mdrejhon

https://www.facebook.com/iFlyToronto They finally got electricified, that part of install went really really slow by our friendly electric company. The building structure is essentially complete enough to rev up the fans after a few more things, so I bet they'll begin testing shortly. The up and coming tunnel instructors are already training at Skyventure Montreal now. Here's a photo from last November. (They are ahead of this stage now at the moment.)

A heartfelt thank you, Gov. Brewer, for the veto. I may not agree with all the Arizonian policies, but thank you very much for the veto.

I am at the 1st Canadian Indoor Skydiving Championship (March 9-10) and Alan, the owner, announced over microphone to a hundred people, that next year's (2014) indoor skydiving championship is going to occur in Oakville. He knows something we don't -- probably the lease is already signed but they never took the sign down; and are intending to begin construction soon after snow melt. Could be a different Oakville lease, but that's what he said -- "Oakville" -- so there must be lots of due diligence already done; getting all the city approvals necessary before lease is signed. He's the key stakeholder of iFly Toronto too, so it's now up to the city of Oakville to expedite things along.

I've been surfing the Net, and accidentally found the location of Skyventure Toronto, in a sort of a landscape blueprint: http://www.oakville.ca/assets/2011%20planning/sp-140106401-landscape.pdf The address in this sheet seems to be: iFly Toronto 2007 Winston Park Drive Oakville, Ontario The satellite map for the location is: http://goo.gl/maps/Mrv4k Note: Do not vouch me 100% on this, because I also did hear that they had to hunt for a new location at one point -- leading to a delay. But it's nice to see that they've went as far as landscape planning and contacting Oakville city planning.

Congratulations, Felix! My highest mere skydive at 6 KM only requires a simple airplane and some oxygen. Your jump from 37 KM required a spacesuit and a visit to supersonic territory! When can I sign up to jump from a Virgin Galactic spaceship? :-)

Yeah -- the specific criteria question often comes up and the question of whether it is inclusive or exclusive -- it is similiar to the Deaf World Record skydive (deaf people only), the Women's World Record skydive (women only), or the POPS World Record (age 40+ only) skydive. There's speciality groups of all kinds that like to get together to do something -- and there's the Women's vs Men's leagues, the Paralympics/Special Olympics -- or the local Retirement Residence bowling league, etc.

We made the Huffington Post!!!!!!! http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/06/rainbow-skydivers-lgbt-world-record_n_1862254.html Our group, including Carolyn Chow whom we recruited to help organize the Record at Rainbow Boogie 2012 at Skydive Chicago, we managed to nail the Gay Way world record this early Monday morning -- a 15-way (after a lot of Hurricane Issac weather holds on Sat andSun). Cheers, Mark Rejhon

They recently had an amazing Mission 100 big way event, the Canada Record big way Skydive event, (happened to be Friday 13th, July 13, 2012). I participated in the big way attempts, and the dropzone vibe has changed significantly. This 102-way successful record blew past the old 59-way record. In the past, they seems to have had a somewhat high priority on tandems, but it seems to have changed, especially with the recent rise of Skyventure Montreal (first Skyventure in Canada, very closely affilated with the Lemays -- Canada's 4-way Team Evolution from Nouvel-Air) and the growing pool of experienced skydivers. I'd give them a try, it's a lot of fun during a good boogie event or big way camp that they do more often now. They have now become the big way central of Canada.

BTW, my Cypres2 will be due for replacement in about 3 years from now. Given SSK is the higher priced of AAD's and they pay for the most advertising of AAD's, I would presume they can afford to provide some sort of a guarantee for fedex'd units: "21 calendar days or the servicing is free!". An automatic email or text can be sent, when the clock begins ticking. (so SSK isn't blamed for rigger delays in rigger-to-SSK couriering) If the army buys lots, save some of that revenue as a reserve, to hire more staff for servicing to make sure they honor the guarantee for some time into the future :-) Or provide a clause that Cypres2 can announce "Code Red Backlog". During this moments, units that are subsequently sent in, do NOT get the "21 days or it is free" guarantee. (Units already sent continues to have that guarantee). This provides SSK protection against loss of revenue from servicing during unavoidable backlogs and staff shortages, while providing an incentive to quickly eliminate the "Code Red Backlog" announcement from their website, so the guarantee is reinstated.

