JeffCa

I could be ordering a wingsuit sometime next year, so I'm interested in this. Most wingsuiters at my DZ have PF products. It's the same problem with UPT and Vector lead times of over 30 weeks. It's not a matter of how many orders you have or which brand is more popular. If you're a more popular brand, you should have more production capacity than the other guys to keep your lead times reasonable. Are you going to tell me that the Phoenix Fly suits or a Vector rig actually take months to manufacture each one? LiquidSky jumpsuits take weeks longer to stitch? No, it's a backlog of orders that they have been unable to work through because of not enough production capacity. This is a business management issue. Why can SunPath/Mirage/Wings/RI/JumpShack/Velocity turn out a quality rig in 10 weeks (or whatever), but UPT needs 30+? It isn't because it take 30 weeks from start to finish to build a Vector because of its "superior quality", it's because as Vector orders were increasing over the years, they failed to act quickly enough to increase their capacity to keep the times down. The reasons for this I won't speculate on. There is a thread on here from years ago with a Vector rep apologising for what was then a 20-week wait time, and wishing they'll be back down to 12 weeks soon. Clearly that did not happen. A company with shorter lead times and better communication is the better-managed company, in my opinion. It has little to do with quality or popularity or the product. We should expect accurate and reasonable predictions of lead times and to have our emails answered, no matter how many suits/rigs a company is turning out. And as another poster pointed out, as long as customers continue to find 30+ weeks acceptable enough to buy one and line up for poor service, what motivation do they have to fix these issues? "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

I've been posting about Tokyo Skydiving Club here: http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=4661417 It's the only DZ in the Tokyo area. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

I don't know anything about the question, but really, would it hurt to do this? Why not use the 190 for a few jumps? Your new canopy won't leave you for cheating on it. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

Likely not. They exit at 0:30, the other guy has cypres fire at 1:28. So thats 58 seconds from exit to cypres fire. Which would give roughly 150 m (first 6 seconds) + 2600 m (52 seconds at 50 m/s) + 225 (cypres fire altitude) = 2975 m ~ 9800 feet which would be pretty normal cessna exit altitude. It seems like you're confirming my point. Most people have a bit more than a minute of freefall time from higher altitudes. I know you're not justifying it in any way, but I want to write my tirade. Doesn't matter one bit what these guys are used to, even if they did have enough jump numbers to have a well-tuned "internal clock", which they clearly did not. If you don't know what altitude you're jumping from and take the appropriate measures, you need to stay on the ground with the spectators. My last 5 jumps have been my first from 10,500' against 150 total from 12,500' in the last 18 months, but I took that into account and was in position to pull at the correct altitude because I check my altimeter and have an audible to back me up. It's amazing to read that one guy didn't even have an AAD in his own rig and was saved by an alert and cautious DZO. Hopefully he's the one that quit. Also pretty funny to hear that they're unhappy the video leaked. If it's true that one quit and one didn't, I'd like to know how much thought the second guy put in before deciding to continue. That should not have been a decision made lightly, and I wonder how he justified it to himself. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

I have the exact model you're looking at. It's my first Mac, I'm a long-time PC user. For the first week, there was a lot of frustration and cursing. Oh, was there ever cursing. I suffered buyer's remorse and had printed the return shipping labels to send the thing back. After the first week, I got to know it better and decided to keep it, and now everything is fine. There are some minor things I don't like about the design, but I'm happy with it. The Retina screen is the best part. I could never go back to a standard screen, just like after you try HDTV, you can't go back to SDTV. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

Risk for any one jump does not, unless you start factoring things in like higher-risk activities or over-confidence. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

That's not what "cumulative" means in this respect. I understand the math well, but not sure if they chose the correct phrase with "cumulative risk". The OP cocked up his math, subsequent posters fixed it and are correct. The OP was suggesting with his original math that if you skydive 133,000 times, that your risk of dying would be 100%, that for each jump you get away with, the chances the next one would kill you increases, as you get closer to the 133,000 number, your odds of death would slowly increase to 100% for any given jump. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

According to the most recent USPA fatality summary, you can lower your risk of death during skydiving dramatically by 1. not participating in high-performance landings 2. installing an RSL/Skyhook 3. having an AAD that is turned on 4. proper gear selection and regular maintenance 5. cutting away malfunctioning canopies promptly instead of going far too low trying to fix them About half of skydivers killed in 2013 in the United States didn't do one of those things. The fatality at our club in Japan also didn't follow them. Only one of these (#5) even takes place spontaneously in the sky. The others are decisions made on the ground (see my signature). And even #5 is easily avoidable by having a plan to handle such emergencies and sticking to it. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

