BarbaraKobzik

I hope this is the right place to post this, sorry if not. Is anybody driving from Miami to Merritt Island / Cape Canaveral area? Or to Orlando? I need to get a console table from Miami to my home in Merritt Island. It’s 48” wide x 16” deep x 30” high and weights about 80 lbs. (It’s in one piece and cannot be disassembled). If you would be able to bring it with you, would be great and really helpful. I will pay for gas and tolls and the extra driving of course. In that case please get in touch. Thank you! Barbara

Wendy, any luck yet with your cousin? Thank you so much for checking, things have become pretty desperate.

Wendy, that is great, thanks much. It’s almost impossible to get an appointment in the Ankara embassy. Usually there are humanitarian emergency visas but we can’t reach anybody to figure out how to get that. Any concrete information would be very much appreciated. Wendy, any luck yet? Thanks so much for checking! Yes thank you.

Hi, I need urgent help / advice for a friend (US citizen) whose family lost everything in the Earthquake in Turkey and currently has no place to go. He flew to Turkey, and he and his family are now in a hotel in Ankara, he was able to get his family from the earthquake region to there. He wants to bring them over to his place in the US (Orlando, Florida) for now until things are somewhat stable in Turkey. He has a big house, so no financial problem, he can sponsor them. Does anybody know if there is an emergency visa process for a visitor's visa for people from Turkey, coming from the earthquake region? His Mom is 83, his brother has down syndrome, and then there is another brother with wife and two small kids. They are from Hatay /Iskenderun. It has been a very long week (or more by now) for them, sleeping in a car with all of them. It would be great to get them out on an emergency visitor' visa as soon as possible. Anybody with contacts to immigration or embassy? Any advice / help with viva / visa appointment in Ankara would be much appreciated ! Thank you very much.

Turtlespeed, can you please send me a brief email to [email protected] ? I will get back to you tomorrow then. Thanks a lot!

Hello, As you all know, missing equipment like masks and protective gowns for health workers are a huge issue during the current corona virus (COVID19) crisis. Most of us skydivers have patched their jumpsuits and stuff in the past and know how to operate a sewing machine, or just needle and threat. We need as many masks and gowns as possible - and as soon as possible. The Johns Hopkins University (who I work for) is working on a design for both and on plans what material to use. It should be ready in a few days. Are there volunteers to help with the prototype testing right now to start mass producing (whatever you can so) masks after receiving instructions Are there gear/jumpsuit manufacturers who are interested in doing this commercially for a while? Can somebody of you provide a list of all / most / many manufacturers of gear, jumpsuits, repair shops etc. so that I can contact them directly? Obviously, this is a pretty urgent request. If you can help in any way, please send me an email to [email protected]. You might receive a reply either from that address or from my Johns Hopkins address. Please forward this request in any way you think it might be helpful. Thank you all, I really hope the skydive community can step up here and help with a task that is extremely important for all of us. I hope you are all hanging in there and deal well with the social distancing and all other things we have to get used to for a while. Stay safe, stay healthy, and all the best! Barbara

Hello, As you all know, missing equipment like masks and protective gowns for health workers are a huge issue during the current corona virus (COVID19) crisis. Most of us skydivers have patched their jumpsuits and stuff in the past and know how to operate a sewing machine, or just needle and threat. We need as many masks and gowns as possible - and as soon as possible. The Johns Hopkins University (who I work for) is working on a design for both and on plans what material to use. It should be ready in a few days. Are there volunteers to help with the prototype testing right now to start mass producing (whatever you can so) masks after receiving instructions Are there gear/jumpsuit manufacturers who are interested in doing this commercially for a while? Can somebody of you provide a list of all / most / many manufacturers of gear, jumpsuits, repair shops etc. so that I can contact them directly? Obviously, this is a pretty urgent request. If you can help in any way, please send me an email to [email protected]. You might receive a reply either from that address or from my Johns Hopkins address. Please forward this request in any way you think it might be helpful. Thank you all, I really hope the skydive community can step up here and help with a task that is extremely important for all of us. I hope you are all hanging in there and deal well with the social distancing and all other things we have to get used to for a while. Stay safe, stay healthy, and all the best! Barbara

