erdnarob

You mean Hot Air Balloon versus Helium balloon. There is no such a thing as gas balloon, but I know what you mean (propane burner) Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

What my thread picture is showing ? : a floating ripcord. One shouldn't make the confusion between a floating rip cord and a handle out of its pocket. Concerning the rig used on the thread picture, the floating rip cord was almost not avoidable with a handle out of the pocket. OTOH, using a Spectra ripcord will reduce the risk of a floating ripcord since due to the bungee inside, its extension requires 3 lbs which is enough to keep the ripcord against the pocket as seen on the picture. I do believe the Spectra ripcord gives some other extra advantages by being able to easily check the bartack at the handle and near the pin and knowing that Spectra line is a 1000 lbs proof. Now the D handle has proven being safe for the last 50 years+. The fact that we can put the thumb inside (and we should if we use it) makes a slippage impossible at a moment the time is vital. I have had personally a total of 6 malfuctions including two totals. Not a single problem and as a result a fast reserve deployment above me. And yes, I was in freefall, not on the ground. I think everybody agree that in this thread we have a very rare occurrence. No equipment is perfect. I would recommend people to do cut away and ripcord pull practice in a suspended harness at the beginning of each skydiving season. After all military people do simulation on a mockup to improve their efficiency in an actual operation. We are able to do the same to improve our survival. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

In Canada, a hot air balloon is considered as an aircraft and actually it is. Provided you have reserved the airspace with the air traffic control authority for the place you intend to jump, you shouldn't have any problem. The hot air balloon pilot has to keep radio contact with the tower or equivalent and wait their permission to allow the jumpers to jump. This stands for an air traffic control area. Jumping from a balloon is a bit like jumping from a helicopter. You stay in the same position as you leave for 3-4 seconds before you have enough air speed to stabilize on it. That means it's better to leave the balloon in a 45 degrees angle. When I did such a jump (from a Firefly balloon), the pilot had climbed to 5500 ft and started the descent. We have jumped at about 5000 ft. Jumping during the descent makes sure the balloon doesn't surge upward when the jumpers leave, when suddenly the weight of the payload decreases. I am pretty sure the USA regulations are about the same than the ones in Canada. Jumping from a hot air balloon can be expensive. Such a device costs 200-250$/hour to operate. That is why they don't go that much above 5000 ft. Often, the wind increases in altitude and a balloon has to cope with it. Thus, it takes very moderate wind. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

If you are used to the Pilot 169, you will not find a drastic difference with the Sabre 2-150. The Sabred 2 has a pitch angle of about 15.34 degrees and the Pilot of 15.06 degrees. But the Sabre seems to have more loading weight distribution on the front lines which makes it to dive a bit more than the Pilot and allowing more forward speed (and a stronger flare). This is IMO an advantage to provide a more accurate "streering wheel". Also the Sabre 2-150 is probably actually a 155-160+ like it's the case for many Performance Designs canopies. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

