GodspeedsC5

Good to hear from you JR, when I jumped with you and Bobby it did cross my mind that you were the only black person I had seen at SDD. Of course that was only after I saw your black rig, jump suit, and canopy and thought damn he has me beat! I still have an off the shelf canopy in white, blue, and purple. I have since seen others black people at SDD and other dropzones so you maybe in a minority, but you are definetely not alone. Also surprised to hear you are 37 as you could pass for someone 8-10 years younger - the skydiving must be paying off. I would love to jump again with you anytime! -Jeremy

I agree and set mine with what others said - breakoff, minimum main deployment, and hard deck. The hard deck altitude alarm addresses your concern about the two out situation with a Cypres fire. If you hear the flat line of the final alarm you've gone below your hard deck and should go straight to the reserve. The only reason your Cypress should fire is if you are unconscious, lack of altitude awareness is a poor excuse and in some dropzones will get you grounded now.

I didn't get the full ofificial tour, but RWS greatly impressed me in the customer service arena. I showed up without calling after 4:00pm - I had an issue with one of my toggles and I wanted it looked at and/or replaced. Pablo immediately stopped everything he was doing, took me back in the shop and replaced the toggle. He was very friendly and helpful, which was a good feeling as I am new skydiver. After the toggle was replaced I gathered up my rig and canopy and he said there is no sense hauling it out, just pack it right here! The best part was the toggle was replaced under warranty and he didn't even charge me. I could not be more pleased with RWS and again am comforted with knowing I made the right decision when I purchased my Vector 3. Next time I am in Deland I will stop by again for the tour.

I feel your pain brother, I've had two hard openings recently on my Sabre2. Didn't bother my ribs much, but screwed my neck and back royally putting me on muscle relaxants and I could barely stand for two days.

Pretty new to the sport, started at the end of last summer. I have a little over a 100 jumps, and have been working primarily on freefly for the last 20 or so. I need to do some freefly coach jumps, I can fly on my back, sit fly, and head down and working on moving in different directions in these positions. Also I am about to start training for a rookie 4-way team for this season. I am headed to Oz in June, so should have at least 250 jumps by then. As soon as I have 200 jumps I will be getting a wingsuit too if I'm not broke. Anyways I am looking forward to coming down and would love to meet up with some of the Oz skydivers! I will plan to go to Picton!

I spent a couple weeks in December in Italy and went to both Napes and Pompeii. For me Naples was a bit too extreme to stay for very long - no offense to those who live there. As said above I would agree 1 day is plenty to see Pompeii - get ready for lots of walking. What I would recommend is actually staying in Sorrento and then traveling to Naples and Pompeii for the day. Unless you like guarding your wallet every second and fighting off beggars, just get in out and of Naples quickly. Then if you have an extra day in Sorrento I would tour the coast, very beautiful.

Thanks, I will check those out. I am looking forward to the amazing scenery, not the deadly animals!

Making a trip out to Oz this year (my first time) and will be in Sydney and Melbourne for about 2 weeks. The Dropzone Database here has a ton of listings, but which DZ's should I visit if I can only go to a couple?

I work about a block away from the Adams Mark and jump at Skydive Dallas. There are plenty of great places nearby to grab a drink, I would be happy to escort you around - you should come out to SDD that weekend for sure. :)

The Skyhook worked as advertised - I took a reserve ride last weekend and was under a fully inflated canopy before I got the reserve handle out all the way out.

From their web site: "And because Airbus has taken care of the boarding and deplaning issue, cutting out choke points by using ergonomic research to design two sets of doors, turn-round time is significantly lower. This allows schedules to be kept tight and extra flights flown." http://www.airbus.com/product/a380_economics.asp

Yup, yup - safety first. I sure enjoyed it and want to keep learning. I plan to get some freefly coaching early next year as soon as I return from the holiday break.

I tried my first freefly jumps this weekend - mainly just a little head down and backfly. All I can say is wow I am amazed at the versatility in fall rate.

How true of a wingsuit must it be to be considered it landing a wingsuit? What if you construct a canopy/wingsuit hybrid such that the wing of the wingsuit has a release you pull that further inflates it into a larger canopy that is flareable and landable? I could see a design like that working safely.

Here's my new rig...

Cool pic, found McDonalds!

For the first few days I will be in Rome and the Vatican, then I am headed down to Foggia (sp?) to spend some time with relatives. After that I am headed back up to Venice and Florence, but really I can go where ever i want to. Maybe the DZ right out side of Rome would be most convenient.

Yeah, I was concerned about the weather too - there might not be much going on this time of year. I looked in the Dropzones section and see Body Flight University in Reggio Emilia.

I'm going to be Italy Dec. 18 - Jan. 1 doing the normal tourist things. I was thinking of taking a day or two and making some jumps, can anyone recommend a DZ?

I was able to make 3 jumps this Saturday on my new rig at Skydive Dallas from 9-10k. I heard Spaceland was not doing any loads due to weather, so I did not come down. If the weather is better this coming weekend, I will try to come down to Spaceland.

I'm debating coming down tomorrow. The weather forecast for Skydive Dallas doesn't look good, but the forecast for Spaceland doesn't look that much better. Go figure I have my new rig, but no place to jump.

Single for about a year now - never been married.

I have done Karate, Tae Kwan Do, Judo, Jujitsu, Tai chi, Pa Kau, and Kung Fu. By far I learned the most taking Kung Fu - it does start getting into eastern religion after you advance. They combined the best elements of all the disciplines as well as mixed in things such as kick boxing, gymnastics, etc. Then there are different styles such as mantis, tiger, monkey, and also many different weapons such as the sword and staff. I remember doing things such as 1.5 hour head stands while being swatted at with a bamboo stick, racing back and forth the room on your hands, spending an afternoon learning to take a fall off a one story building, and doing bare knuckle push ups on concrete until you bleed. The physical and mental intensity of the trianing was unmatched, but truly excel it has to become a way of life.

Amanda, I believe my instructor for the tandems was your boyfriend Brian. Sounds cool, hopefully sometime again this month depending on weather I'll come down to Spaceland. My canopies arrived yesterday (PD Sab2 190 and PD 176 Reserve), the Cypres next week, and the container/harness (Vector M-Series) the following week. I guess I could always come down and rent gear for the day though.

Bigun - good to see you again this weekend. Thanks for jumping with me, I had a blast.