skr

During the latest thrash here in Colorado I posted this on the local mailing list. Why are we skydiving in the first place? > King Air, Twin Otter, what more do you want? A skydiving scene, a jump story, a feeling of special times. People who have been there know what I'm talking about, and for people who haven't it's like freefall, no way to explain it in words. It's vibes and feelings and friendship and personal journey. To look only at the mechanical infrastructure is to miss the whole reason why we jump. I've experienced it at Cessna dropzones. I've had the really good fortune to be right in the thick of it several times, Oceanside, Elsinore, Z'hills, The Gulch, Pope Valley, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Australia, New Zealand come to mind from the 60s and 70s. The experience was so good that I studied the process, the ingredients and how they come together in order to enhance the chances of helping another one happen. I think Steve Woodford knew about this and tried to do it at Brush, but it's not easy, it's delicate. It's like a complex chemical reaction using emotions instead of chemicals. It's delicate and easy to trample or derail. Jeff and I didn't just argue, we talked about a lot of stuff too, and I told him several times that he should hire me to help with this. Several times we took a tentative step down that path, but the gap between us was just too great to bridge. I started to try at Brush when it opened but I found Brush depressing, something about the vibes of the town and that horrible cattle meat grinder place just down the road maybe. Plus, for me, the dogs and blasting music are such an unpleasant environment that I gave up and went to Calhan for a couple years. Calhan started well but in the second year the weather and disintegrating dropzone ended it. After last year at Mile-Hi I started feeling a lot of hope that maybe this year it would happen. It's been trying to happen in Colorado for years but it needs fertile ground. It's a delicate, emotional chemistry reaction, much easier to destroy than create. Maybe it's still possible, I don't know, it's out of my hands, but it would be really wonderful for both new and old to experience one. There's really nothing like it. Skr

I think Bryan stated it in terms of body position because at this time in history people are really hung up on what body position you happen to be skydiving in. The real point is fall rate, and what he meant was slow fallers (boards and RW usually) first, then fast fallers (sit and head down usually), then high pullers. So if you are falling that fast you should probably go just before the head downers. Some of Bryan's original posts on this are down at the bottom of http://indra.net/~bdaniels/ftw/index.html Skr

Down at the bottom of this page: http://indra.net/~bdaniels/ftw/index.html is a note on the 45 degree idea and also a couple articles on the general question of dealing with upper winds. It's not just separation. Skr

I remember her and Karen Roach(?) being at Taft in the late 60s but I have no idea about now. Skr

I ordered a custom Stiletto. They estimated 9 weeks. It showed up (last week) after 7 weeks. They've always responded well to any questions or problems. I'm just one customer but I'm happy with how they do things. Skr

Hey Riddler, Maybe the riggers where you jump aren't familiar with Racers because there's only a couple of us jumping them, and they're reluctant to pack something unfamiliar. Gear fashions can get pretty ingrown at a small drop zone. Skr

>but what exactly is a flat turn and how is one executed? I wrote a thing called "Wings Level" that talks about this and some other canopy flying and put it at: http://indra.net/~bdaniels/ftw/c_wings_level.html Skr

I finally got to go last October. Modern day China was a real eye opener after a life time of images. I was always attracted to China and took Chinese in the 60s thinking I could get a job that took me over there or something, but there was the cold war and revolutions and stuff. I couldn't remember enough to be of any use but it added somehow to the richness of the experience. I'd go again. I think the sleeping dragon is awakening. Skr

> I can't imagine doing a forward aikido roll going 20mph After reading several posts similar to this I'm wondering whether we are all meaning the same thing when we say PLF, because I find them even easier to do with forward speed. It's not a slap the mat absorb downward force move but round off the corners roll with the flow kind of move. Oh well, it's been a good thread. Skr

Thanks for the John LeBlanc opinion. That's exactly what I think but I've never been in a two out situation so for me it was all theory and thinking about things. I wondered about forcing a down plane in a side by side and then cutting away but I will take John's advice. ---- Maybe we can get the Safety and Training Committee to revisit this because I know a lot of experienced people who think this is a better approach than releasing brakes. Skr

