DiveMaker

Why not? Did you look at the ground? How did your reserve open? - pull reserve - RSL - AAD fire ?? . DiveMaker

recap from these posts: http://dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=1114420;#1114420 http://dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=1114801;#1114801 http://dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=1115287;#1115287 Tucking the handle under the harness is a really bad idea. It will be MUCH harder to find the handle if you need it after discovering that you have a main malfunction. A friend of mine had a floater that was under the harness. The reserve cable ran under his armpit with the handle floating above him. He dumped his main and had a malfunction. He cutaway. He tried to pull the reserve by getting the cable where it comes out of the housing. He spent the rest of his life doing that except for a turn to the west to watch a beautiful Coolidge sunset. The kicker to this story was that the folks on the jump told him about the floater. He decided to ignore it and continue with the RW. I am pretty sure he thought that the odds of him needing his reserve on that jump were small. I do not recommend ignoring a floater. Most people cannot get the handle back in the pocket. I did one time, but that was a Martin Baker handle with an elastic pocket. Most of the velcro sandwich pockets today make it very hard to replace the handle in real time. Don't get caught up in this - Pull at the appropriate altitude. Most jumpers have deployed the main and reseated the reserve handle once under a good canopy and checking for traffic. You can also try to hold the harness and handle together as you deploy your main. This will reduce the chance that the flailing handle would pull the reserve pin out during opening shock of the main. Some jumpers might go head down a bit when holding the MLW, but it is possible to put one hand on your MLW and pull without going head down. Nowadays, this is a tunnel exercise. One hand on your back, both hands on your back. etc A slightly head-down position for deployment under this scenario would be little more than a slight inconvenience. The best way to tell some on else they have a floater is to: 1. get their attention 2. point to your reserve handle 3. point to their reserve handle. Then stay out of their way - Do not stay directly in front of them (like an RW 2-way) because if they pull, you will eat their feet. The statement of 'tucking it behind the MLW' suggests stashing the handle between a jumper's body and a harness that under some conditions would be taut enough to hold the handle in place. Some jumpers might think chest strap - that's pretty taut for most during freefall. Some jumpers might think MLW - about where the RC pocket is. That is taut for some jumpers. Of course, if you had a large chest, there is always a gap between the harness and body, except for where the harness draws across the maximum girth of the chest. Specifically, I can say that large chested women have a gap between the MLW where the RC pocket is and their torso. The handle would NOT be held in place there under any conditions. The big disadvantage is that even for the jumpers that have the harness tight against their torso or chest will experience slack once the main opens. The handle falls. If the handle is under the MLW, it could fall back under the armpit if they have to cutaway and pull the reserve. If the handle is under the chest strap, they end up with a cable wrap around the chest strap. If you or anyone else does not understand the potential problem with this, I'd be happy to show you at the DZ. Just ask. You can decide for yourself, which idea is better or has more potential problems. Say someone tucks the handle under the chest strap. Then they deploy the main, the handle falls thru during opening. Oops - now they have a malfunction and cutaway. Then they go for the reserve handle. But wait - the cable is wrapped around the chest strap. The handle won't budge. Too much friction between that S-wrap the cable has around the harness. Now, you are back trying to grab the cable as it comes out of the housing. The cable may be tightly pressed against the harness. If you have gloves on, add in a greater difficulty level. If the cable is routed around the harness (MLW or chest strap), that will be a much harder task than looping hands around a cable freely floating about (not wrapped around the harness), pulling until the handle slips into your hands. Floaters happened quite often many years ago when almost all rigs had elastic pockets. It was relatively easy to loops thumbs and fingers around the cable as it exited the housing and pull. The suggested technique of 'tucking the handle under the harness' adds to the difficulty in pulling the reserve because a reserve cable that is wrapped around the harness will be harder to grab and pull. The odds of a freely floating reserve handle pulling the pin during main deployment are slim. You'd have to have one hell of a hard opening and a rather long excess cable length to generate typical reserve pull forces. You have to provide options to jumpers that may experience this. Your options complicate reserve pulls, if they are required. But I suppose that some new-age jumpers won't worry too much about that because they have an RSL and CYPRES to back them up. I prefer to be able to pull the reserve directly. For Floaters in general: you are not supposed to try and catch the handle in mid-air as it flops about. You are supposed to loop your hands around the cable and pull. The handle will come into your hands as you run down the cable. If the cable is routed around the harness, then this may not happen. Then you end up trying to pull the pin with pressure on the cable. That's a bit harder that using a handle to pull with. Other handle types: TK Donle told me RWS makes all 3 types of handles & it's up to the jumper to 'choose his poison'. No handle type is superior in all situations. JumpShack only TSOs metal handles for Racers. Gloves: Gloves definitely enter into consideration here. Each jumper should determine that they could get the reserve cable with their gloves on. If you follow Bill's advice and have that cable wrapped around the harness, then this is a significant issue. End of Housing: Make sure the end of the cutaway and reserve housings are properly tacked down. . DiveMaker

