skytash

Why is that not allowed? You have a profile, you should be able to read through anything on here. Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

Colchester is home to 2Para and 3Para. I expect the parachutes she has seen will be military. You may struggle (or not want) to get hooked up, unless it's to a herc to jump from a very low altitude with a round... tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

Same here. Would rather publish under an even more anonymous name than this one or my FB profile... tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

I was born a he??? Why didn't anyone tell me and how come I don't have a willie? Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

at least his first reaction wasn't 'let's live on government hand-outs'... Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

I'll miss the girl who was forever young, bubbly and up for groping asses with cylume covered hands at a party to leave glow in the dark hand prints! tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

This doesn't go in Incidents, so I'm starting a thread here. Not sure where you get that idea from. My taxes subsidise the military jumpers during the week. The operation at the week end is run by the Army Parachute Association, the one during the week by the MOD. Different student kits owned and used and cross charging for lease of planes. I believe the APA owns the planes and leases them to the MOD to use. APA is a non-profit organisation. MOD is the Ministry of Defence. Neither need to make a profit at the end of the year. tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

I think you need to be really careful when comparing different policies, esp looking that the trail posted here as terminology in each of the posts describes a different kind of insurance. BPA insurance covers the cost of other people's damage or injury that you cause during a skydive (if you do so), not damage to yourself. One of the reasons for that is the NHS in the UK who looks after you for free if you hurt yourself in the UK. Also, it is impossible to waive someone else's right to sue you for physical injury under UK legislation, so you may want cover for legal fees too. Travel Insurance with Medical fees included will cover cost of medical treatment from damage to do to yourself in the event of an accident in a foreign country and may include repatriation, but may also have limits on value or duration of treatment and other bits in the small print. Ciritical Illness Insurance pays you a lump sum in the event that you have a particular injury or illness. Most are designed to pay out once per injury or illness to cover lack of income in the event of that injury or illness. They do vary though. Life Assurance pays out in the even of your death - check details though as policies may exclude payments being made in the event that death was caused or took place during the course of a hazardous activity, incl skydiving. I don't Ciritical Illness Insurance, as I can continue to work even if I end up quite beaten up and consider the risk of not being able to work as a result of an injury low. If I was a scaffolder or plumber or farmer, I would have it as an injury could prevent me from earning a living. I don't have life assurance either as I have no dependents, so don't really care what happens financially after I die. Not everyone needs every form of insurance, so understand what you are buying, why you are buying it and compare real details in the small print when comparing prices. tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

Going back to the post that revived the thread, I'm wondering why you are looking to get your FS1 without BPA membership. When I was jumping in Germany or South Africa, nobody even knew what an FS1 was let alone cared about whether I had it. If you are jumping outside the UK, why bother with a sticker that few outside the UK understand? If someone is insisting on it (eg a Spanish/US dropzone) surely a logbook with the experience is enough as that is what their local jumpers would be presenting not being able to get an FS1 sticker from their local association? tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

save the boobies indeed - I like mine and feel them regularly to make sure I get to keep them tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

ok, they were too fast for me to want to calculate it - here's £60 to JFTC chicks! tash

I think they are holding back to make sure I donate the full £60!

I'm timing the geeks and am considering a suitable prize for how long it takes to make it here. tash edited to add that I've worked out the prize: I'll donate up to £60 to the next JFTC fund, a pound per minute after the broadcast that it takes to appear on You Tube. If it takes an hour or more, it will be the £60. Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

I got this from idea-a-day.com and wondered what people thought of this: I'm guessing it's quite server intensive so would get a thumbs down from HH, it would also put the repost police out of business so may not be popular with the general public either! tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

You'd be amazed how quickly you adapt to this when putting a second rig together, as I learnt with just 10 or so CRW jumps Fellow-pup-tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

Can you make that apply to my company too? They aren't really Storm enthusiasts, but I'd like Mondays off to do more jumping! tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

you are definitely not the only one, anyone who packs well and fast was at the stage you are at now at one point. I remember being taught by instructors and riggers and thinking 'you've got big hands, of course you can control the canopy and I've only got small little hands which is why I can't'. It's all technique. In my experience, everyone packs differently, having picked up one tip from one person, another from another and melded them together to make their own personal technique. I'd suggest keep going, and ask different people. Work out exactly where it is that you are getting stuck, ask people if you can watch them at that point when they are packing their canopy and perhaps adopt some or all (or none!) of that technique. The other important thing is that you need to understand how it all works, so why do some people roll the nose, others don't, why roll the tail (or not), why flake the cells, why have an s-fold etc. That way you will find it easier to understand why the different techniques can achieve a very similar outcome and you will be able to pick 'your' part up knowing why you are doing it, not just because 'so-and-so said so' tash edited for spelling Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

I'll never forget that smile and know it will cheer me up to remember it when a bigway just isn't going the way it should. You'll live on in our memories. tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

I'd say 50/50. There are some decent DZ's in the UK where you can be treated fairly and have a good laugh, but there is absolutely nothing, nothing that compares favourably to an efficient and succesfull US or mainland European DZ. The national culture of over-regulation and all powerful instructors is everywhere. In my experience, the efficient and successful UK DZ's are friendly and some small club DZ's in mainland Europe are very, very unfriendly. I'm thinking is to do with the ones that are successful and efficient than the ones that are in the UK. There aren't quite as many successful and efficient DZ's in the UK. Because of our weather we tend to attract fewer skydiving tourists than say California, Florida or southern Spain. As a Brit, you tend to see your local DZ (which may not be the efficient/successful one) but only ever see the efficient/successful ones in the US, so are not always comparing like with like. Just a thought. Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

Any confirmations of dates yet? tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

Good going guys & gals (I'm assuming you have some chicks in these societies , if not just wait, we are waiting in the wings just to be old enough to join the fun!) tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

not experienced, not in North Florida, but know what you mean about the rush of doing CRW - it's what got me all excited about jumping out of planes again after starting to get bored 10 years after the first jump! I now have my own gear, and next week-end the weather better play ball or I'll be tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

From memory, my travel insurance which I bought from the local Sparkasse in Germany covered skydiving abroad, so there may be something you dad can buy in Germany rather than having to get something in the US. tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

problem with his closest dropzone is that the winds are often higher than free met records show. It's on a hill and we get some howlers through that the surrounding towns and villages don't even register. Other times we have complete calm and everyone around us has lots of wind (fnar fnar). Someone who knows the Ops Manual better can find the bit about wind limits, or you can go and have a look on the BPA website www.bpa.org.uk. The problem towards the latter part of this week-end was more the low cloud. I think there were only around 4 - 6 lifts in total over the 4 days of the long week-end, and one group decided that they didn't even want to take off 'cos it would cost them the jump ticket once wheels were off and they didn't want to risk not being able to see the ground from the plane and land in the plane again. And then there was the lift that circled quite some time to find a hole in the clouds - it was cold up there (and before anyone warns about hypoxia, we circled low enough and only climbed the last bit once we could see where we were going to jump) tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe

good going - being a POP is now far more daunting, your records keep getting bigger tash Don't ever save anything for a special occasion. Being alive is a special occasion. Avril Sloe