Tokyo Skydiving Club. Our cutaway percentage is far less than a lot of other DZs because we don't have the super-high-performance canopies and everybody packs their own gear, so it doesn't even happen very often. I'll participate (and have) in a search for a canopy for ANY jumper at the club, not just my closer friends, and I'm sure they'd do the same for me. I'd be shocked if anybody gave me any crap for landing in the LZ after a malfunction. We actually help each other out.* *(It's what the Americans often refer to, in a derogatory manner, as "socialism". It's known in the rest of the world as being a decent and helpful person to your peers, knowing that they'd do the same for you.) "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

I didn't use the word obligated, I wrote that they do it. It's their job. So maybe it is an obligation, as it's what they're getting paid to do. They watch that every canopy is open on every load, report in when the canopies are open, watch everybody make it to the landing area, etc. So is it really a mistake to think that they'll watch for it? My main doesn't cost $3,500 and I can afford to lose it. You don't know the state of my wallet. I will go the LZ. The few chops I have seen at our DZ all had their pilots head back to the LZ. Nobody was overheard saying they made a mistake. Or the club staff will do their job. It won't be luck. Landing on an unfamiliar canopy in undeveloped land that you've never landed in before and was not maintained for landing is never safe. How could it be? I don't have to worry about this particular problem, I only have my own gear. I'll get one the moment somebody can confirm that it works. Promise. I've already been in touch with the makers of the product in the OP. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

There's always next year. Oh, I forgot to tell you that you need to register with the club at least a week before you want to jump. They need to get a government permit for each jumper. So send them an email and tell them you're coming. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

I know you're old-school, but ... I don't consider this lazy, and there is somebody on the ground who will take care of it at my DZ, along with lots of people who will watch it for as long as possible under canopy. But when I make my first cutaway, I sure am heading back to the LZ, to my safe landing area, especially with an unfamiliar canopy that I'd be under. I don't want to make my first landing under my reserve in sub-optimal terrain. I'd rather lose my canopy than break my leg, and I think my DZ would expect me to try to make it home. If a DZ doesn't have a spotter on the ground for each load, maybe they should start doing it. Let the jumpers come home to their familiar LZ as safely as possible. The reasons for the chop could include a hard opening snapping lines (a friend I trained with just had his first chop under these circumstances), in which case they're possibly dazed. Familiarity would help in such cases. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

Night jumps are on September 13th. Alternate dates (weather) are 14th, 20th and 27th, in that order. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

I feel like I'm in over my head here, but for me, being happy is about finding a good work-life balance, and finding hobbies and people that make me happy. Learning to scuba dive is one of the best things that I've ever done, and I'm much happier with my life since I added world travel a few times a year. You don't have to continue skydiving if it isn't making you happy anymore. Find something new and different, take the opportunity to explore new places and activities. For me, it's the exploration of the new that seems to bring the payoff in happiness. My friends were different. I have a friend who sounds like you. He had depression, lack of energy, etc. He was diagnosed with a sleeping disorder, and got treatment for that. He also had a couple of children, and since then, he's been way happier and found a purpose. Children are not for everybody (including me, I don't want any), but for some people, they can give meaning to life. Others can find meaning in charity work, and so on. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

I'd also like to hear (read) an explanation of this. I have a Pilot, which opens slowly and softly. That's one of the primary reasons that I bought it, and I've been very happy with the openings so far. I pull at 3,500'-4,000', so don't really believe it should be an issue. But this thread has made me think about that in a way I hadn't thought about before, and I should probably raise my "go-to-silver" altitude. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

We have a small but active wingsuit community, a mix of Japanese and foreigners, but mostly (all?) English-speaking. I hope to join it soon, but I'm still under my 200 jumps. Just don't tail-strike our plane, like one guy did a couple of years ago! "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

With my Racer 2K3, I've got the reserve flap against my back. I check the pins before I put it on, then there's nothing anybody can do after that. Has anybody heard of the Racer reserve pins dislodging, even though they're protected back there? Do you think it's a safer place for them? I'd welcome a main pin check, though the Racer flap is different from most others and it's a pretty tight fit. People always take forever to figure out how to close it back up, which makes me nervous. I check myself before I put it on, every time. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

