kelpdiver

Damn straight - this is a danger to any emerging growth sport - more people enter, thereby lowering the average participant IQ, competition tends to force quality of training down, accidents go up, and then the [bad] response is to try to replace personal judgement with rule setting. OTOH, skydiving appears to be a sport with a stable participant count, and declining fatalities. There is a marked shift in how the accidents happen towards landing issues, but it's still a very low count. If you told most Americans that only 30 people die with millions of jumps, they'd be surprised. They think it's closer to russian roullette. This fear of government takeover seems a bit overstated. And when it comes to legislating whuffos who want to save us, no bones you give them with wing loading BSRs will satisfy them, because they don't see any valid reason for us to be up there in the first place. Self imposed rules reaffirm their conviction that we lack the ability to think for and protect ourselves.

It's probably you, John. Keep in mind that by the end of level 3, and 4 on, there is only the primary JM on your right side. They're hanging on as lightly as possible. You still fall vertically as stably as your form allows. Keep in mind that the standards for AFF1 are pretty simple - jump out, do a PRCP, pull, land. You're not expected to do great on the first 50 seconds of free fall experience. But the bar gets raised. In any event, if you get passed on 2 with a "marginal" performance you probably will get zinged on 3 and 4 when they let go. Don't worry about it, try to do it sooner than 2 months, and move on. Maybe you'll not get hit with the L4 barrier like me currently.

yes, but fortunately your's are not accurate. Your hypothetical characters have a chance of living. 1- probability that 1 or more of the 20 will die is 1.0 - (19999/20000)^20, or .000999, or just less than 1 in 1000, just as we'd expect with 20 people at 1 in 20000. Prior jumps don't matter - we know that they survived them all. 2 is true, though the odds for each person doesn't increase. 3- 1.0 - (19999/20000)^20000 = .632. 63% likelihood of 1+ fatalities. 4- if you believe in chaos theory - that even doing the exact same jump again could result in different results, then the answer is the same as #3. But if you go with the followup posting that you're already succeeded and are just repeating it, you know you will survive. (cynics might point out that the airspace would be getting pretty crowded long before the last jump) If you rephrased #1 to what is the likelihood that a group of 20 new jumpers would make it to 1000 jumps, it too would be only 37%.

In the US, most states require an additional license but once you have it, you're free to get the biggest fastest ride you like. California does have a M1 and M2 designation, but the M2 class is 150cc's or less, which most scooters don't fit into. It's no different from the A license process. You can do the MSF course on a Honda 150, and then go buy a 1300cc Hayabusa with a top speed just under 200mph. In Asia and Europe, many countries do impose a HP or displacement limit for a period of time for new riders. You're proposing something similar - the catch is how do you actually implement it without having worse consequences. The primary danger is that you may force people to still make "aggressive" choices but now to do it secretly.

You said it quite accurate. I think the phrase in English would be "prior events have no bearing on future probabilities." And the chance is of course not consistent. AFF1 students have two JMs, a simple plan, and very good focus, if not any experience with handling mals. Reasonably experienced jumpers start to lose a bit of that focus - don't fear death as much. And then veterens have survived that period and enjoy better odds, unless they are also increasing their degree of difficulty substantially. Now you can take that 1/20000 and ask the question, how many jumps can I do before it is 50% likely that I'll die? The answer is slightly less than 10,000 - you multiple 19999/20000 against itself until you hit .500. But then again, people win the lottery every week and that's a 1:50mil shot. Does anyone know how the USPA derived the 3 mil jump figure? Is it all confirmed counts from DZ or member surveys, or did they add a fudge factor for non USPA jumping? I'd be surprised if the true count were more than 25% lower than it, and could easily be higher. So it's probably at least 1:75000 and perhaps as high as 1:150000.

That works well enough, and isn't such a burden that people will work around it. That's a problem with trying to implement BSRs - you'd hate to have people purging and dehydrating themselves to make the weigh-in. Might encourage more nude skydiving though. Color coding and other routines like that are at odds with the KISS principle or could distract the LO from other matter. Maybe you make it part of a safety check on the jumpers. It may just be a lot of effort that won't screen out determined fellows. And if you make it a forbidden activity rather than a frowned upon on, you encourage them to do it secretly. If you did want to do DZ enforcement, it may be easiest to do at the landing zone. Obviously they get off a jump first, but people are attentive with a new chute - it's later that they get complacent and more likely to get in trouble with the high wing load. Those that talked about education and being sociable with the new jumpers- you're my heroes. Everyone at Monterey has been very friendly and talkative and set the grounds for leading by example. I think you get the best mileage here.

I read the back threads and didn't see the disputed facts. Seemed rather straight forward - guy was turned down for permission to be out there and disregarded, put a chopper full of people at risk, paid the ultimate price. The cost of getting to the bottom of this in court will likely run 6 figures, and that's without a judgement. Guess who pays? Moreover, insurance might actually settle rather than spend that much for what appears to be a simple defense. Unfortunately, that means no case law is established. This is particularly problematic in the scuba world. It only encourages future litigation.

Lots of weekend warriors keel over with heart attacks. Bowling is the worse, though you have to keep in mind they were walking stiffs waiting for the first trigger to force the heart attack. But let's stop kidding ourselves - we got people trying to assert diving, driving, squash, whatever is more dangerous using selective vision. Few sports are within an order of magnitude of risk for serious injury or death. How many people do you know, here or in person, with fused bones from a hard thump? Or do you see at the DZ enjoying skydiving vicariously until they are cleared to resume? The rewards may outweigh the risks, but come on, they're certainly there. The good news is that a lot of the risk can be assumed, or passed, depending on the practices you use.

I think that for most, it's the taking a step out of the plane that scares of shit out of people. Once they've made the leap of faith, it's mostly a fun ride. AFF1 is rather intense, but the spike is definitely at the exit.

Jeff, g is pretty much a constant on earth, so if you only look at this equation you're back to the feather and bowling ball falling together. The ball has a great gravitational force, but since a=f/m, it gets cancelled out. Only when the opposing force of drag is considered does the extra mass matter.

No, they're just trying to figure out how to fly. It should be expected that they aren't going to be fully successful at it. But you, with likely 500x their unattached flying time, should have no trouble staying out of harms way. And in short order you become experienced with all the crazy things they can do that you need to look out for, for both their safety and your's.

QuoteI'm a newbie speaking here but: My first question is "why are you landing on your butt?" Spinal compression fractures happen that way. If you are losing it, you should be in PLF. ----------------- He may not be losing it. I'm 0 for 5 so far but every landing had been soft. But landing into the wind I find the flare swings me forward like a pendulum and I can't get a foot back fast enough. Feet touch, sit down, stand up. No bruises, but no style points yet. It's easier in low winds, but I didn't flare fast enough in my one attempt, slide in like going into home plate.