freakyrat

Take them with you as a carry-on. If you have an Altitrack turn it off. Chris

This really breaks my heart too from someone who saw the original band play in Birmingham, Al in 1973. Billy could play anything on keyboards from sweet soulful music to get down honky tonk. He truly will be missed. I really enjoyed how he played and my condolences go out to his friends and family. Chris Fly on Free Bird.

I fly a Samurai 136 and also a Katana 120. Both canopies take concentration but the Katana takes a little more because of my wingloading and the smaller size and it's just comes in steeper and faster. I made my first no-wind landing on the Sam last November and I must say it was SWEEEET. It was by far the easiest canopy to shut down in no winds and the airlocks kept it inflated throughout the whole landing sequence. Touchdown was extremely light with just a slow walk off at the end. I've also jumped the Sam in some strong winds and choppy air and it flew and landed great. Chris

Mike, Right On, UPT has always been good to me. I only had one problem with an old VectorII several years ago where the left side botton of the main container was sewn wrong where i couldn't get the main bag in the container. I just picked upt he phone and talked to them, Labled the problem area with a piece of paper and sent the rig back. I had it fixed and back by the weekend. My Micron that I got last October is perfect. The harness fits right and I told the gal who does the embroidery to use the trim colors on the wonderhog pig on the left mudflap and she used her imagination and it came out great. I did manage to misplace my packing instructions video CD with all the nice tips on it and I picked up the phone to UPT and they sent me a new one. Come to think of it, I also jump a Mirage G4 and I had an issue with a main lift web that was too short. (on a full articulated harness) I was in Florida and dropped it off and they took a few measurements and put a longer center piece in on both sides and I picked up the rig the next day. As with any business, If you're nice and diplomatic about a problem you have you can get things resolved much better. Chris

(freakyrat et cetra, do you remember if there was any bonfire jokes at Rainbow Boogie 2006?) Mark, I never was at the bonfires but I'm sure there were some jokes especially with Brian there. he was a real card. Chris

Dave I'm not disparaging your jokes. I think the tandem joke was the slut boyfriend joke you and your friends used on the football player type that didn't like to be strapped unto another guy for his tandem. It was frikkin funy. Chris

Billy. I forgot about that website. Chris

yeah Dave, You could recycle that Tandem joke you told several years ago. Chris

Steve You DID NOT PICK THE WRONG SPORT. Yahoo has a sports group for gay and lesbian skydivers and here is it's url. http://sports.groups.yahoo.com/group/RainbowSkydivers/ No ones life is a joke. yours included Jokes are jokes so relax this is a fun lovin sport and I found that some of the best gay jokes are told by the gay skydivers themselves. Trust me I heard the funniest crap at the Boogie in Canada. The Rainbow Boogie in Canada 2 years ago had a group of straight skydivers come up to jump with one of their fellow gay skydivers from their DZ. If that isn't gay friendly or friendly in general what is? I've been around this sport for a long time and I can tell you the majority of the jumpers don't give a hoot about such a petty issue. Were all out to have fun and to do it safely. Frankly I'll jump with anybody as long as safety is first. If you feel the need to talk futher PM me I can tell you some related jump stories. Chris

Here's mine Chris

I have a G4 MT and my 120 Katana just gets in it. It's not tight but its a snug fit. I also had a Pilot 124 in a G3 MT and it was really snug. I don't think you would get a 135 in it. I might ad I demoed a Samurai 120 in the G3 and it was tight. Hope this helps. Here are some pictures of my G4 MT with a Katana120 and an Optimum126 Reserve. Chris

Here is the front of mine. Chris

I just want to add a thing here. I remember jumping one of the first lightweight Flite Suits back in the early 70's. It had the provision of putting the legstraps inside the suit. Same basic scenerio as with a wingsuit but less intense. I always had to check to make sure the legstraps were routed correctly and snapped. There were no thread-thrus in those day. Most of the time I would just leave them on the outside of the suit. Chris

