CoolBeans

Would you say the hook knife saved your life? What if you didn't have one on you?

At 5:36:

That looks pretty crazy. Do you remember what you were thinking? Were you altitude aware? Seems like you had your mind set on getting to these toggles, did you know right away it was toggle fire malfunction? I noticed you attempted some rear riser play to get the canopy to fly straight but it was unsuccessful.

I just watched this video. I understand now that the toggle that's stowed behaves exactly like unstowed one pulled about 50% down, is that correct? In the case of left toggle fire, canopy will start turning right?

Can somebody please explain to me mechanics of why released toggle can cause violent turn? How heavy could the toggle be? 0.1-0.2 lbs? Why is such a small weight on one side vs no weight (toggle still stowed/attached) on the other side causing violent turn? Flying normally, with both toggles released/unstowed, in order to create most violent possible turn I would have to have left toggle above head and right toggle all the way down to the knee. If I just let that 'knee toggle' (right) hang on its own it's going to stay around me head, it won't go all the way down to the knee on its own. It's not heavy enough to go any lower than my head level. And toggle around my head should NOT cause extreme turn. My experiences are from a big student canopy, maybe other canopies behave differently? Is there any difference between stowed toggle vs unstowed but held all the way up? I would think no...

How safe are front/back flips and barrel rolls maneuvers on a student rig that's 100% NOT freefly friendly? Isn't there a premature deployment concern?

What does it mean when skydivers fly in 'deep brakes', especially for accuracy landing? My understanding is that any skydiver can fly normally or fly in 'deep brakes'.

Is it when I hold toggles all the way down, around my knees? Also, especially in base community, I know that some people adjust brakes to be at 'deep brakes' level right after canopy inflation. What happens when they pull the already 'deep brakes' all the way down to knees level?

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.

There is lots of very useful information in this thread. I'm myself very interested in different ways to prevent hard openings. Nobody mentioned that very easy trick so far, so I'm pointing it out. One of the very good ways to prevent hard openings is to look at your free fall speed. The slowest possible free fall speed is at the very beginning hence do hop & pops!

Hi there, I'm trying to grasp the accuracy landing topic. I'm currently a student on a big canopy (260sqft I think it's Navigator). I normally start the pattern at 1000ft, turn left at 600ft then turn left again to final at 300ft. Only after turning to final I start to get an idea how far I'm going to fly before landing. Would you please share how you are approaching the accuracy landing? Regular landing pattern: Tools and tricks that I'm interested in: 1. Looking at the horizon and target - is target "going up", "going down" or fixed? if fixed that's the point I will most likely land at 2. S turns on final - if I know I'm overshooting I could bleed some altitude by doing small left/right turns; I've been told that's a bad idea as it makes me unpredictable and other jumpers can be confused; however it is very efficient 3. Flying in deep brakes on final - never tried that myself, I've seen/heard/read that this could be a way to bleed altitude faster in case I was overshooting; but then how do I flare? 4. Using front/rear risers to either land sooner or later - no idea about that, is that even an option? 5. Modifying last turn to final at 300ft - instead of regular 90 degrees turn I could cut it short or circle around by turning little bit to the right first and then doing long left turn; the challenge with that one is that I don't know how far I'm going to fly before I actually turn to final 6. The way I flare - quick half-way down should give me a bit more glide, slow full flare should stop the canopy sooner - is that true? 7. Pay attention how long/quick my downwind leg is and based on that figure out when/how to do final turn. I have no idea how to use that one in practice 8. Get the insights about how strong the wind is by looking at the wind sock - that's the theory for me, I have no clue how to actually apply that in practice other than seeing wind direction and knowing that I want to land upwind I'm aware that before executing any new maneuver I should talk to S&TA at the dropzone. Another important thing that I already experienced - before anything I have to observe traffic. I had one situation where I was fixed on the target (is it going up? down?) and didn't see tandem landing close to me - as a result they had to do some corrections. I'm just curious to hear your opinions.