For the old copies of CanPara see Beatnik on this forum. Now, I was and I am a contributor of several skydiving magazines like : late Skydiving Magazine, Blue Skies magazine and Canpara. I am a translator for Canpara for many years and I never had the impression that CSPA was against BASE jumping. CSPA does not support BASE jumping which another story. Base Jumping as far as I know does not have a specific program and curriculum for the progression of a jumper. It is so far more a discipline learned from buddy to buddy. BASE jumping is a free discipline and has, so far, no organization on national or international level unlike discipline supported by CSPA like : SF, VSF, accuracy, crew, canopy piloting, freefly...etc for which elaborated programs exist. On the other hand, many BASE jumps have been illegal in the sense that they were made without landing zone owner permission. I am not blaming BASE jumpers, several of them are friends of mine. The legal aspect is to be considered should an organization such CSPA recognize it as a discipline. I am glad to see more and more towns, states... organizing BASE jumping supervised in specific events and locations. There was a note accompanying the article published in Canpara about some BASE jumpers. CSPA while not supporting BASE jumping wanted to outline the contribution made by some jumpers of this discipline. I don't see a huge change at all. Just a recognition of some people involved in BASE jumping. OTOH one has to remember that CSPA does not publish in Canpara texts and pictures illustrating breaking the Basic Safety Regulations. Canpara is read not only by jumpers members of the CSPA but is read by many other organizations such as Transport Canada, foreign associations head quarters, Aeroclub of Canada (from which CSPA is affiliated), Sport Canada, Canada coaching association... and because of that, has to be very cautious to remain credible, strong, imputable and responsible for the supported disciplines. ie CSPA has to be a bit on the conservative side. Also many new disciplines has been supported by CSPA recently when it was seen that there were more and more people practising them. I can name : freefly (head down, head up or figures), canopy piloting (distance, speed and accuracy), freestyle, sport accuracy... I have to congratulate Lise Hernandez, editor of Canpara until August 2014 for the nice work done. It was a real pleasure to work whith her. Translation was really a team work between translators, reviewers and editor...yielding to a magazine of a great quality. Lise has already started a new discipline ie. wind tunnel freestyle choreography including music heard by the performer and the audience outside the tunnel a bit similar to figure ice skating. I wish Lise a lot of success. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

You have first to answer this question: what do you prefer, function or fashion ? IMO one should always go for function first ie : a parachute has for function to be able to land you safely. Now, a reserve is a bit like a spare tire, you don't expect a lot of performance from it, you want it to save your life and land you with no injury. OTOH I believe that a reserve should have its lines shorter than the main. This will likely provide you with a biplane in case of two parachutes out. You then use your main as a lead while only the reserve remains on its brakes. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

At my DZ, recently, a friend of mine made a group jump involving a quite unusual problem which fortunately had a happy ending. The airplane is a Caravan with a plexiglas door. When he took the front floater position outside the airplane standing on the step, he had to move slightly toward the center of the door. It seems that move was the cause of the floating ripcord caught by the outside door hinge protruding by ¼". The reserve D handle was caught by this hinge when he was brushing against the outside frame of the airplane. The jumper said he had checked his ripcord handle several times before the jump and found it well seated in the pocket. In freefall another jumper noticed the problem and tried to catch his attention as seen on the picture. The jumper with the problem couldn't understand what was going on only to find out after opening. Brushing inside or outside the airplane is responsible for many problems like, closing pins moving, flaps getting open or in this case, ripcord extracted from the pocket. Again I come back to what happened in Germany several years ago, in a similar set up a jumper on the step outside the airplane brushed his equipment against the airplane frame when the reserve ripcord ball ending was caught in a little slot seemingly located on the vertical edge of the door. At the go, the reserve deployed and got entangled with the airplane horizontal stabilizer. A hell of a scenario. The use of Spectra ripcord with a bungee inside makes a floating ripcord impossible like the one of the picture. Any idea to prevent this kind of problem ? Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

If the hypothesis is not right for the extreme ie. 4 way versus 50 way, is it better for formation like a 40 way 3 points versus a 60 way 2 points ? Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

A question I have been thinking of for a while is the value of the amount of jumpers in a completed formation multiplied by the successful points they have accomplished. To be more specific, is a FS 10 way - 5 points equal to a FS 25 way 2 points. After all if you multiply the numbers of people in the planned formation by the numbers of points the result is the same. Can we generalize that way of thinking ? If not, why ? Are small formations with many points harder to accomplish than large formations with few points when the above multiplication yields the same result ? I would really like to get opinion of people who have tried both, large and small formations. Thanks Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