Fixed it for ya. (makes your post accurate to SIM) When I nightjumped, I did sort of what you did -- I attached the strobe to top-rear of my helmet where it points at the canopy, so I don't get blinded by it. I only turned it on under canopy. I used glowsticks for the freefall part, which is the 'steady' light source you describe (and in the SIM) I agree, blinking lights during the FREEFALL is bad, it's hard for humans to judge distance from a blinking light (according to tests on blinking vs steady bicycle lights) -- important for a long diver diving at night RW. Ideally, steady-light glowsticks on arms and legs, so body size can easily be approximated from quite a distance at night. SIM doesn't say this, but it's highly recommended for night RW, especially night SCR.

I heard that Koryo Tours (the biggest travel agency catering to westerner tourist wanting to see NK) does give "special tours" to those people paying extra $$$. A few rollercoaster enthusiasts asked for a special tour of North Korea's communist-style amusement park, and they got what they asked for. It's surprising! So, if you have the $$ (unusually large amount) and you're not an American (since that's probably illegal), you could ask Koryo and see what they can do for you... They already have a dropzone (see davelepka's photos above). I saw a bunch of NK photos on Flickr, and it's rather eerie, interesting. Controversial mind you, but very interesting to watch the evolution over the last ten years. [Background info about ongoing NK developments, interesting to tourist POV. Not starting anything political -- just some interesting background info useful to tourist POV] They are one of the world's most tightly controlled societies. But from the changes in the photos on Flickr, they seem to be on some very early verge of something new, much like China's changes starting in 1980's. Tourists from the Western economies are mentioning that NK has changed a lot in the last 10 years. Though they finally have their 3G mobile phone explosion (94 percent of NK's 24M population now has 3G signal, over 1M subscribers, growing fast), and the mobile phones are finally even spreading to the rural NK poor because NK's countryside now has good 3G reception, and generally slowly starting to discover the 'outside' world (NK citizens texting in their country-only texting network, about secret meetings to meet to watch bootleg DVD's of western TV shows. Very few have access to DVD players, so DVD-watching is often a very large social affair in North Korea) and discovering what Westerner lifestyles are like, despite tight filtering -- to government chagrin -- only recently. Leaks are starting to slowly occur. In fact, just about barely enough computers have now shown up in NK schools/instutions, that a few NK citizens are meeting at them to do file sharing, by sneaker-netting files between electronics devices (i.e. cellphones/MP3 players), sharing foreign audio/video media between intensely curious NK citizens, and easily-hidden microSD cards readable by now-suddenly-available cellphones. Interesting developments. Although scary-tight society, NK seems on the cusp of being 'enlightened'. Anyway, meanwhile -- tourists are also being allowed to do more than they used to, and with fewer guides/minders than in the past, apparently -- I suspect it won't be long before a rich tourist is allowed to skydive in NK (after some payoff to an NK-approved tourist agency) probably within 5 years -- at least as tandem -- from the patterns I'm seeing in Flickr tourist photography of NK's slow changes and what they're starting to let tourists do, and they do already have a dropzone. People fascinated by Perestroika developments of the 1980's, should start popping their popcorn now. Since NK has at least one dropzone and at least one tandem rig, what this means for the OP, given a neutral/enthusiac tourist, it's probably realistically expect that said person to recreationally skydive in NK well before the end of this decade if they begin the process now (if one tried very hard to make it happen). I'd imagine one would do it in steps -- visit first to their 'extreme sports' stuff like amusement parks and whatever they've already let tourists do. This gives them the opportunity to do some "networking" about seeing what the leads are for the not-yet-tourist-allowed activity, and establishes a tourist relationship that contributes to state coffers. Then during next visit, successfully convince an agency to arrange a tandem. Then actually visiting for a tandem and doing the jump, also showing them their own skydiving license. And then on their third visit to NK, revisiting another month or two, actually do their solo skydive (to give time for the bureaucracy to grinds along to allow it to happen) -- Might not let them bring your rig, but might "rent" them one for the right price. Given a determinedly enthusiac visitor with lots of money and lots of patience, obviously. At least, so the pattern goes in how NK travel agencies "seem" to work these days for unusual tourist requests... All theoretical, of course, given sufficient money offered. If you're lucky, one might be able to pull this off in just two visits, rather than three or four. Maybe not. But it seems unusual requests are starting to be granted to rich tourists nowadays, as they all know NK's famous thirst for funds. And their photos/youtubes are always interesting. Not condoning it, and USA prefers you not send tourism dollars to NK, and we all hear about the controversies. But one can be fascinated by new photography/videos (and NK being curious/witnessing outside tourists tends to be a good thing in slow enlightment process). NOTE: Easier challenge first (and rehearsal) is to skydive in China first. Only recently, it's become possible for tourists to skydive in China. (Beijing Shahe Airport, at least) Very pricey, I heard. Watching with popcorn, though, from a distance. Student of history. (Merely vacationing in NK is an extreme sport!) It's all interesting to watch, no matter the controversies.