Hi there, My sister plans to fly from Germany to the US for a Christmas visit, flight is this Thursday. She entered her data for ESTA which is required for Germans travelling to the US, but the request was rejected. Background is: she is married to a US citizen, lived in Florida for 2 years and had a temporary greencard during that time, then moved together with her husband back to Germany. Her temporary greencard expired in the meantime while she was living in Germany, she didn't do anything with it anymore after she had left the US, neither applying for an extension nor cancelling the greencard request. That is most likely the reason for the ESTA rejection and was her fault, but now is the question: what needs to be done to travel to the US? Especially to get it all done by Wednesday night, the flight is Thursday morning. Sure we know about calling the embassy and appointment there and emergency appointment as well, but does anybody know exactly what to do in this case and what the chances are to get it sorted out quickly? PLEASE, if you have some good advice, please let me know asap. Thank you very much ! (and yes, if you have the special hint that sorts things out, I am sure she will be more than happy to keep you and your buddies drinking beer at the dropzone for an entire evening ) Barbara --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It's nice to be important, but it's much more important to be nice.

Hi, Video guys, can you help? I am looking for a very small wireless camera, it also has to work with a lightweight battery. It should be not too expensive (actually quite inexpensive), doesn't have to be great quality. We plan to put a few of them into a football (just in the garden, not NFL!), so the min range should be around 300 ft. Any ideas? Any websites where you buy stuff like that cheap? Thank you very much! Barbara --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It's nice to be important, but it's much more important to be nice.

Thanks a lot. I looked on some of those websites. Obviously it depends on the type of item; there is an entire item list which tells you what kind of tax you need to pay. In my case I wasn't too lucky finding what I need. The item is a stained glass door and window for the house entry somebody in Germany builds for me. It's about 5k Euro. When I looked up "stained glass", I found an ID number for it, and it said "0 % tax" which is great, but it also said "for religious groups". Maybe I should quickly start a religious group, believing in the big blue sky or something like that. Well, seriously, I have absolutely no clue what kind of taxes I might have to pay, and with this amount I for sure need to know upfront. I also count on getting back the German VAT, is that a realistic assumption? It would be great if somebody can tell me how I could find out - I need to know for sure. "Usually this happens, but sometimes not" unfortunately might exceed my budget. Thank you all so much for your help! Barbara --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It's nice to be important, but it's much more important to be nice.

Hellooooo ! Nobody here who can help? Come on, guys and girls, I know it's more boring than all your titts topics, but I really could need some help here, so - anybody has some experience with this? Thanks a lot ! Barbara --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It's nice to be important, but it's much more important to be nice.

Hi, Does anybody know how things officially work when you buy something outside the US (in Germany) and have it shipped here? (no, not a rig). What kind of taxes do you need to pay? It's for my own use, nothing commercial. And shouldn't I get back the VAT from Germany which by the way is 19% at the moment? It would be great if somebody can help and explain to me how it works, I tried to figure out with Mr Google and others, but haven't really found a clear answer. Thank you so much! Barbara --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It's nice to be important, but it's much more important to be nice.

Hi - Can anybody recommend a good brush cutter? I don't need a trimmer to make the garden look like a golf course and trimmed like with nail scissors, I really need to go thru brushed (up to about 3 inches diameter) and especially thru dry tall grass and reeds. It's a pretty big area. Any recommendations what to buy or what to stay away from? Thanks a lot, Barbara --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It's nice to be important, but it's much more important to be nice.

Thank you. If anybody could recommend a certain kit he has good experience with, that would be really helpful. So far we have heard prices from 2k to 12k, not sure what really makes sense to have. Barbara --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It's nice to be important, but it's much more important to be nice.

Thank you very much. It's for our lab technicians. We have a new radome to test our weather radar system, and we need to have fiber connectors all the way from the lab to the radome. So far we just used the standard cables in the lab and test plane and let Boeing do their thing in the aircraft, but now we need to do some cabeling by ourselves. Thanks a lot again! Barbara --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It's nice to be important, but it's much more important to be nice.