BirdMan Flat-Spin Recovery

[kimgriffin 0]

Hi Bird People!

Jari and I were witness to an interesting and somewhat scary situation during a 4-way flight last weekend at Skydive DeLand. I’d like to share the story with you so that you will, in turn, share the information with other birds.

Just after our 4-way exited the Twin Otter around 13,500 ft, two fliers bumped into one another causing one to get over the other’s burble. This guy (who, by the way, was wearing a Skyflyer) went through the other jumper’s burble without a collision but ended up flipped over on his back. He began a slow, slightly diving spin. (It was much quicker than it sounds in writing.) At first glance the turn didn’t seem like anything to be concerned about. Within seconds, though, the spin became surprisingly fast and flat. He was in a flat spin on his back and losing altitude quickly (for a wingsuit jump anyway.)

He arched like mad and tried to use a flipping motion to get himself back over, but the speed of the spin continued to increase. I saw that he was very aware of what was going on and was trying just about everything to get out of the spin. He ended up cutting away his arm wings to try to regain stability (which he said was very easy to do even with the G-forces), but that still did not fix the problem.

Finally, he closed all three wings and started to curl up in to a ball. Even before he could ball up completely, his spin stopped, he arched and was quickly stable on his belly again around 8,000 ft.
The moral of the story is, if you get in to a spin (no matter if it is on your belly, back or side) that is not controllable by arching and relaxing then you may want to implement what we are calling the flat spin recovery technique. Here is the technique we recommend:

Once you realize you are in an uncontrollable spin, don’t waste time and altitude! Quickly tuck into a ball by bringing your arms and knees to your chest. There is no need to cut away your wings to do this. This body position closes all 3 wings and will put you in to a butt-to-earth position. You will kill the spin’s momentum, which will enable you to control your suit again. You will be falling like a safe in that position so, again, don’t waist time and altitude – arch to flip back on to your belly. Then calmly and symmetrically re-spread your wings.

What you don’t want to do in a flat-spin situation is waste time. The jumper above has thousands of jumps, is a BirdMan instructor and a very heads up guy. But, he just did not have this recovery technique programmed in to his emergency procedures.

From what we have heard and personally encountered at BirdMan, uncontrollable spins are not common. The accounts we have heard of have been on the Skyflyer. But we don't want to limit the possibility that it could happen on a GTi or Classic. Many flyers out there are getting very radical in their suits (Skyflyers included) and have not encountered the problem. I have put myself in to a faster spin than I had counted on (for a stupid reason I won't get in to here ), but my Skyflyer’s momentum ended up stopping with me just arching, bending my legs up, and countering the turn (I was on my belly). I could feel the momentum slowing down, so I knew the spinny ride would soon come to an end.

But, the spin described above is quite different - you feel out of control. But, it can be a mere blip in your flight if you handle the situation quickly and correctly.

Of course, once Mother Earth is coming close you should hold off on any radical maneuvers that could cause instability. But, that is the case with all types of skydiving. You may never get in to this type of spin, but you should always plan on Murphy joining in on any given skydive.

Have a plan on how to handle every emergency – big or small – and if you have questions pertaining to BirdMan suits, please email us at [email protected]. Like many of you out there, we are learning as wingsuit flying grows. We welcome your input. Feel free to pass this information on to others in the flock. Spread the love.

Thank you for your time.

Blue skies and long soars...

Kim Griffin
BirdMan Inc
Business Manager, BMI, flight fanatic

-Kimberly Griffin

[skyboyblue 0]

I'm no wing suit pilot, nor do I play one on tv but I do have a question if you are in a flat spin. wouldn't tucking your arms and legs in a ball actually increase the speed of the turn much like ice skaters tuck their arms in and spin on a given spot?

[cobaltdan 0]

on my 3rd skyflyer jump i was playing monkey see monkey do witha friend. while trying to fly over then under him i fliped on my back and bumped. i went into a flat spin. it was definately freaky and my solution was the same. arching did not help and fliping over was not working so i balled up and rolled over at the same time, then went back to an arch then track. balling up definately works.

sincerely,

dan<><>

Daniel Preston <><>
atairaerodynamics.com (sport)
atairaerospace.com (military)

[vesatoro 0]

I'm too a bit concerned about this advice. What correcter the situation in this case, may not work in another. And may also lead to more problems. The reason is the law of circular momentum that increases the rotational speed when the radius of rotation is decreased. perform continuous loops from standup position and then go to tuck position and see what happens.

