Spike

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  • Main Canopy Size
    170
  • Reserve Canopy Size
    150
  • AAD
    Cypres

Jump Profile

  • Home DZ
    Willowbank
  • License
    C
  • License Number
    102721
  • Licensing Organization
    BPA & APF
  • Number of Jumps
    590
  • Years in Sport
    3
  • First Choice Discipline
    Formation Skydiving
  • First Choice Discipline Jump Total
    612

Ratings and Rigging

  • AFF
    Instructor
  • Tandem
    Instructor
  1. Your lowest natural skill team member needs to "catch up". Jump numbers isn't necessarily a guide, so... I'd do a 1 on 1 with your coach and let him/her work out an airtime rota based on who needs the most work=needs the most tunnel time. As individuals/cost this may not seem fair but as a team its the best way to get the best result. Your weakest link is what will hold you back. Moral of the story, be a low timer and join a team keen to invest in improving.
  2. Hi Beth, There is a group from Nethers going out a little later this year. Drop me a line if you want to know more and I'll put you in touch with those that know. Cya
  3. 13. Seeing the visor on your Factory Diver frost over on a frosty day and not being able to see your 4way partners, or your alti, or the ground. 14. Watching the prop turn.
  4. anyone want to be my valentine?? QuoteYou mean there's a vacancy Happy birthday sweety
  5. Here's my story and why I posted the question. Very, very newly rated. During TI training I and my instructor experienced a mal. We're both still alive and I have the rating so I guess I did the right thing. I also experienced a side spin. Partly down to the passengers body position, but also to my poor presentation and a feeble attempt to outfly my passenger. Luckily I was drogue side up and recognised instantly the nature of the problem and a few seconds later that I was not going to be able to fly us out of the spin. Quite frankly I found the sidespin the most frightening experience of my skydiving career. However I took a deep breath, saddled up and got back on with the job. It didn't kill me and I won't make that mistake again (I hope). But it did make me realise that as a newly qualified TM I was severely low on experience. This got me to thinking about the level of risk and people's awareness of risk. I too as an A+ licenced jumper have done several qualification jumps to help out newbie TM candidates get thier rating. However its only now that I've done the TM course that I realise the additional complexities and risks of a TM jump. Add to that the low experience level and your into a whole new danger zone. I'm not just talking about the freefall dangers either. Those canopies just don't fly like the sport rig that you (as a sport jumper) have spent hundreds of jumps getting used to. And the landing approach techniques, straight in/stall surge/turn to stand up, slide in or running/nose plant are again quite different to sport rig landing techniques. However as Aggie, said, as a rated TM, I now have the confidence to know I could at least help in most situations. If you don't have a TM rating and your on a qualification jump with a student TM. Don't fu€k around, arch hard and do what your told. Your TM pilot is probably nervous enough as it is and no-ones joking when they say a TM's work rate is high enough as it is. Gosh that sounds overly negative, just understand, whether your TM rated or not, a Tandem is not just another jump! I voted TM rated yes.
  6. Spike