"Actually, you are driving my point home. Inspecting one's gear is fundamental to every skydive, regardless of a jumper's experience level (students not withstanding) or what other distractions are present. If anything about a skydive is so consuming that a jumper can't get the fundamentals right - and making sure you have on legstraps is definitely a fundamental - they should rethink making the jump under the existing conditions. Your mention of the jumper feeling behind schedule is a perfect example of my point. And of course a first wingsuit jump is not "just another skydive. That's because no skydive is "just another skydive". Chuck, I completely agree with you. It seems like today we don't see the gear checks that we used to see in the past. I think we should get back to it and take more personal responsibilty for ourselves and our friends safety. I remember my little incident when I should have got a gear check when I had just hooked up my main canopy after a reserve repack. We had just broken ground. "Catfish" was sitting next to me on the Otter and cought a misrouted right side three ring. I rode the plane down and fixed it and then went up. I learned a lesson that day. This wingsuit incident has upset me about as bad as the North Texas weather has. It was entirely preventable. It seems some newbies want to try things to fast in this sport. Swooping with tiny canopies, flying with cameras, Wingsuits whatever. Some good mentoring from us experienced skydivers might go a long way if we explained to them why they shouldn't be in such a hurry. It could save their lives and make their skydiving experiences a lot more enjoyable and SAFE. Chris

Drew My Samurai136 and my Katana120 open about the same, the Sam may be a tad quicker and it's always opened on heading. The Sam is also extremely easy to shut down in light or no winds. Chris

Hey Dave, Happy Birthday Chris

If you are an EOD guy make sure you wash your hands frequently and wash your jumpsuits and possibly your gearbag with unscented TIDE before you travel in order to eliminate the possibility of a false positive from the EDT machines. Chris

" I never announce that I have a parachute with me. Half the time it goes through the xray machine without a second glance so why invite extra screening when you might not even get it if you had kept quite. Second I always take it out of the bag so it is scanned by itself. Saves time and no risk of them swabbing the bag and picking up some trace of explosives from something else. " This is good advice as the trace EDT machine picked up a false positive on my gear bag at Houston Hobby recently and it ended up costing me a reserve repack. Mind you the rig itself was never swabbed. Chris

I've had the same experience with my Mirage G4 MT sized for a PD126R. Here in Dallas its a bit drier than it was at my previous DZ. I swapped out the 126R for an Optimum 126 and it fits great. It is not to loose and actually packs about a half size down and the rig does not feel like a brick. Your Wings will probably feel the same. The Optimum 143 would probably fit but maybe it would give your rig the same brick like feeling it had with the PD126R. Your rigger will have an easier time packing and closing your container with the Optimum 126. My Mirage has got a nice clean flat profile now and has that nice wedge shape on the side with the Optimum 126 in it. As I said earlier, it feels great on my back now and has a lighter feeling around my neck area and upper back. My rigger like it now as he has an easier time with it. I also have a Micron310 sized for a PD143R that I have an Optimum143 in with the same results.

Jim Sorry to hear what you went through in Orlando. I think you have probably read about my fiasco with TSA at Houston Hobby a few weeks ago. They decided that they had to swab my rig. They never got to it as the inside of my kitbag tested positive for explosive residue (False Positive) Now at the same time my rig was run through the xray machine again and it seems like while they stopped the screening line the Supervisor didn't know where my rig was. They never swabbed the rig itself. I ended up opening the rig based on this swab test of the KITBAG (main and reserve compartments) so that the EOD guy could check it. Nothing was found. He admitted to me later that he expected to find NOTHING out of the ordinary. I put everything together closed the main container up and where did the RESERVE pilot chute go. You guessed it in and against the so-called contaminated kitbag. Now my kitbag could have been contaminated from almost anything. Like Glycerol is used in almost all soaps, hand lotions, shaving cream etc. A biffed landing can screw up a jumpsuit with nitrates. There just has to be a balance struck somewhere. I mean we all want to be safe when we fly and I didn't mine paying for an unecessary reserve repack. The thing that I have to question is Why wasn't the rig swabbed? Were the swabs contaminated or the machine contaminated from an earlier test? If this same rig and kitbag have passed swab tests before, what was different this time that the kitbag didn't pass. As I posted to a different thread I washed the jumpsuits and kitbag and took them both to Love Field and the TSA did another swab test and they were all clean. Chris

Mark I always pushed the bag with the weightbelt through first. It seems to distract then than they forget about the rig and I just get the rig and go. At least that's what I did before TSA. How did the Spaceland stuff go?