Kim wrote:
>Finally, he closed all three wings and started to curl up in to a ball. Even before he could ball up completely, his spin stopped, he arched...<

In my opinion, this only indicates that as he started to curl it changed his position from one to another. The new position was aerodynamically more or less opposite to the position causing the spinning and stopped it.

just my thoughts

Vesa
BMI

"Fear is the path to the Dark side"
(Master Yoda)

[ManBird 0]

Quote

I'm no wing suit pilot, nor do I play one on tv but I do have a question if you are in a flat spin. wouldn't tucking your arms and legs in a ball actually increase the speed of the turn much like ice skaters tuck their arms in and spin on a given spot?

Ice skaters don't have to deal with rushing air. Your wings are just that... wings. The more surface you give the wind in a flat spin, the more you spin. Shifting your center of gravity would usually help, as I would assume that most spins have a slight offset, but if they're dead center, then you're basically a top. By not giving the wind any wing, the momentum will eventually die down, as per the jump in this post.

"¯"`-._.-¯) ManBird (¯-._.-´"¯"

Click

[verticalflyer 11]

have not been in any radical flat spins to date in my suit however at the 2001 wingsuit festival in Sweden Martin Rosen managed to replicate just this, after going into John loken's burble. Again same as Kim reported balling up took him out of the spin after he had tried everything else.

I am an aerodynamic engineer and understand the momentum theory thoughts and increased rotation as the body goes into a ball, however the key here is the direction of the momentum. By tucking up the direction is changed and the momentum does not follow the direction change efficiently hence the spin should dissipate.

Ok thats enough train spotter techy stuff for one day.
Jope the waethers better in the rest of the world than the Uk.

Cheers

Fraser

Dont just talk about it, Do it!

[cwhitchurch 0]

I got my first flat spin a few weeks ago. the story:

I recently ordered a SkyFlier, so lately I've been trying to push the GTi. Trying flips and barrell rolls in series, working for more control.

I'm out on a solo, and things got weird. I find myself on my back, spinning like hell. Arch - nothing. Arch harder - nothing. Curl up - Bingo. it slows, I roll out onto my belly, and promptly dump at 7k (I was last out, and long).

While under canopy, wondering where the hell that came from, I find my right arm was unzipped about 2/3 the way up. I'm not sure when it happened. I doubt I left the plane that way, but regardless, I don't think an open arm helped anything.

It took some effort to ball-up. I had some wicked rpm's going. But it worked.

lesson - when things are a little goofy, arch out. When things are way goofy - be the ball.

I'm glad I heard the word on this earlier. My vote goes with Kim.


-christian

[schafdog 0]

My reply to all this is education and training. We instinctively do what comes naturally through training and more so through habit. Arching has been widely known as the thing to do to recover out of most situations. But as can be seen not in this particular case. I am glad that Jari and Kim were on the dive to witness me go through the spin. They were able to benefit directly from this situation and pass info on.
Long Soars - Kevin

[cobaltdan 0]

a note on wing zippers: many frequently unzip. i solved the problen by stitching on a small tab of velcro. i have seen other people use a small rubber band...

attached is a pic of simon when his wing unziped during deployment. btw. he sorted the canopy and landed it fine...

sincerely,

dan

Daniel Preston
atairaerodynamics.com (sport)
atairaerospace.com (military)

[kimgriffin 0]

Hi Christian. The spin I got in to over a year ago had to due with the fact that I didn't lock one of my arm zippers down before exiting. (A Skyflyer) Jump run came faster than I expected and I rushed to make it to the door on time (mistake #1 - late again - damn!) So, the zip started opening in freefall and I knew that would suck and wondered how to remedy it. My bright idea was to go into a sit fly (which am a big-time novice at) and reach with my right hand over to my left arm zipper. (Mistake #2) You would not believe how fast that aesymetrical movement got me spinning (duhhhh... yeah, that was a very lame idea. Hindsight...) So, I closed both wings in to my body (which DID NOT make me accelarate due to the fact that I got rid of the drag causing the spin in the first place) and arched to get back on to my belly. That worked no problem, I still went around a few times but the momentum stopped.

This situation is not the same as the flat-spin situation I brought up yesterday. I guess, the moral of this story is to make sure your zippers are locked down before exit. If they are not, don't do what I did. Maybe just hold off on full flight (bring your arms in).