>what discipline of choice the poster has. That makes one kind of sense, base is not crw, but ... (there's always a "but" isn't there :-) :-) how about adding a "none of the above" or maybe an "other" for people who are doing "other". Having a closed list sort of implies that the territory has been staked out. Then when some new activity or viewpoint enters consensus reality you could just add it to the list. But leave the "other" for people who are still doing "other". Skr

>However . . . when tracking, there are better places to look, in the interest of safety, than staring at an altimeter, ya gotta agree with that, right? :-) :-) I was stunned speechless when he said it, because I knew he wasn't kidding. Here was an S&TA, AFF instructor, been on a couple big record attempts person looking at his altimeter while he was tracking away. The gap in our outlooks was just too great bridge, so I changed the subject. Skr

OK - It looks like it's now sliding down the page into finished threads so thanks everybody for the encouragement and feedback. On the crosswind jumprun in high uppers there will have to be a large crab angle to maintain a course across the ground perpendicular to the uppers so the ground speed of the plane will be greater than flying into the uppers but still small enough to require more thought. But I think this tables approach would help remove the chaos from the low to medium range. Skr

Lots of good replies here. On hands and toggles and hands in front of face: When I'm coming in I do my best with toggles and steering and then just a fraction before touching down do feet and knees together, elbows in to ribs, chin tucked and shoulders rounded, and my hands come together in front of my face. I think of this as rounding off the corners and keeping flailing arms out of harm's way. And then I actively make the roll happen the right way. It doesn't happen of itself. When I have to do this on a muddy day the mud is always in the same place: feet, right knee, right butt, diagonally up across my container to my left shoulder. I don't let go of the toggles but once I touch the ground it's all body motion. The toggles are just along for the ride. Skr

>caught in a little time-warp. I think I'm going to put that as my home dropzone. >entering information and saving at the same time as I was making changes :-) Network software was good that way: start a transfer like this, wait for those lights to start blinking like that, when the disk rattles 3 times hit this key here and ... Bingo - queue tied in knots ... ---- I just went to my profile to find my first post to get a date and I see that the Registered field is the same as the Local Time field which is the time that window came up. I just tried it again: go to Forums Who's Online click on skr Don't know it that only happens when I do it. ---- Anyway, my first post was on Sep 25, 2002, 5:33 PM skr

I think science and religion address different aspects of our human experience, but how I go about experiencing those different aspects isn't all that different. In math I go into attunement mode and then follow the recipe (proof), think these thoughts and you will experience the truth of the theorem. In religion I go into attunement mode and then follow the recipe, clean up your act, adjust your attitude, meditate, eat vegetables etc, and I experience the truth of spiritual insight. They're both predictable and reproducible. Actually what I like to do is go into attunement mode and see where it leads. Skr

I think you're smart to get really good at PLFs. I've made it through quite a few bad situations with a PLF, including once having too much fun with mountain curves and a motorcycle. For technique any old timer who can still walk and jump probably knows how and so do military jumpers. Start easy on something soft so you can get the motion down without worrying about hurting yourself and then accumulate a few hours practicing them. With squares you mostly need front PLFs. I don't think you need to jump off of moving trucks and stuff like that. We used to do stuff like that, but then we used to do a lot of stupid stuff that I wouldn't do now. I took some Judo once before I started jumping and there was a lot of practice in how to fall down in various ways which I think helped me in jumping. If you learn how to fall down without hurting yourself it removes some of the fear of landing and you can then relax more and be in a better state to tune in to how to fly your canopy. Sliding in is understandable if you don't know how to PLF, but you wear out your gear and get a lot of commentary from your fellow jumpers, plus if you're going down instead of across you can break a lot of important stuff. Skr

I just went and updated my profile, saved changes, then viewed my profile. The date registered field now shows the time that I saved the changes. Hee hee .. I can break anything .. the programmers used to hate seeing me coming down the hall. I like the changes you're making to dropzone.com. Good work. Skr