All formations consist of one or more of eight possible grips you can take on other jumpers. . DiveMaker

Hemet CA WalMart (there is only one. - about 0.5 miles from my house) from PE.com Trip takes scary turn CARJACKING: A teen dies and the family of an elderly Hemet man worries about his fate. 01:25 AM PDT on Thursday, April 29, 2004 By KENNY KLEIN and SONJA BELLAND / The Press-Enterprise One of two teenagers suspected in the carjacking of an elderly man from the Hemet Wal-Mart parking lot died after the vehicle smashed into a tree. The elderly man was dropped off minutes before the crash. But family members, including the son who happened to spot the speeding car while searching for his dad, did not know his whereabouts for hours. About 1:30 p.m. Wednesday, a citywide search began for 82-year-old Hemet resident Darrell Grangaard. Police said they found him more than two hours later wandering outside a mobile home at Sun Valley Estates, less than a block from the Wal-Mart. After the ordeal ended, Grangaard sat in the air-conditioned back seat of a Hemet police car as medics checked his vital signs. DeeAnn Bradley / The Press-Enterprise Hemet resident Darrell Grangaard, 82, thanks Hemet Officer James Waters, who found Grangaard wandering less than a block from the Wal-Mart where he was carjacked. "I'm OK. I'm fine," Grangaard said. "I'm happy." The unidentified 15-year-old passenger in the stolen car died when the car wrapped around a tree in a San Jacinto neighborhood. An ambulance took the second unidentified teenager to Riverside County Regional Medical Center in Moreno Valley, where he was in critical condition. The crash marked the second fatal accident in San Jacinto this month that involved a stolen car crashing into a tree. On April 2, two Hemet men died after police chased a stolen Mustang through the city. Shopping trip gone awry About 1 p.m. Wednesday, Grangaard, his wife, Mary, and their daughter Janet Green went shopping at the Wal-Mart on Florida Avenue, police Sgt. Kevin Caskey said. A tearful reunion hours later brought the day to a close. Before the carjacking, Darrell Grangaard, who doesn't drive, waited in the back seat of their 1995 Mercury Marquis with the windows partially rolled down, family members said. The key was in the ignition because he was listening to the new Rod Stewart tape. The teenagers got into the car and drove away, but dropped Grangaard off unharmed a few minutes later, police said. When they left the store, Mary Grangaard and her daughter realized the car and Darrell Grangaard were gone. They told a store employee to call 911. A store greeter tried to console Mary Grangaard as the cried, she said. Green said she focused on helping her mom and keeping track of the plant and shoulder pads the two had purchased. "When something like that happens to you it's like you woke up from a darn dream or something," Green said. "I just told her don't think the worst - you can't." Hours of worry When the doorbell rang about 5 p.m., Mary Grangaard scurried to the front door. Her "Bub" was home. "What a day. What did they do to you, sweet pea?" she asked as she held her husband's face, kissed and hugged him. After many more hugs and kisses, Mary Grangaard helped him to his favorite spot on the couch. "They didn't want an old bugger like you?" she asked him. For two hours, Mary Grangaard worried about her husband of more than 60 years. After heart attacks and strokes, the family feared the trauma might bring on another one. The couple is never apart, as Darrell Grangaard needs help walking because he broke a hip. A detective called his wife at home to tell her that her husband had been found. The minutes took forever to tick by as Mary Grangaard and her daughter waited for Bub's return. They called relatives to let them know the good news and watched the coverage on television. "There's Bub, look at him. Bring him home," Mary said, blubbering as she saw footage of her husband being helped by police. Fear and luck The worry of Grangaard's family was amplified when his son, Darrell E. Grangaard, spotted the car and then saw it totaled moments later. The son, who works in San Jacinto, rushed to scene when called and told what had happened. As Darrell E. Grangaard drove to his mother's aide, he spotted his parents' car speeding near Seventh Street just east of Main Street in San Jacinto. He followed it as the suspects almost crashed into several cars about 2 p.m. "They almost hit me head on," said Hector Villegas, a 32-year-old Hemet man. "When I moved into the dirt to avoid them, they lost it. They went sideways and slammed right into that tree." At the scene, Darrell E. Grangaard, his granddaughter Cherise Musick and other relatives watched as firefighters and officers searched the totaled car. The car was so mangled, Grangaard's relatives cried and feared their loved one was inside. They repeatedly questioned officers and broke into tears. Later, they found out he was not inside. "What a stroke of luck to see the car," Musick said. "We were worried Grandpa was in that car. It's terrifying to say the least." Officer James Waters later found Grangaard behind a mobile home. Grangaard, wearing a black "Hawaii" cap, dress shirt and tan slacks, was dehydrated. "He did not know where he was at," Waters said. "He had a difficult time communicating."Residents in the Sun Valley mobile home park where Grangaard was found didn't think much of elderly man wandering around - until television helicopters circled overhead after more than a dozen officers arrived. "There are old guys walking around here all the time," resident John Skiles said. "You just don't know. You just become blind to what's going on."Staff writer Han Kwak contributed to this report. .......... There were also two helicopters circling the area about that time. They were flying over my house so I went out to see if there was a big fire or what not??? I hopped on my bike & pedled down to Florida & Gilmore (x-streets by Walmart) All I could tell was that they were overflying the area from WalMart to a place to the East (where the crash was) WalMart also has a security officer in a golf cart patrolling the lot during business hours. .............. Hemet is a small retirement community. I leave my house unlocked all the time. I only lock things up when I leave for days at a time and take RePete with me. ............. For what it's worth…. The kids that hijacked the car - then probably to their surprise - realized someone was in the car - did the better of alternatives by setting the old guy out. The neighborhood has many retirement areas. Better that, than taking the old man on the joy ride and getting him killed too. I don't condone what the kids did, but I think they realized they had more than they bargained for & made the better of it. The people that left the old guy in the car: I don't know if the car was on with AC running, but it was HOT that day. I wouldn't do a quickie WM run with my dog - even if I left the engine & AC running (with locked car of course). I just can't see that the people leaving this 'almost' invalid type elderly man in a vehicle alone are completely innocent. Certainly, they do not need suffer a kidnapping or car jacking, but they left someone that apparently could not take care of himself alone in a car with 100 degree temps. That just doesn't sit right with me either. ......... DiveMaker