IIRC, in 2006, a mid-air collision also occured at the 400-way World Record, but that was when the base was funneled (the world's biggest funnel). No injury, it was also superficial contact. There is a safety tradeoff. I think it enhances safety only when the bigway is 200-way or bigger, because the big way has to breakoff synchronously. The tricky situation arises partially because mega-size big ways have a breakoff altitude range (i.e. target breakoff 7500 with a harddeck of 6500 feet -- basically delayed breakoffs if the formation is stable and nearly complete. It's safer to be a stable formation at 6500 feet than a massive funnel at 7500 feet. The option is there to signal break off early if it's a mess, funnel, or early jumps -- videographers wearing radio to talk to the people in the freefalling base, for example.) so people can't rely on their audibles -- people have broke off early while the last person docked, so breaking off on audible is generally discouraged during 200-way and bigger, and alternative mechanisms are done. Otherwise, large Records is no longer possible. That said, I would imagine that many would agree that the final pullout could probably be skipped -- it is mostly not necessary when the formation is now only a 40-way (i.e. the inner part of the base of a 200-way). The pullout is needed when outer people can't see the base anymore, like in a big 200-way (i.e. Florida State Record) I think modern pullouts in big ways are more carefully planned, to ensure that this scenario is unlikely to happen. This includes the whole chain like choosing the appropriate parachute and proven packjob -- as well as the way it is pulled. In many cases, the person is to keep holding in the base while a person docked behind pulls for them and then backs away a bit. This ensures that the person does not lose balance, float around, or drop below. The deployment 'rips' the person out of the base. (With preplanned safety procedures for unlikely high speed mal cases, late base funnels, which hopefully we don't want to see ever happen!) That said, the pullout procedures seem to be more rigorous nowadays, especially after 2006 during the world's biggest funnel (one of the 400-way attempts). Sometimes, people are informed of the breakoff harddeck where they go ahead and breakoff if there's no signal from the center. (that's where audibles should be set to) There is so much logistics behind mega-size big ways (200-way and bigger) that begins to involve flexible breakoff range (target breakoff and harddeck), radio-wearing organizers and videographers, break-off team technique (flocking for a few seconds), and more.

Fellow RainbowSkydivers Kat Haney (SDC freefly organizer) and Carolyn Chow (Gay Way World Record organizer) will be there! Also, it's now the time to check your airfares -- we recommend www.hipmunk.com as a good way to compare airfares. Skydive Chicago has a great campground. More info found at www.rainbowskydive.com/travelinfo.

This would be a great lego set to build during bad-weather days at the dropzone. http://lego.cuusoo.com/ideas/view/17534 Would be a bonus if it came with a few lego minifigs wearing lego skydiving rig backpacks!

