, I always field stow (and I have a Vector3, which has the true lock toggle set up which in theory should keep the stow secure). The problem on this jump was that I think I was in a hurry -- on the jump before -- to get out of the field and get packed up (last jump of the day, running late to get home, etc.), and I don't think I stowed them quite as well as I normally do. We can see the result of being careless even once...

Oh, and just clear up some confusion: what I screamed out during the flight had nothing to do with the packer (Christian was down in VA when this got packed). Nor does it have anything to do with any sort of religious conviction or faith. That's about all I'll say about it.

[piahenzi 0]

I ALWAYS stow my excess brake line but this was one of those incidents where I used a packer, did not ask him specifically to do so, got the sight mounted the next day and BLAM!!! the first time offense of the golden rule caused the loss.... it only takes one time.... hard lessons to learn but there you have it... I've learned it ... never assume anything..
Even when using a packer for any reason, I am/was always religious about stowing my own brakes, slider etc., but since I am really new to tandem vid, my darling packer was kind enough to let me drop and go to do the dubbing so I had the extra few minutes as the pressure is on at the DZ to produce the vid and stills in 10mins...

I didn't even THINK about asking him to make sure that the extra brakeline was stowed...

I'll be doing all that stuff myself from now on... and get that video to the student in 13 mins instead :)