tommyh

Nope. It would probably help though.

I jump a fox 285 loaded at .59-.61, depending on the day. I have jumped this setup about 70 times out of my total of 75 jumps. Despite my lack of experience with other canopies and wing loadings, I can tell by observing other peoples openings that mine are.... sub par. The heading and speed of achieving "significant deceleration" seems to be a non issue (save for one opening that slammed the ever loving shit out of me), but I do see a very frequent (almost every jump) problem with cell pressurization. The slow cell pressurization also leads to the canopy not syarting to fly very quick (duh). This has never gotten me into trouble, but I could see it being a problem on really low jumps.

I am very glad to see a lot of enthusiastic jumpers willing to do this jump. But before everybody goes and fights for their right to jump, try and picture 150 rather "extreme" looking hikers, walking single file to the top of el cap wearing funny looking backpacks. I could easily see the whole group getting busted before it even gets out of the valley. I think that the parachute packing idea is a very good one. hang in there.

what would make it base specific?

I had a base jumper from the DZ show me how to pack, went out to the perrine with some locals, and made 4 jumps during memorial day weekend, 2004. I voted this as "other" because nobody had really taken me under their wing to teach me. Since then, I made another trip to idaho for more "learning jumps" and have since progressed to slightly more difficult objects. It was a really shitty way to learn how to base.

Hey chad, I sent you an e-mail.

If you smack a wall, and become stuck, I don't think there is any one best way to get down, other than waiting for search and rescue. If you are the more self reliant type, you really have two choices: Do a tard or other unpacked jump; or climb to safety. If you decide to climb up, you can always pack and jump again. That sounds like fun...

I work at a climbing gym. It's totally, inexcusably lame.

you may consider getting gear of the same make and model (or similar) as the more experienced jumpers that you will be jumping with.This is because they probably know all of the ins and outs of their specific rig and can then pass that knowledge on to you, while their knowledge of other types of gear might be less abundant. I also believe that most of the gear put out by major manufacturers today is of good quality and none of it will "kill" you as a result of it's design. And once you finally get your gear, remember to have fun with it.

This is very cool. thanks alot.

I can see where people could be turned off by the idea of posting their incidents in a general base forum. A lot of people probably don't want to put their story up for the public to read with the reason being that they don't want to come off as someone talking about their bad-ass harrowing survival epic. maybe people would be more receptive to the idea if there was some sort of system for reporting that was independant from the base zone. Maybe a seperate forum on blinc? Or maybe an entire website not unlike nick's? If somebody had the ambition to start something like that it would have the potential to be very helpful, especially to a novice like myself. Just ideas...

I think that jaapsuter made a really good point in an earlier post (sorry, I don't know how to quote you here). He stated the importance of discussing non fatal incidents and I totally agree. In my opinion, analyzing the non fatal ones are going to provide a lot more info. because A) There is a heck of a lot more of those than the fatal ones and B) the person involved in the incident has lived to tell about it. Therefore I would like to encourage everyone to openly discuss incidents and problems in their base life. I also think that a formal way of reporting non fatal incidents would help. does such a thing exist? should we create one? sorry if this is a little off topic.

This may be a little off subject here, but how in the hell did you get off that ledge? I'm glad everything turned out alright.

I remember when I did my first BASE jump I had 100 or so skydives and I thought my canopy skills were just fine for BASE. after about 20 jumps and a few crappy canopy flight decision (none of which had dire consequnces, luckily) I realized that my canopy skills weren't all that great after all. hindsight is always 20/20. It might not be apparent to you now, but there is probably a good reason why most first jump courses recommend a minimum of 200 skydives. Whatever you decide, I hope everything works out for you.

So although it won't come off, it (most likely) won't alter opening/flight performance? I think I may be overly paranoid about this. thanks for the reply.

I was wondering if anyone could tell me a good way to get that tar crap that you find on railroad tracks off of a canopy. I recall an earlier post about it but can't seem to find it. Can someone help me out?

Does anyone else think it looks like a melted antenna? especially the first pic.

There is also some info about Railay/tonsai at www.8a.nu

thanks for that

Does anyone know if there were any jumpers in thailand (or any other place affected) when the tsunami hit yesterday? I had some friends that were staying in tonsai over the weekend, but I think they are all OK.

Am I the only one that can't get the spread sheet to work? I would be very interested in the info., but It comes up blank for me.