>What is it? Relative work started out as a freeform expression of exploring and creating the idea of flying together. In the early 60's Bob Buquor took pictures of some small stars and inspired people to try to make a bigger one. That caused the idea of a star as something in its own right to enter skydiving thought. It's hard now to express the effect this had. I know for me, a graduate student at Caltech in 1964 ostensible getting a PhD in math but having a hard time reconciling the reality of what I was seeing on the weekends with what I was seeing in the math dept, the picture of the first 6 man star on the cover of Skydiving Magazine was what tipped me over the edge and caused me to drop out and eventually become a full time skydiver. Bob Buquor later drowned doing camera work for a Hollywood movie. Bill Newell wanted to honor Bob and recognize the advancement of relative work so he started the Star Crest. It started with the 20 people who had been in an 8 man star getting a letter from Bill with a patch to put on your jumpsuit. As time went on skydiving advanced and being in an 8 man lost its significance, except in Texas where they have created a truly Texas sized ritual around it. I stand well back when I see a Texas SCR ritual under way :-) :-) But at one time the SCR had way more meaning than the USPA licenses. Skr SCR-16

Well done. Skr

>So post me an opinion on Racer containers. Nothing to add to the what's been said but I still like them. I got my first one in 1976 and the one I have now about 10 years ago. The only upgrade I would do is cover the bit of exposed bridle. Skr

> I asked this very same question a while back. I looked at that thread and someone there suggested a PIA document which also said to use the toggles of the dominant canopy. But I'm still not seeing anyone explain what the advantage of this is. It seems to me that unstowing the toggles of one canopy creates an unbalanced situation with that canopy driving more than the other. I also found me in that thread saying that Rick Horn had said that was a mistaken copy and paste of a possible technique for experienced jumpers. It still seems like a bad idea to tell students to do that. I also remember this being brought up to the safety and training committee a couple board meetings ago but changing it met some kind of resistance from whoever writes the SIM stuff in headquarters. Maybe an email to the safety and training committee would get some kind of answer for this. I'm not going to teach people to unstow brakes until I hear what the advantage of it is. Skr

Hey Brian, sometimes it feels funny emailing someone when I could just talk to them at the dropzone, but then sometimes DJan and I email each other when she's just 20 ft away in the next room. Modern times I guess :-) :-) >Perhaps the answer is to arrange jump run perpendicular to the uppers on high wind days. Yes, or even curving up wind and then back down wind. It's the only idea I've heard so far that addresses the really strong uppers case. I've heard of pilots doing this, but it seems like a much more difficult thing to do than zeroing in on the GPS coordinates for green light on and off. It will be interesting to see how this plays out 10 years from now. >Your discussion about using the ground as a reference is right on! Yes, when I started everything was ground referenced, spotting, pulling, everything. It was VFR skydiving. Somehow it has evolved into IFR skydiving. I know some pretty experienced jumpers who say they never see the ground until they're open, even when they're tracking away. One guy (3,000+ jumps) told me he looks at his chest altimeter when he's tracking away! I've wondered whether that is a by product of switching to AFF as the main doorway in. >The idea of having a GPS at the door is great except for one drawback: If it happens to quit working, people will be lost! Hence the need for a heads up display in everybody's helmet :-) :-) I don't think this is as pressing as the abyssmal lack of canopy training but OPEC did start raising the oil prices in 1973 and multiple groups per pass became common within a few years after that. So really, you'd think that after almost 30 years we'd be further along than just "leave more time". I think I'm losing my patience in my old age. Skr

>the problem of winds at opening altitude opposite the direction of jumprun, which would tend to decrease separation. Thanks, I will put that back into part 1. I wrote both parts in parallel intending part 1 to be words and concepts and part 2 to be details and calculations. If you have say a 10 knot opposite lower wind that's equivalent to a 10 knot slower aircraft ground speed so you can just look at the next row down for the answer instead of doing another whole table of some kind. I didn't think many people would feel moved to read part 2 and I was trying to make part 1 readable as a stand alone document, but I'm going to adjust them based on feedback. Skr

>Yet in every single instance where I have discussed a stable two-out scenario with instructors, their answer has always been to leave it alone, do as little as possible to it. Is there anything to gain by unstowing the brakes? Seems like changing the configuration by unstowing brakes is just asking for trouble. I've never had two out so it might seem different when it's actually happening, but I agree with you. Leave it alone, steer with the rear risers of the front canopy and try to get on the ground before anything weird happens. I've never seen any explanation of why releasing the brakes on the front canopy makes the situation better. Maybe there's some advantage for an experienced jumper but it seems like a really bad idea to tell a student to do that. Maybe someone in this thread will explain why it's better. Skr