douwanto

Cathy I always enjoyed chatting with you.  BSBD. 

Miss you Bob

Best estimate is 4000 to 5000 world wide across all manufactures. 

Very sad. BSBD Cathy.

On 10/20/2020 at 3:40 AM, Rio Santonil said:

I'm 52 years old and started on this new journey. Currently, I'm taking AFF course out of Skydive Elsinore in Lake Elsinore, CA USA. I'm scheduled to take AFF Level 5 next week.

In my younger days, I have always been respectful, physical and mental in regards to my approach to any sports. I would like to apply the same principles to skydiving which will hopefully help avoid to jeopardize my progress. In short, I have a 3 part question.

1) What physical exercises or regimen do you do to develop strength, be limber and so on (arms, legs, stomach)? Any advice is appreciated. 

2) What mental preparation do you do? (Before, during and after)

3) What books do you recommend for beginners? Is there a Skydiving for Dummies?

Right now, I am exercising every other day to develop my strength. Working in the corporate field for over 16 years did not help in maintaining my physical stamina. Through my first 4 levels, I'm finding that I'm not as limber as I should. In my assessment of myself, I need to work on body awareness. For my last 3 jumps, I made it a point to do 15 minutes of tunnel time the day before prior to my actual jump in order to be ready.  This is a snapshot of my capabilities and preparation I do for skydiving at the moment. 

Any advice are welcomed and appreciated. 

Thanks everyone! 

 

As a 53 year old instructor who jumps regularly and consistently who is also in above average physical condition my first recommendation is stop doing 15 minutes of tunnel time the day prior to your skydive. 15 minutes in the tunnel if you are tight is only making you tighter the following day. Even experienced athletic young skydivers find this to be true unless they are tunnel rats. 

On 8/25/2019 at 7:48 PM, kaiser said:

I need a count on full time active instructors in our sport.Week end warriors not included.Its time we stand up to have our own Play house.All those part timers and armatures are messing up our sport of skydiving.

Wind em up why dont you... LOL

On 5/28/2019 at 2:23 PM, TheCaptain said:

My second Gopro hero 7 will be here today(their trade up thing took about a week and a half ) so I will have mine on line this coming weekend. I took it up with just one in shooting video on a couple of tandems this past weekend and it works great. Camera locations are almost identical to the pivot dual stack housing for the Gopro3-4.

 

Where did you get the camera mount. I have the pivot glove and really like this gopro 7 setup.

On 7/29/2019 at 12:41 PM, skymama said:

Oh no! This makes me very, very sad. I just saw him post to FB on July 14th that he was celebrating ten years since his bypass, and he felt great. You know how there are people who genuinely smile and seem happy to see you? That was Jack. He always had a corny joke and a smile on his face. I have so much love for him and Lynn, the love of his life. (Photo from a picture his granddaughter posted on FB.)

Last saw Jack at Skydive Daytona/Flagler.. 

 

Blue Skies.

On 10/31/2018 at 11:13 AM, baronn said:

Finally got all the parts together to put this rig into service. With a 400 in a Sigma container, real estate is definitely at a premium. Drogue toss was uneventful but, this thing bucks around like crazy. Pretty annoying. I called UPT asking to exchange it for a 54 and was completely shut down. Was told they can't take back a "used" drogue. Yeah, it has a whole 1 jump on it. Landed on grass and you couldn't tell it's been jumped. Charge an exchange fee if needed but, I didn't even get that. Just a really rude response and a lengthy 'splainin why they can't/wouldn't do it. Pretty shitty service after paying full retail for my 5th rig I got from them.

It bucks because it's out of round. They should take it back. 60 inch drogues dont fall any differently than 54 . They are a bit slower and softer openings.. call Simon Wade to get a good drogue.. 

12 hours ago, SethInMI said:

The problem with that question is that it lacks context. My definition of dangerous is different than yours. Personally I don't feel I should do "dangerous" things, IOW "dangerous and too dangerous" are synonymous. But that is me. As a result, I would probably say "skydiving is not that dangerous". But I would rather respond that "skydiving is as dangerous as X or Y" and then you the questioner can make your own judgement of what that means.

Dan BC's answer "skydiving is a dangerous activity that can be done safely" is a nice turn of phrase which I like, but it also provides no context. Is driving a car a "dangerous activity that can be done safely?" how about mountain biking? or downhill skiing? If you say that phrase to your partner, is he or she going to worry about you more or less?

The fact is skydiving is getting safer; the fatality rate is going down, and that is despite all the millennials who apparently can't tell the difference between their asses and the holes in the ground they are going to make on their next jump.

