Andrelr

Very quick on the draw: 4-way rote jump with canopy over tail. Canopy was OK, #4 joined us late and we still did a 6. Only found out what he did after landing.

good advice

Now if Perris was closer to Dubai... This last year is the first since 1987 that I haven't been on a rote team Cheers Andre

Hi G Watching it live (from the ground) was bad enough, but did you have to post it? A

Having a Shisha (hookah) in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Note no beer on the table...

I think the original post is in Trivia. My copy of the video has been lost, unfortunately. Looked pretty cool - cameraman spiralling madly and this mess falling away from him, getting smaller and smaller until you see a flash on the screen. Speed? None of that shit above him was flying at all - it was only good for drag. He WAS going in.

Since moving to Saudi, my wife and I thoroughly enjoy a shisha every evening. "Two Apples" flavour is great. The only legal "high" you can get over here...

The same guy that ended up in a flaming fireball in mistimed landing with a Spitfire? The stories about him and his take-off impatience with the Porter are legend in South Africa. Ditto with him landing the plane with a full load after someone farted.

Great story. I can picture it - hanging in there, unable to do a thing, watching you come in for a dock. I've had a couple of over-keen teammates dock me while my canopy was busy falling out of the stack on top of me. The best wrap story from my team also involved Pursuits (possibly the worst CRW-specific canopy ever!). Tonto posted the details elsewhere in the forums, but involved one guy eventually falling away from us (body) line-wrapped up in his plus another Pursuit. Not much material actaully holding him up at all. As he wasn't getting out of this in a hurry (luckily the initial incident happened at 7000'), he popped his reserve at about 2000' only contributing to the mess around him. Again, very little material above him. We were all spiralling down crazily above him, watching him go in. Directly over a suburb - you start wishing for miracles like landing in a large pool, whatever. Not sure that would have helped. We saw this flash of light as he hit and landed near him. Here's the scary bit - as we got there, we saw him get up and look around in disbelief! What happened: he went through the main powerlines feeding the suburb. After his body went through (without touching lines), the material of the canopy collection caught, slowed his fall, shorted, melted as a result and released him, fully horizontal on to the tar below with the angled concrete roadside holding up his head. Not even winded. Only injury was a badly cut finger from his hookknife. True story. 4 April 1992, Pretoria Skyding Club, South Africa. Jumper: Chris Flint. With those Pursuits, we had 6 cutaways in 6 jumps (looking at my logbook). Chris wore a tersh for the next year!

The post above regarding the Dubai club is correct. They have a King Air purchased and being readied for jumping due "any weekend" now. Frustarting, but when the club gets going, you can get in around 5-6 jumps a day. There were two good boogies there earlier this year. Saudi jumping is "almost" there, I'm told. The Riyadh club awaits its plane from Jeddah. The Jeddah club has plans to start in a couple of months. I live in Saudi and get to Dubai twice a month. Currently very frustrated with not getting enough jumps in. Perhaps both clubs get their act together soon. Insh'allah

Hi Ron Didn't know you hung out on DZ.com. You probably have more that a few scary stories with all the demos you've done. Share them with us. I remember Dave well - jumping at Klerksdorp in the mid to late 80's and having to check in his gun to Schalk (the DZ operator and another larger-than-life character) for the weekend to avoid any Saturday night pub fun.

Not for a while - I'm still stuck out here in the desert. How did that op on your back go?

2.2, Tom? With that old body of your's?

Nice facepaint, Ernie. Your posted pics didn't come through. Check out www.aerialfx.co.za where Graham Field jumped this flag in front of the Union Buildings in South Africa. BTW - 24 of us jumped from 6 Jet rangers. Graham with the flag and the rest of us with 150000 signed postcards (to Nelson Mandela - an anti crime protest) between us. Had to drop them after turning on to final before flaring.

Don't confuse the jumping with the lifestyle and the friends. Too many force themselves to jump when they really find it difficult socially to walk away. As Tonto said: it's only jumping...

I'd go for container 4. You know that your main is VERY similar to the canopies used by the Red Devils (and my old team, as we bought Red Devel rejects from Aerodyne). See pics.

A simple-to-use logbook would be great. A Pocket PC companion to this would be even better. There is one for the Palm OS, but nothing for Pocket PC.

The Kudu is South African. Look up www.aircraft.co.za The Arava has lots of pics on Google Images. Otherwise the 3 attachments should help.

What sort of pics: skydiving exit shots or profiles of the aeroplanes themselves? Do you mean the Israeli-built Arava?

Only 8 over the weekend, but all from 15000 out of an AN26...

You've become such a gear yuppie in your old age! A far cry from the plain black Vulcan with the painted Grim Reaper?

Brilliant thread, everyone! I've been hanging around DZs for all my adult life. They're ideal places for all of us who refuse to grow up. They're populated by groups of foulmouthed, uncouth, badly behaved, unwashed but very memorable people. People who make up my oldest and dearest friends. I also have a 12 year old son. If he hadn't almost grown up on DZs, I would never have seen him. He was almost born on one (6 hours after we left that day). The profanity he hears, he accepts as DZ talk. He doesn't talk that way at home, and I doubt he's any more profane than his buddies at school. My only proviso is that he goes to bed before the REALLY rough stuff starts at night.

....

"Cars are like freebags..." One of the things I remember about being on a team with you, Tonto, is that you come up with great one-liners. One that stays with me is: "aeroplanes only crash on the way down"

Hi Tonto It was actually a 5-way at that time: Paul Labuschagne was pilot, I was pin, Cameron 3 and Chris alternated 4 with Fionn Williamson. Whoever was out of the stack on that jump was Camera. Fionn filmed that incident, but my copy was overwritten. Amazing footage with Fionn catching everthing, then spiralling madly after Chris who got smaller and smaller until there was this flash of light as he went through the power lines. You actually replaced 2 guys: Paul and Fionn both dropped out after China. Chris wore a tertiary reserve for a year or two after this. Cheers A