Lloyd I really appreciated your comments. Being a Vietnam era veteran also (Thailand Service- ATC) I along with most of my crew hung out with some of the EOD people so I knew where the guy was coming from and we had a conversation about our military backgrounds etc. so in all it turned out pretty well. I think when we travel just to be on the safe side we shoud wipe down our kitbags inside, wash our jumpsuits and maybe take a damp cloth with maybe a tiny amound of unscented tide liquid and just take a swipe across the sides of our rigs and let them air out to be on the safe side. Thanks again Chris.

Lloyd The EOD guy mentioned this about off-airport landings, and biffing a landing like you mentioned and how he had one rig give off the presence of Nitrates and had to have the jumper open the reserve etc. I didn't raise much a fuss at Hobby with any of the TSA guys or the EOD guy, but I really did not want to open the reserve and did everything the I could to talk him out of requiring me to open the reserve. The thing is I still got on the airplane with the contaminated kitbag and my rig with a loose reserve pilot chute against the contamination. There should be a cutoff in the level of contaminates that can be on things because of all these nitrates and glycerol being used in innnocent applications. One question I failed to ask the TSA folks "is anyone wearing a pacemaker? I completely forgot about the magnetic riser covers as I brought my Micron to Houston. The only thing I will remember next time as I don't want anyone hurt. Chris

I have travelled thru numerous airports with my gear without problems. It has passed a few EDT swabs also without problems. However there is a isolated chance that it might not pass these tests due to contaminates you might introduce on your gear through no fault of your own. Such was the case that happened to me two weeks ago travelling with my rig thru Houston Hobby back to Dallas Love field. The trace EDT machine found traces of explosives on my KITBAG. My rig was NEVER swabbed. I ended up having to open my rig, both main and reserve, so that the EOD guy could look inside of it. I did not have to take the canopies out of their deployment bags. I might add that he had a thorough knowledge of every component on the rig and told me afterwards that he knew he was not going to find anything out of the ordinary. Now when I got back to Dallas Love I talked to a TSA supervisor and explained the situation and steps to alleviate it from happening again. I went home washed the kitbag and jumpsuits with unscented Tide liquid as recomended. I brought the kitbag and jumpsuits back to Love Field the next day during a slack time and talked to a TSA Supervisor and explained the situation. She took my kitbag and jumpsiuits and ran them through x-ray and an EDT swab and they were negative. My rig was at the DZ getting a reserve repack. The TSA also gave me a few tips on how to alleviate the situation such as asking that the test be done with a fresh swab out of a fresh package on a different machine etc. For all I know the machine could have been contaminated from a previous swab or the swabs could have something foreign on them. It was just a crapshoot. In summary: I consider this an isolated incident and a false positive test that would probably not happen again as I have travelled through Hobby several times with my rig and had numerous EDT tests done on my rig, kitbags and jumpsuits with Negative results. The TSA people were all professional and were just doing their job although I wish they would have done a swab on the rig itself and not just the kitbag it was in. Nitrates and glycerol are out there and it is easy to introduce these contaminates though no fault of your own giving off a false positive test. Glycerol is used in our soaps and shaving creams etc. I was using a rental car that could have had Nitrate contaminates introduced by a previous renter from golf clubs, fireworks or whatever. Who knows. If you don't want to wash your kitbag at least wipe the inside of it with a damp soapy cloth with unscented Tide and let it dry thouroughly. I'm not going to get into a discussion of the accuracy of these trace EDT machines cause it would serve no useful purpose to this discussion and would aid and abet people that choose to do us harm. We all want safety when we travel and a $75.00 repack was a small price to pay for that safety. I might also add that you can take your rig out of the kitbag and put it in one of the grey bins and run it seperately through the x-ray machine this might air it out a bit and help alleviate a false positive test. Incidently, I gave the USPA the details of what happened and the steps that TSA advised me to do to alleviate the situation and they and I consider the case isolated and closed. Chris

How sad. I have one of his cool painting's on my wall by my computer. It is the one with the alien figure sitting on top of clouds. Chris