Fraser, thank you for your input about acceleration and spins. The iceskating thing sounds logical, but seems not not be overly relevant in this situation. Not to say that it can't happen.

We are all learning as wingsuit flying grows. Jari and I are fortunate enough that we can fly often, but we also rely on the input from other experienced flyers. We love these discusions. Keep it up. Thanks to all of you for sharing your stories and ideas.

-Kimberly Griffin

[Spy38W 0]

Quote

Fraser, thank you for your input about acceleration and spins. The iceskating thing sounds logical, but seems not not be overly relevant in this situation. Not to say that it can't happen.

First let me say that I am not a Birdman, yet. I am planning on going up to Deland for my maiden voyage soon though.

I think the ice skating issue, or try spinning yourself in a chair with your arms out vs. in makes sense, but not when compared to the aerodynamic forces that will have more effect than the CG/Arm effect illustrated by the chair/ice skater... just one point of view though.

--
Hook high, flare on time

[kevin922 0]

Quote

a note on wing zippers: many frequently unzip. i solved the problen by stitching on a small tab of velcro. i have seen other people use a small rubber band...

attached is a pic of simon when his wing unziped during deployment. btw. he sorted the canopy and landed it fine...

sincerely,

dan

Dude. How in the hell did you get that shot??

Kim - thanks for all the information, I'm glad to see this fourm is starting to have some good information in it...

[Spy38W 0]

Quote

Dude. How in the hell did you get that shot??

http://www.extremefly.com/aerospace/products/aerialphotography/hyperbolic.html

Very cool hyperbolic lens they have.

--
Hook high, flare on time

[SkymonkeyONE 3]

I am going to start another thread in a second concerning zipper blowout and creep, but I would just like to respond to the one comment that was eluded to by Kim.

If you have NOT zipper creep or blowout, you eventually will. I think it's just going to be a fact of life until we come up with a better zipper. My left arm on my GTi is a constant problem, so I remedied it by sewing velcro closures on both arms, right over the zipper end, down on the cuffs of both arms. When that didn't fix the creep totally, I replaced the zipper slide with a ring off a key ring and now run my velcro cuff lock through that ring. It only takes a fraction of a second to undo the velcro and it REALLY helps out. That cured problem number one.

Problem two started some time later when the same zipper (left arm) would blow out about midway up in the middle of a dive. I couldn't figure it out at all, then I checked both zippers and discovered that the left arm zipper is different than the right arm and the two front zippers. The teeth are not nearly as heavy duty. Not sure how that came to be, but I am going to have to replace it with a heavier duty zipper sometime soon. It does not blow out often, but I can't risk that happening to one of my students, so I will do it as soon as possible.

Another problem on the same suit arose when my roomate was jumping it at Rantoul. He had a sort of mid-suit/ wing junction blowout in mid-flight. The white tabs that one feeds the cutaway cables through to affix the wings pulled free on the wing side. We ended up running an additional seam accross the tops of all the tabs, reinforcing them and hopefully preventing this from happening in the future. It should be noted that we jump the shit out of that GTi. I sewed the same reinforcing seam on my SkyFlyer as a prophylaxis measure.

My SkyFlyer does not exhibit any of those zipper creep problems, but I have been on a flight with a guy who had a catastrophic blowout soon after a CASA launch at CSS. He sucked it up and flew the suit all the way to standard pull altitude, but he was an experienced flyer and just worked through the problem. Bottom line here is that if your zippers are creeping or blowing out, then you need to fix the problem before it leads to something serious.

Chuck Blue
BM-I

[basehoundsam 0]

Hi Kim -
After blowing out multiple zippers from trying to fit too much battle gear on for BASE jumps, I replaced most of mine with metal zippers.... they never come undone!!! I had to special order the zippers from a zipper company in Denver(About 4 bucks a piece).
My next wingsuit I will definately preorder the metal zippers and have Kim ship them out ahead to be built in in the first place.
Jay E.
www.adrenalineexploits.com

Jay Epstein Ramirez
www.adrenalineexploits.com

[arlo 0]

because it's so late and I'm about to hit the sack, i just wanted to respond to this by saying that the "ball up/spin faster" thing works on ice, but what happened with the wingsuit (balling up) worked. to spare the details, it has to do with a change in directional energy...translation from horizontal to vertical blah blah....we're dealing with 3 planes now.
I can totally see why you would think this, but in the sky, this person did exactly what was needed to get himself out of that flat spin. Typical: you do what you've gotta do to save your ass and that's what he did....and kudos to him for figuring that shit out.