Since the thread drifted a bit about juming different airplanes and how pleasant it can be, here is the list of airplanes I have jumped from. I have 11 jumps from a Hercules. Despite that the heigth and width of the door do not allow jumpers to have a grip on it, I can say the Hercules allowed us to do superb linked exits even though is was at 155 mph. That was in 1986 in Quincy Ill, at the Freak Brothers convention organized by Roger Nelson. The Hercules (Safie from South Africa...) has flown from South Africa with about 30 South Africaner jumpers aboard. They stopped at Abidjan, (Ivory Coast) before crossing the Atlantic ocean. Left a spare engine in Boston and some other spare parts just in case. That aircraft was almost new. I had the chance to visit the cockpit which was the most beautiful one I have ever seen. Wide seats for pilots, roomy. When I asked them which system they were navigating with, they told me the list of different systems and better yet a pilot went and opened a little closet to remove a sextant which he positioned vertically on a special adaptor on the roof of the cockpit. He told me that once in a while they use it, even overnight using the stars, and that the precision was about one or two miles. (no GPS at the time). My only regret is that I could have asked them to bring me back (me and my car...piece of cake for a Hercules) in Canada since they were going to a international conference at Quebec City after the boogie. Great memories. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

Possibly, your main lift web (MLW) length has not been evaluated properly. Every rig manufacturer has its own way to perform those measurements. To do so, you have to stand up straight and have somebody takes the measurements, and better to do it twice. If the problem is persisting, return the rig to the manufacturer to change that. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

The main advantage of the D handle (ring) is that you can (and you should) put your thumb inside and therefore have a better grip. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

Hi Rob, I can see that you consider that checking the pin is part of the safety. As I was mentioning in another post, the cause of a pin check is that they can move after putting the rig on, in the airplane for instance especially when the main closing loop has not enough tension. This is why the pin set up and orientation has an importance. I am back from a boogie at Quebec City (Atmosphair) and I can tell you that I didn't see a single main pin with the concave side down. Check with packers, they have seen thousands of those.

Not at all, it was the US Papillon "Carrousel" Here is a picture. Sorry but after almost 40 years, the picture did fade out. On the sides on the picture, what appears like sand color was actually green apple color. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

Contrary to what you write, I was not talking about the Sidewinder manual. I know Al, he is a careful person. I made comments about the main closing pin set up in general as seen on the pictures (unfortunately...your pictures) and better yet, I answered the Swedish (Hellis) guy who were asking explanations which is the purpose of this forum. If you read carefully my post, you could see that it is based on facts. MAIN CLOSING PINS DO MOVE IN THE AIRPLANE. I have seen pack opening in the airplane. It can be caused by a too slack closing loop or/and by the closing pin being "brushed" or a combination of both. One has not to be a rocket scientist to understand this potential problem. Have good and safe jumps Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

Sorry to disagree with riggerob but here is my explanation. When you sit in an crowded jump airplane, contact between the back of your rig and the seat or another jumper already sat on the floor is common. That can put on your main closing pin some upward force. If the closing pin is pointing downward or having the concave side down, it can be moved or even extracted. To avoid that possibility, put your closing pin as a smiley (concave side up) or pointing upward. IMO it is why a lot of jumpers ask their fellows in the airplane before exit to check their main closing pin set up. The right set up of the closing pin is a preventative measure. You wouldn't believe how a little detail can make a big difference. The worst possible resulting scenario (and it has already happened) would be to have a premature deployment at the airplane door). Many years ago, in Canada, we have lost a tandem master and his student when the main Dbag fell down on the airplane step. More over, when I was student and jumping out of Cessna, I was told to always protect my front reserve ripcord especially when other jumpers were "brushing" against me with their rig when moving in or out. Also I was told that in case somebody makes a rough contact in my back, to ask for another pin check. On the same idea, this is why when I had steel cable ripcord, I always put the 3 inches part near the ball ending into the ripcord handle pocket. Years ago in Germany it seems that one jumper didn't do that. Being out of the airplane and leaning against the fuselage for a FS exit, his ripcord cable ending ball was caught in a slot on the vertical edge of the door. He didn't notice. Ready, set, go...and his reserve deployed in the tail of the airpane...NOW is there still people to say ha, ha, ha... Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