One other comment, going through a fatality list and removing ones that don't apply to you IS valid. I don't concern myself with suicides and other medical events, or people dying while fucking up a reach for their rears while swooping, cause I don't reach for my rears, and am not planning on committing suicide, and heart attacks are a "you are gonna go sometime" thing with me.

 

The question is perfect. It allows the respondent to set the tone of their response and thereby expresses through their answer their attitude concerning the danger of Skydiving or lack there of in their perception.

Adding any more context would stear their answer.

The first question I ask when teaching a FJC is how Safe or dangerious fo you believe Skydiving is and why do you believe this?

I'm amazed at the answers.. millennials believe it is a safe sport and that they are immune to its dangers. It is an attitude from trophy getters not trophy earners. They need to know they can die at any moment and that their actions can kill others. 

 

In 21 years I've been to as many Skydiving funerals as car crashes and bike crashes and suicides and drug overdoses. 

On 3/28/2019 at 10:09 AM, MIKELOCK34 said:

I disagree. Skydiving is a very safe sport. It can be made dangerous by poor training, poor ability, poor decision making, equipment malfunction and so on.

Millennial fantasyland.. 

On 5/28/2019 at 7:12 PM, gowlerk said:

Ya, but is also too lazy to do the hard work of tandem. There's a reason why tandem pays better.

Horse shit some of us work hard in AFF and Tandem. 

On 4/30/2019 at 10:41 PM, turtlespeed said:

April made 12 months - I don't miss it.

Congrats. 7.5 years for me. Still clean and sober and skydiving. Love life.

Blue Skies Criss

Blue Skies Mariposa you made this world a Brighter Better Place. 

On 4/22/2019 at 5:26 PM, CoolBeans said:

Hey, I'm the loose jointed person, I happened to have subluxations (partial dyslocations) of a shoulder. Then I had shoulder surgery (torn labrum/SLAP) and finished the rehab recently. Skydiving is obviously difficult on shoulders but also neck and spine. I'm curious to hear if you do any sort of training targeting these body parts.

1. Training shoulders to deal better with 120mph+ wind blow
2. Training neck and spine to deal with potential hard openings

1) I've been using bodyblade during the rehab and it seems to work pretty well. Also, I've done bunch of exercises with elastic/resistance bands that aid shoulder muscle development well too.
2) I haven't done much in this area.

I've known 2 skydivers who's shoulders dislocated in freefall. Both took time and PT before returning to sk6d8ve again. Both had subsequent locations within weeks of returning and eventually both stopped skydiving due to this problem. One with a broken ankle because he could not fly his canopy with both hands..

PG Paulo Silvia has taken a woman in Brazil every year since her 100th birthday. She is currently 106 or 107 I know she jumped at 103..

 

link below

 

 

sigma 340 is the most stable tandem canopy out there. 

\

The amount of jumps you can do in a day depends on the dropzone, and the weather. It is common for skydivers to make many jumps in a day. Tandems may need to be pre booked. AFF depends on the length of the class instructors on hand weather and efficiency of the dropzone manifest. ASK WHEN YOU CALL.


IF YOU THINK YOU ARE GOING TO LOVE SKYDIVING DO AFF. Find a Dropzone that does AFF. Sign up take the class and learn to skydive. Dont give your money to any dropzone that requires a (tandem first jump) unless you just want to do a tandem.

You do not have to do a tandem first. It is a lie Dropzones tell people so they can bleed money out of customers..

Accelerated FreeFall is the way to go
Also known as AFP in some locations.

It is very common for harness training to use a real hanging harness to practice the malfunction Tree solutions. I cant believe you even made your statement and have never been in a harness for training.. sure standing around with a full rig on your back pretending to through drogues and pull handles works but actually throwing drogues and actually pulling handles is 100 times better training..

Chris

It has Been a fun Year of Skydiving BoB

All the way to the ground??

+1
32 when I earned my TI. 51 currently

We had 2 tunnel wufoos this week. Both from s as me tunnel and trained by skydivers. Both did well in freefall to a point then both put their feet on their ass and arched excessively at pull time both
Put their feet on their ass and rolled their right shoulder at deployment despite extensive ground training to counter. Both also chucked an instructor mid skydive by arching extremely hard and extending the instructors armed suddenly. Weird exact 2 jumps 4 different instructors. My point is had these been one instructor jumps the students both most likely would have been alone and on their back while deploying.. student safety is first priority and evaluating them with 2 instructors seems prudent..

Been a while just stopping by.. Be rude not to..