Good one. Like pull/pull at altitude/pull at altitude while stable. Obviously, I'd be making sure the plane was level in stable flight with nothing alarming ahead. I don't know the frequencies on the main radio though, so I'd probably call up on the current frequency and stay on it, unless there was a button labelled "EMERG" or other convenient method of accessing a memorized frequency. If I get a fighter jet escort, I'll know I've accidentally squawked the wrong frequency, radioed the wrong guy, or flew somewhere I shouldn't have. Fighter jet escort flies alongside. (Pilot waves sternly at me) Me? You're pointing at me? Me? (pilot points ahead) Down? At this big military runway over there? OK. Gulp. At least I'll be crash-landing on something big.

Can I squawk both? 7700, then 7600, then back to 7700. Signalling a 7600 would be useful because I am deaf. But then again, a non-responding 7700 would be pretty automatically probably mean a mayday anyway and that ATC should clear the hell out of my path when they see a 7700 flying random paths non-responsively on their screens... It's almost definitely never going to happen, I'm sure, but that little tidbit of sqawk knowledge is interesting. BTW, on the topic of non-pilot flying airplanes, another non-pilot, Colton-Harris Moore stole and crash-landed several airplanes. I think some of us would be able to fy better that, even with somewhat less Flight Simulator experience than he did, having observed more actual pilots flying their airplanes, and some practical basic piloting knowledge from the parachute.

Just a heads up: Readers of this thread may be interested in this semi-related thread in the wingsuit forum too: Wingsuit TAKEOFF from a ski slope without ramp -- possible? I'd like more people of all kinds of appropriate skills (especially ski jumping skills), to comment.

maxtreme -- I posted that link sometime ago in some of my other posts in the past. Andreas Küttel's wingsuit ski jump is potentially useful research, and it would be nice to contact Andreas to discuss with him. It was commented to allow the same jump distance at lower launch velocity -- so it did add airtime (which can be fractions of second) for a specific launch velocity. On a similiar vein, Colm in the basejumper.com forum made this reply: Although this is second-hand info -- from looking at the pictures of ski jumping from Merriam-Webster, it would appear that this Olympian is probably right. The wingsuit adds other variables, but it is worth researching, as wingsuit instructors say that tracking knowledge helps in learning how to wingsuit. Almost tempting enough for me to try to learn ski jumping from a real ski ramp, partially to see how my tracking skills translate into ski jumping. (i.e. does being a good tracker, allow you to become a better ski jumper sooner? Very valid question.) Though, the ski jump equipment is quite expensive, and it's another entire hobby into itself, even if just done semi-recreationally with rental gear or just basic gear. It would be a low entry bar to skiiers with sufficient experience -- There are ski jump classes held at ski resorts from time to time, and it does give WAY more airtime than just leaping off that small ramp at the aerial/snowboard park on the slopes, even if not approaching olympic jumping. I wouldn't mind sharing my research, even though I would never do such daredevil feats. Alas, my location (Toronto) now puts me a bit far from the slopes that provide skijump lessons. But the entry bar is not that high especially if you're already an experienced alpine skiier that already enjoys going fast on black-diamond slopes. It does gets progressively more expensive/ambitious from there.