For few dollars you can download WIND SPEED application from iTunes. The iPhone mikes are then used as pressure sensors provided you orient the phone horizontally according the arrow showing up on the screen. Moreover you can get the units of your choice like kph or mph. It gives you the real time speed, and the average speed while a little propeller on the screen turns matching the wind speed. I personnally have also a wind speed indicator comprising a see thru tube with a little ball. The wind enters the hole at the bottom and make the ball going up in the tube where there are marks and numbers indicating the speed. For high speed winds you have to put your finger at the top of the tube just to let the air escaping through a little side hole. I have checked ParaGear catalog but they don't sell that anymore. Check on Internet. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

Well, other AAD brands like Vigil let you send back to them your AAD when you decide for it just like you do for a car, for a health check up, for your home electrical and plumbing stuff...etc and they will check it and update the software if neccessary. It is a quite different than no maintenance required. That calls for a responsibility and as serious skydivers, we should always have our rigs checked before problems happen including AADs. After all we are not babies to let other decide for us. OTOH, an AAD requiring compulsory maintenance can develop problems right after its check up. With electronics, it is likely possible. A new chip can be of short duration while the one replaced could have been good for many years. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

If you jump your rig without the AAD, you have to understand that your main parachute will never see a difference and will deploy as usual. Please don't consider an AAD as a mental crutch. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

On those three pictures, I can see that the pin concave part is down and does not appear as a smiley. That can cause the pin to be extracted in the airplane. By solving a problem here one has created another !!!??? Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

Spotting for sure is part of any skydiver survival procedures. At some DZ, spotting is critical for many reasons : tight landing zone, lake, mountain, highway or houses nearby. If you want to perform demo in a park, football field....spotting is a must by throwing a least two wind drift indicators to make sure. Also, I learned many years ago that you have to spot not only to come back at the DZ but in case of cut away, to get your main parachute and reserve pilot chute/freebag assembly back at the airport. That way, you put yourself in the conditions to save a couple of thousands dollars if the main parachute is lost. Now a pilot error is still possible and in rare occasions the GPS can be erouneous. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

I have mine in a little poach on the chest strap. But it's mounted upside down and secured with a snap. The hook itself has a little orange biding tape on the handle for easier pull. After the opening, the harness is always few inches higher including the chest strap. This is why I decided for an upside down mounting and that way I have to pull the hook downward which is more natural. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

Not if the closing loop is tight enough and the manufacturer's directives are closely observed for flap sequence, pilot chute material and bridle set up. Many years ago, after the Russians problem with Mirage, I have performed a test on my Vector III, I put a flat cutting knife under the reserve floor with a pull cord attached to it. I had then the maximum closing loop length remaining. I closed the reserve container and performed a pull. The pilot chute jumped 5 ft high. This test has been published on Skydiving Magazine including pictures of the launch. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

That has happened to 2 Russians skydivers on Mirage systems years ago when they had pulled low on a jump to discover after landing that their AADs had fired but without any extraction of the reserve pilot chute. At the time, the AAD cutter on Mirage was still located just above the packed reserve freebag. That incident prompted Mirage to change the position of the cutter for placing it above the pilot chute crown which make the remaining of the loop shorter. The incident was, if my memory is good, attributed to a too loose closing loop. When the closing loop is cut, the reserve flaps spread out making the closing routing being a zigzag which can jam the flaps and the pilot chute. That is why, a tigh closing loop is always better. Now, if the rig has been packed in the Spring in dry air, in the Summertime, humidity and heat can lose the closing loop due to less static elecricity which makes the reserve packed volume decreasing. Another possible consideration is the rigger who packed the reserve. He has to stick closely with the manufacturer's directives for flap sequence, pilot chute material set up and the setting of the bridle. That should avoid that very embarrassing situation. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.

Correction : Pioneer Parachute Company was located at Manchester Connecticut, not at Ellington. Sorry. Learn from others mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all.