Me! Welcome to the worst country in the developed world to be a skydiver. We're on our only 10-day open stretch of the entire year, and the weather for the first 4 days of it has been so shitty. This after just coming off of the rainy season. The good news is that prices have dropped since some of the old reviews, even more so if you buy in bulk, but for some reason they don't like the exact amounts being published. PM me if you want to know the rates. We have a Caravan that seats 19 jumpers. Jumps from 12,500'. Must pull between 3,000' and 4,500' or so, so no CRW. Hop-n-pops are rare, usually only possible on the first load of the day. We do night jumps once a year, in September. AAD mandatory. Hook turns are severely restricted. Open weekends and holidays mostly, with some scattered weekdays throughout the year. Open all year, except for February when plane goes in for maintenance. We don't have enough plane capacity for the number of jumps people desire, so it's not uncommon to spend the entire day there and get 3-4 jumps in. No packers. Rigging services available, but no master riggers jump with us. They only rig, usually during the week, so can be tough to talk to them. Good views of Mt. Fuji and Tokyo during the cooler months. Lots of fluent English speakers at the DZ, including at least one on regular staff, and a good supply of foreign jumpers. Landing area is spacious (kinda narrow, but long, like a runway) and grass is well maintained. Your profile suggests that you're tiny, so you'll fall well with the Japanese girls, and even some of the men! As far as I know, I'm the only member who posts here, so I guess I'm the one to ask if you have questions. Edit: About 32,000 yen membership dues for a year, which includes third-party liability insurance, death payout, and an amount to cover lost wages (not hospital bills) if you have to be admitted. We are USPA-affiliated, but you don't have to be a member of USPA to jump. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

The 4 canopy types that come up over and over again in recommendations for new jumpers on these forums are Sabre2, Safire2, Pilot and Pulse. Besides that, you've asked a very broad and unfocussed question. Every container on the market has merits and none of them seem to be causing an enormous number of accidents. If you want a new, custom-made container for cheap, the Shadow Racer 2K3 and the Rigging Innovations Genera can both be had for about $1,500. These are basic entry-level containers with no/few options and are priced accordingly. If you want to stick with Javelin like you're familiar with, they have stock containers that they'll add a custom harness to and have it delivered in a very short time. Most people on here will advise that you buy used for your first rig, though. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

I'm not the OP, but I weigh 155 and have a 218 reserve. I bought my reserve and sized my rig for "the unconscious scenario", bought low-bulk to get more canopy into the same container. Dz.com members also helped me to think it through, and I think I made a good decision in the end. I've yet to meet my reserve in action. I like the way you think. Thanks, it means something coming from a well-repsected jumper like yourself. Not sure who wrote it in my thread about reserve choice, but I was told that nobody ever cutaway, looked up at their reserve and said, "I really don't need so much reserve." It made sense. I understand that my choice won't be the best in a strong-wind reserve scenario, but point out a reserve choice that is best for all scenarios, various levels of incapacitation, all wind conditions, etc. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

I'm not the OP, but I weigh 155 and have a 218 reserve. I bought my reserve and sized my rig for "the unconscious scenario", bought low-bulk to get more canopy into the same container. Dz.com members also helped me to think it through, and I think I made a good decision in the end. I've yet to meet my reserve in action. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

Yes, this would depend on the failure rate of both devices. If Vigil has a very low failure rate over its lifetime, then the warranty is not worth worrying about. According to their website, the first Vigils are just about to reach the 12-year mark, so data could exist about failure rates of Cypres vs. Vigil over the 12-year lifespan of a Cypres (though I'm sure we'd never see it). Data would not exist about failure rates over the claimed 20-year lifespan of the Vigil, as we just aren't there yet, and the Vigil II is only at 7 years or so. Then again, the Vigil people could go above and beyond and repair units for free even out of warranty, as certain other companies in this industry have been known to do. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

Can you elaborate on what it can't check for? And do Cypres customers not also pay for the maintenance of their unit, even though it is mandatory and scheduled? Or do you mean that Cypres includes the repairs in their check-up cost, but Vigil will charge for check-up and then charge for any necessary repairs that they find? "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

As the Vigil reps on here repeatedly point out, you are welcome to send your Vigil in for inspection any time you want. It also has a self-diagnosis program, so if there is a problem, it should tell you so. I am a Vigil owner but would have no issue switching to Cypres or staying with Vigil. Difference is not large, in my opinion. I won't jump without my AAD (mandatory at my DZ anyway), but I respect the decision of others who will jump without theirs. We shouldn't give each other crap for this, and let every individual make their own choice, assuming the proper information is available to them. But as I pointed out elsewhere, I believe that the number of people who jump without AADs will reduce every year until they are de-facto required. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth

Check the sticky at the top of the Gear and Rigging forum list. "So many fatalities and injuries are caused by decisions jumpers make before even getting into the aircraft. Skydiving can be safe AND fun at the same time...Honest." - Bill Booth