DSE -- Alas, not yet. I've got experience in ski/racing rather than wingsuiting. A little 'play' freestyle (not professionally), not just moguls, even though I used to a lot of frequent double-black diamonds back for the 90's and early 00's. Enough to know what airtime on skis mean, at least back in the day, launching myself completely into the air from a small freestyle snow slope, though I don't do somersaults. Some times, the aerial park too (now often called snowboard parks) and stuff. ...Note: Before you compose your response, remember it is easy to deduce that can wear a costume (which just happens to be a wingsuit) while going under 10mph on a shallow kiddie slope -- it's too slow to fly. A wingsuit is just essentially a costume while skiing on kiddie slope at under 10mph; The *point* is that it is very easy to see that _risk_escalation_ is very gradual and controllable -- i.e. 10mph-15mph-20mph-25mph-30mph-etc -- up to some specific point. It is possible to do just for kicks because it's virtually zero risk at 10mph anyway. Maybe it will add 0.1 second of airtime from a freestyle ramp even at just 20mph, while looking comedic and silly. Then at some speed X, maybe even as low as 30mph, we start to get into serious territory that starts providing useful research for wingsuit takeoff and/or landing endeavours.... Anyway, virtually anybody can ski on kiddie slopes regardless of whatever they are wearing, as long as they have sufficient balance and can see the slope ahead. The real risk/skills go when you can escalate to some speed such as X mph, of which presumably highly experienced wingsuit pilots would be able to go. The question is can these speeds be fast enough for wingsuit takeoff - and I think the answer is yes (which is also the point of this thread of discussion). P.S. I'd also love to hear from other skiiers of your opinions. (more than a tourist skiier, even if you don't have professional experience, i.e. just being part of a weekly school skiing group/team/club, etc.)

If I wasn't deaf (which I am), I would make every effort to try to call up an air traffic control tower. Being "talked down" to a successful survivable landing, by a ground pilot, is possible. (In fact, Mythybusters confirmed it too.) .... Alternatively, if there was no response on the main radio, I'd try to see if some student skydiver has his radio and an instructor is on the ground, I might try to ask for somebody to get on the main radio. (If the student jumper already jumped a few times and didn't really need the radio, I'd ask for the radio before he/she bails!) I would ask for a pilot on the ground to give me all the data for the specific plane I was in (flap settings, throttle settings, feather settings, etc) to give me some quick over-the-air pilot instruction. I would then attempt to land it someplace where I had lots of safety overrun/underrun margin and few obstacles. Preferably on a runway, if I could successfully set up an approach to it. Assuming the plane has about three or four loads of fuel plus a safety margin, I'd be able to fly for a couple hours for practice, keeping an eye on whatever fuel gauge there was. If there was no radio response, then if the plane was flying level at high altitude without steering input, and I had a cellphone, I would try to text people at the dropzone to inform them that the pilot was gone/unconscious and that I would attempt to come back to land the airplane. Then put away the phone and focus. (exception to the cell phone rule. And the phone would keep reattempting to transmit the text, until successful. Notifying the dropzone to vacate/clear the dropzone, or suddenly scramble to try to raise me on VHF radio) Being a skydiver, you have an advantage of knowing not to turn too hard at low altitude (it dives), and that you ideally prefer to flare before landing, as well knowing that adding flaps is like doing braked parachute flight, you are a bit ahead of a non-pilot (which can still be successfully talked down to a landing by a pilot on the ground). I already know there are markers on some important indicators that you really need to pay attention to. Important one is the airspeed. Don't go below the minimum speed. There's usually a red marker on a number on the air speed indicator, such as 80 knots. Don't go below that airspeed, or you could stall. If I immediately notice stall danger, I'd push the steering down carefully to nose down to speed up (and I'd then also push the throttle too, if it's seems to be at a very low position). Things will interact (i.e. flaps affect stall speed, etc) so I'd be cautious. Now, if it was all over farmland an the pilot has a bailout rig, damning the airplane to its destruction, is probably more attractive. But I also know it's possible to land an airplane survivably without being a pilot. Non-pilots have landed small airplanes before in an emergency. Pilot has heart attack, passenger takes over, tower talks them down, plane survives (sometimes with collapsed nose wheel, etc). Examples include Helen Collins (80yo wife of hubby pilot that had heart attack) For my situation, because I am deaf, it would be different. (If there was a radio, I'd try to keep announcing repeatedly on the radio about the pilot being down and then what I plan to do. I may keep intermittently repeating the word "mayday, mayday" on the radio just to be sure that someone is clear that I'm an airplane in distress, with no traffic control guidance capability, and you'd better clear the damn hell out of my way.) I may try to attempt to fly/learn the plane for almost an hour, and then try to land it back the dropzone airstrip if I knew where it was and there was sufficient runway margin. Or the nearest huge flat opening I could find, such as a freshly plowed farm field or big grass field, or quiet beach, or even calm water, or nearby towerless (aka VFR-only) quiet municipal airport field, etc...

