dukekala

So, this guy is definitely a fraudster and is back again. Here is my story. I needed a new reserve, found this ad http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/classifieds/detail_page.cgi?ID=82571&d=1 for PD-193R, the price seemed reasonable enough, so I contacted the seller and we agreed on the terms, $55 for shipping to Estonia (where I live), and that I will pay him up front with PayPal. So I did that, sent him the money. The next day I received a notification from Paypal saying that a refund has been initiated on my payment. With no further explanation why. I contacted the seller about this and asked what is going on. He responded that he had trouble transferring the money from PayPal to his bank account. I did not think much of it, since the notification about refund came from PayPal (I could verify it at paypal.com, in my account there) and even though the refund was shown as pending (the money was not yet transferred back to my PayPal account), I got the impression, that this delay is because of PayPal, that they need some time to process it. In other words, I thought that the money is back in PayPal system and will eventually land on my account again. So, while it did appear weird to me, that somebody has these kind of problems with PP, I was not yet suspicious. Now we agreed that I will pay him through Alertpay.com instead (it was his suggestion), I have not even heard of alertpay before, but checked it out and found it to be reasonable enough. Small, not that widely known, but apparently reliable enough. I created myself an account on alertpay, and immediately found out that they have a limit of $200 per month for credit card transactions. About 3x time less than I needed. They did however offer an alternative - a simple bank transfer, first to my alertpay account and then from there to the seller. I did that bank transfer, it took a few days to clear and when it finally reached my Alertpay account I immediately sent the money from Alertpay to the seller. Then asked him to post the reserve when he receives the money. He promised to do that. And now all the sh*t hit the fan. I started doing more background checks on him (I did some before even contacting him the first time, but apparently was not careful enough, at least I did not find anything back then). This time I found this posting here, I contacted the author .. and lo and behold - I am already the second buyer for this very same reserve. He already "sold" it once, to Scootersv and the same thing happened to him. The seller went completely silent, after having received the money. Maybe Scootersv will post his story as well. And just when I was talking with Scootersv, I received another notification from PayPal, saying that the refund has failed, because the receivers bank did not clear it. THAT was completely unexpected to me, apparently I and PayPal have completely different understandings about what a refund really means. I have not been able to contact the seller any more. His very last e-mail to me stated, that it is 6AM in the morning at where he is, that the post office will open at 8AM and he will send the reserve to me then - in 2 hours. That was before I got the information from Scootersv. It has only been a few days from that last e-mail, in any other scenario I would be willing to give him a benefit of doubt, since everything can happen, maybe he was hit by a car or something. But now - I am completely convinced that this guy is a fraud. Here is where I stand now: I have paid him 2 times $705 dollars and I will never see that reserve. I have done everything in my powers to dispute those transactions, with PayPal, with my bank and with alertpay, but frankly I would be very surprised when they manange to recover any of that money. I still hope though ... So, in hindsight, I was very VERY VERY stupid. I really have no one else to blame than myself for having too much trust in people on here. I want this to be a warning to other people on here. Do follow the recommendations against scam on this site very cafefully, step by step, before even thinking about buying something. Do backup checks on the seller through different channels. Most of the guys on here are honest to good and cool skydivers, but alas there are a few bad apples around that manage to destroy all the goodwill. And, you, Ronald David Vento, I hope you choke on the money.

Yeah, isn't it :) The car (old Ford Escort) got hit by an elk in it's previous life, no longer street worthy, but perfect for a DZ car Indeed, there are better planes for those nice and long freefall jumps, but An-2 is a really nice plane as well, it takes approx 12-13 jumpers and since it's so big you can simply walk to the door and step/jump out, instead of crawling to the door like on many other small planes. And btw, while this one doesn't usually go higher than 8000 feet, one other An-2 was actually flown to 4km with jumpers. This was a few years ago in the winter (cold air!). Took them approx 1 hour, but the made it :)

There are quite a few An-2 still flying in Estonia, all of them have or are being used for jumping. Here are a few pictures of it at the Nurmsi airfield (www.slk.ee) and also a few of our pickup car :) Update: apparently I cannot upload any images, so here are the URL-s instead: http://www.slk.ee/16528.html http://www.slk.ee/16544.html http://www.slk.ee/16560.html http://www.slk.ee/16552.html http://www.slk.ee/16555.html

How could an unstable body position possibly cause a bag lock?

I had my first reserve ride at 6th jump (line twists because of an extremely bad exit position). Tried to get them open twice, but couldn't. Then decided to cut away and at that exact moment the fear I felt was gone. I knew what I had to do and just did. Look at red, grab red, look at silver, pull, feel myself falling, grab silver and pull. Just like in training. My hands where shaking after I landed and the beer (which I bought, it was a first after all) has never tasted as good before :) Still, I was completely calm at the cutaway and others who I talked to said basically the same thing.

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I plan to visit Budapest (Hungary) early next month and stay there for about a week and a half. While there I would really like to make a jump or two at some local dropzone. Since all my jumps (8) until now have been IAD, this (or those) would have to be IAD (or static line) as well. Perhaps someone here from Hungary can recommend a foreigner friendly drop zone not too far away from Budapest?