    Need Sympathy

    Hey Adam, Did Vicki really need an excuse to be rubbing linament on your chest! Hope the pain isn't around too long. Mend fast.
  7. Hi Craig, I did my AFF at Brisbane Skydiving Centre, Queensland, run by Brian Scoffell and about 50 minutes drive from Brisbane. They will collect/drop off from the city or airport. Small very friendly DZ with a Cessna 206 and 182, bunkhouse, showers, kitchen and bar. I got 1 on 1 instruction and total attention, worked for me. There is also a much bigger DZ about an hour and 15' out from Brisbane at Ramblers. I was there at the Equinox boogie in October. Great facilities, but much busier. Both of these DZ's are 7 day operations. Have fun and good luck with the AFF wherever you go.
  8. Zoter, these aren't fantasy costs, do the maths yourself. I left out the costs you mention because they're almost the same between Paris and the US and are in any case such a small component of the total that they have a negligible impact on the total cost of a trip. Just to make it clear, 3 hours of tunnel over a 5 night stay, including flights, taxes, transfers, hotels and tunnel time. Item Paris Orlando Flight £23.00 £291.00 Hotel £82.70 £64.80 Transfer £18.00 £13.97 Tunnel £3125.89 £951.14 ============================ Total £3249.59 £1320.91 Paris £3249.59 Orlando £1320.91 ================ Saving £1928.68 is that clear enough? The fact is that tunnel time in Paris is 3 times the cost of Orlando and thats a huge differential if your doing more than 30 minutes or so of tunnel time. The flight cost of £291 included tax. In the US you can catch the bus from the airport to International Drive for US$1.50 or you can splash out on a Mears Shuttle for US$25 return. The equivalent would be EU€25 for a Paris shuttle. EU€25 / 1.3884 = GBP£18.00 US$25 / 1.8136 = GBP£13.79, cheaper in the US by GBP£4 odd. Hotels, well Lemonjelly quoted EU€18 a night so we'll take that figure for the Paris hotel. The Super6 motel (walking distance to the tunnel) in the US costs US$30 US$30 / 1.8136 = GBP£16.54 EU€18 / 1.3884 = GBP£12.96, cheaper in Paris by a whopping GBP£3.58 per night. So if you stay for 5 nights, the difference in hotel costs is going to be a massive saving of GBP£18 odd if you stay in Paris rather than Orlando. As I said, the hotel and transfers costs are a negligble component of the total cost and do little to offset the fact that per minute Paris is 3 times dearer than Orlando. Personally I'd rather go to Orlando and save 1,000's than go Paris to save 10's! You may not like the time spent flying to Orlando. But there's nothing impractical about it for UK citizens. Have you seen how many Brits holiday in Orlando? Still dubious about the comparative costs? Shall we work out the difference in subsistence, the cost of a Big Mac against Le Mac Royale next?
  9. You're clearly a natural at flying your body. Whereas I still find it a challenge after nearly 20 hours in 3 different tunnels around the world. Have you tried a solid walled tunnel? or what are you basing your comparison on? Your very words reveal you don't know what your talking about. How do you turn and go back when you've already fallen off the air column? Which is what happens when you get to the net. In the solid wall tunnels, this drop off in workable air just doesn't happen in the same way. Simple maths, Skyventure per minute is cheaper than Aerokart. GBPound to EU€ = 1:1.3884 GBPound to US$ = 1:1.8136 Aerokart costs one off discount registration €20 / 1.3884 = GBP£14.40 Discounted session cost = €48 (2 mins) / 1.3884 = GBP£34.57 Skyventure Orlando costs Block booking time = US$575 (60 mins) = US$19.17 (2 mins) / 1.8136 = GBP£10.57 If you book now for February via Expedia you can get a flight from Heathrow to Orlando for GBP£291. 24 minutes at Aerokart will cost you GBP£429.24 24 minutes at Skyventure Orlando will cost you GBP£126.82, leaving GBP£302.42, more than enough to cover the flight and I've excluded travel costs to Eurokart. The break even point where it costs about the same to fly at either Orlando or Paris is less than 30 minutes, any time over that and its cheaper to go to Orlando. No, not complete crap, complete fact actually. This was my experience at Aerokart. The fact is that if you call Orlando you can book your minutes exactly when you want them during the day. Paris doesn't operate a booking system in this way so you don't know when you will have your time during the day. I WAS at the Aerokart tunnel first thing in the morning waiting for the gates to open. I WAS there all day till closing time before I got all of my time in. I WAS left wondering when it was going to be my turn next. This was my experience, yours may have been different, but that doesn't give you the right to describe my experience as complete crap. You will note that I made no criticism of the coaches at Aerokart. I agree that they have some excellent coaches there, but this equally applies to those available at Orlando. Politeness costs nothing and working out the best deal sometimes takes a little effort. But niether is hard.
  10. Cancel the booking. If you liked the Orlando tunnel then you won't like Aerokart. The Paris tunnel is of a different design with an open mesh sided chamber. My experience was that at Orlando you can just push off the wall, at Paris when you get to the edge you fall of the column and onto the padding. At Orlando you can talk (or at least shout) and be heard, in Paris "no one can hear you scream" as they say in the movies. I found the digital video debriefing facilities at Orlando far better than what they have at Paris. At Orlando they have a creepers and a creeper area. If you take your own creepers to Paris, try using them and you'll be asked to stop. If your booking an hour at Orlando you'll break even on the Paris costs (including flight expenses). Orlando you make your booking, you know when your in the tunnel and for how long. At Paris, its all a bit vague. You know how much time you've bought, but the operators decide when to put you in and for how long. So you might have 2 minutes at the start of the day and two minutes at the end of the day, but you won't be able to plan ahead. As you can tell I didn't enjoy my time at the Paris tunnel. I won't be going a second time. If you want a really cheap alternative to Orlando, try the Skyventure tunnel in Malaysia.
  11. Thanks to everyone for the advice. I passed my AFFI rating,
  12. Hey thanks for the link, I picked up some good usefull info, cheers.