I think it's awesome that Kim posted that because sharing knowledge of events such as this can do nothing BUT help people. You can't rehearse every single scenario that can occur, but the more "answers" you have to "questions", the more chance (in my opinion) you have to successfully and correctly deal with the problem at hand. I think that's why you see so many pics of malfunctions going thru your FJC...and we all know that those aren't the only mals you'll ever encounter. :)

let's use this example to share information with our brothers and sisters (and birdbuddies). no one wants to be caught in a situation whose remedy could've been easily obtainable just by sharing experiences and stuff...

blues,
arlo

[verticalflyer 11]

Spy38w, it was not actually me quoting iceskating stuff as i agree its totally irrelevant to this situation which if you read my post you'll realise not the one above, which actually talks about it by manbird.

Anyway aside from that, the best zipper mod I have seen is a simple loop connected to a split ring (key ring type) the loop hooks over your thumb and it works sweet no danger of Velcro wearing out or bungies breaking, just slip off when you unzip the wings its straightforward and if you use elasticated material it is very easy to pull down at pull time without pulling your normal loop for the wing down with it as it stretches off over your thumb easily.

Cheers

Fraser

Quote

Quote

Fraser, thank you for your input about acceleration and spins. The iceskating thing sounds logical, but seems not not be overly relevant in this situation. Not to say that it can't happen.

First let me say that I am not a Birdman, yet. I am planning on going up to Deland for my maiden voyage soon though.

I think the ice skating issue, or try spinning yourself in a chair with your arms out vs. in makes sense, but not when compared to the aerodynamic forces that will have more effect than the CG/Arm effect illustrated by the chair/ice skater... just one point of view though.

Dont just talk about it, Do it!

[Spy38W 0]

Quote

it was not actually me quoting iceskating stuff as i agree its totally irrelevant to this situation which if you read my post you'll realise not the one above, which actually talks about it by manbird.

I had just quoted from the person I made my general response to.

--
Hook high, flare on time

[effinjump 0]

You post saved my bacon last weekend! I was doing some Bird-Man heli jumps from a heli that I had not used before. The first exit was awkward, as the strut attachment point was high enough to make a normal skid launch impossible with a wingsuit. As I balanced on one foot, with the other behind me, distracted by awkwardness, I looked straight down and launched. I went exactly where I looked and began to front flip over and over again until the relative wind increased and I then found myself on my back, spinning. As this was a heli jump, my launch altitude was close to where I normally pull, so there was no time for this nonsense. I remembered your recent post, pulled my arms and legs in, immediately became stable, flipped to my belly, flew stable for a few seconds and deployed. Thanks Kim!

Rob Tonnesen

"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom" -Anais Nin

[ManBird 0]

Hey, Rob, are you down at Elsinore? How's the BM scene? That was my home DZ for a couple years, and I'm thinking of heading down over Thanksgiving weekend. Would love to get on some larger flocks.

"¯"`-._.-¯) ManBird (¯-._.-´"¯"

Click

[effinjump 0]

should be at elsinore or perris on those dates. when r u coming?

Quote

Rob Tonnesen

"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom" -Anais Nin

• Quote

[kimgriffin 0]

Whoa, Rob - sounded like a wild ride. So glad everything worked out okay. I would have never guessed that a couple days after seeing you and telling you the story that you would actually have to use the technique. Yeah, the Skyflyer is picky about how she likes the wind to caress her inflated skin. Just like a women, eh?

-Kimberly Griffin

[arlo 0]

Quote

Yeah, the Skyflyer is picky about how she likes the wind to caress her inflated skin. Just like a women, eh?

Oh my god....let the games begin.

glad you worked that one out, Rob...

arlo

[ManBird 0]

I should be there Thursday and Friday, the 28 and 29. I might be there a bit on Saturday, but I also might want to spend Saturday and a bit of Sunday exploring two or three DZs anywhere between Arizona and Washington.

"¯"`-._.-¯) ManBird (¯-._.-´"¯"

Click

[effinjump 0]

I should be at Elsinore by 2pm on Friday, as 'relative work' will have me elsewhere until then.

blues, rob

Rob Tonnesen

"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom" -Anais Nin