Me either - until I met a few of these folks. One guy (few hundred jumps) had trouble pulling his main. He tried again, rolled on his back, got face to Earth, tried again, rolled on his back. Then -being the altitude aware type of guy he was - he maintained a stable, face to earth position after he passed thru 2k and waited until his cypres fired. He wanted to give his reserve every chance of opening properly. One jumper (~50 jumps or so) cutaway a spinner a few seconds after opening. Good call there. The jumper pulled the reserve handle out, but stopped pulling when it got to the point of actually pulling the pin out. The jumper pulled, but only to take out the slack in the cable. The jumper did nothing else. The cypres fired and saved the jumper. The jumper told me later that they did not think it would be so much of a pull to pull the pin. (as compared to the training harness handles) No RSL because it was rental gear. These two jumpers are different than the ones Billvon mentions. Plus I have a few other stories from around the world. Some are on the cypres save site. The good news is that they are few and far between. # DiveMaker

I am under the impression that the new-age dirt alerts go off at some flat line altitude, like 1500 feet or 1800 feet or whatever you can set this to, but only when you are 'going fast' towards the Earth. Do the dirt alerts go off at the flat line altitude if you have a 'slow' descent? Is there a way to set what speeds it will go off on? Do any of the new-age dirt alerts have the capability of sounding off, at say 1500 feet or 1000 feet, no matter what your descent rate is? I'm not in the market for any of these gizmos, just want to know if they have this feature. . DiveMaker

Yes they speak English at least the owner does. I met him in Thailand a few weeks ago. Tell him I say 'Hi' again. . DiveMaker

sorry I missed that you were not a US jumper. but you are the first person [case of beer] that has admitted to reading all those waiver forms. Guess I shudda put a lilttle smile face-thingy on the comment. I would like to know, did I answer your questions of "Where can I read it? What requirements does it include?" There were several other answers that contradicted me, just want to know if I'm doing my job to your satisfaction as a National Director. - DiveMaker

USPA Statement of Medical Fitness "I represent and warrant that I have no known physical or mental infirmities that would impair my ability to participate in skydiving, or if I do have any such infirmities, that they have been or are being successfully treated so that they do not represent any foreseeable risk while skydiving. "I also represent and warrant that I am not taking any medications or substances, prescription, or otherwise, that would impair my ability to participate in skydiving." This is normally in the waiver you sign. You do read those, right? - DiveMaker

Yes. It was a response to my post at the other place. It has nothing to do with: Norad or Flight information Information last updated at 5:05 AM Paris time AF 068 Flight left from Paris (CDG) at 3:12 PM Flight arrived in Los Angeles (LAX) at 5:53 PM All times shown are local times Departs Arrives Airport : Paris, Charles de Gaulle (CDG) - France terminal 2E Los Angeles, Los Angeles Int. (LAX) - USA terminal 5 Scheduled departure time : 1:35 PM, December 30, 2003 4:05 PM, December 30, 2003 Comments : Flight AF068 has been delayed as a safety precaution. Get a Grip! . DiveMaker

see Formations for Dummies - All formations consist of one or more of eight possible grips you can take on other jumpers. Online DiveMaker . DiveMaker

So what did Sunpath do for the rig? Were they the original risers? Was this opening at 'normal' deployment speeds? [aka nothing like a head down or flat fly with excessive speeds?? The way you say it, it sounds like a normal opening with belly perpendicular to the flight path at ~ 120 mph] . DiveMaker