gbm

My Stage 8 AFF (hop n pop is Stage 9 in Oz) was also my 1st jump from an Islander. I hit the undercarriage (near the door on an Islander) on exit, sending me unstabe. I thought I would do a nice easy practice exit from height before doing my "scary" stage 9, so manifested for a solo. Unfortunately, when the plane got to 3,000 ft there was an engine failure and the pilot ordered "everyone out" .... so I got my hop n pop anyway! (the person behind me said I only just missed the undercarriage again). Not too exciting (Islanders are twin engine), but exciting enough for me at the time .... and I didnt have to pay for my slot for my last AFF jump.

I've had a few mals (a line over; brake line come loose on opening and tangled with other lines; a hard opening leading to 6 broken lines; and a reserve pin popped on deploying my main) - all packed myself so only one person to blame! Cant work out why some call be "Temporary Geoff"? But looking at the numbers so far (ignoring the few who have several mals backed by both themselves and packers): Out of the 37 votes by jumpers who pack for themselves, 17 had mals ...17/37 = 46% Out of the 15 votes by jumpers who use packers, 7 had mals ...7/15 = 47% All in all, the numbers don't seem to indicate much difference between packing for yourself or using a packer (unless of course you're a lazy & careless packer like myself...)