It would be something that needs to be trailblazed. Practice wingsuit landings would have very low deployments, much like Gary did very low pulls during practice. Doing a stand deployment would be rather dangerous here; as that would speed up descent. It would probably be the most dangerous territory of the learning/training for a wingsuit landing on a ski slope -- the emergency/practice low deployments while wearing skiis, the jettison procedure (if any).

It's an interesting concept, but observe the angles: Gary's wingsuit landing angle: http://laughingsquid.com/gary-connery-completes-first-successful-wing-suit-landing-without-using-a-parachute/ Ski-jumper angle: http://visual.merriam-webster.com/sports-games/winter-sports/ski-jumping/ski-jumper.php More images: http://eyowf2011.cz/web/dgqsmz8a.html?lang=en Also, even if the toboggan method was safer, what kind of progressive step-by-step training method would be possible with the toboggan method? Presumably we'd need some form of a low risk entry point to training towards a wingsuit landing. We need:Low risk entry point Easily controllable escalation of risk Easily Allow progressive gear changes/adjustments Create a larger audience to increase pool of potential 'extreme atheletes' The Daredevil Factor: Strive to eliminate untrainable territory Low risk entry point That'd be wearing a wingsuit while skiing on a bunny/intermediate slope. That's obviously super-low risk. (Even you and I can do that) You progressively go faster on steeper slopes while learning & adjusting the gear for safety, and starting to fly the wingsuit more and more, while you're skiing, and it becomes strong enough to allow you to balance on your skiis, just by flying the wingsuit. Easily controllable escalation of risk Start on the bunny slope with wingsuit! It's nearly no risk at this point; I can do it, you can do it. Then intermediate, then black diamond. Steeper and steeper, gradually. Go from there. Eventually you may need to fly somewhere to visit a slope with a specially steep & flat slope, but you wouldn't need to start out with that. Just doing plain skiing on a recreational ski slope, while wearing wingsuit -- probably just jumping up gently (as if going from kneel to standing up, suddenly inflating your wingsuit) while skiing 30-40mph (I easily ski at least that fast, when wearing my old racing-style skiis) would allow you to hop up into the air a few inches and allow you to almost fly for short distances for up to one second. A skiier/wingsuiter could probably be able to 'learn'. I've tried a very minor amount of freestyle, and basically, freefly skiiers often assist their airtime with a little jump, a wingsuit would presumably 'add' airtime, even at low speeds of 30-40mph. Wipeouts at 30-40mph typically isn't painful on non-icy, flat diagonal ski slopes, provided you're wearing appropriate gear. I have wiped out on skiis at over 30mph before -- no injury. You can control risk escalation during training, as you go to 30-40-50-60mph to the point wherre simple wingsuit takeoff may become possible just by the sheer airflow speed alone with no leap-assisted hop. Even though injuries become more frequent at higher speeds such as at 60mph (but quite survivable wipeouts -- can be still injury free -- deaths during wipeouts are caused by collisions with trees/rocks/obstacles as you skid at higher speeds into them especially during curves) -- careful choice of obstacle-free slopes would be warranted -- and escalation of risk during training, is thus more controllable, than the toboggan method. Learning stays at a measured pace. Mathematically basing off the fact that flared wingsuit flight is 50mph -- flaring a wingsuit at 30-40mph should still be able to suddenly eliminate more than 50% of your body weight off your skiis. It is probably even within many of our skills today, to be able to do that. With such a big weight reduction, you can jump very high with just a small leap with your legs. In theory, if I ever tried wearing a wingsuit while I went skiing, I'd probably train no further than about 30-40mph (based on ski speeds I've gone already, and risk assessment), given a suitable long reasonably mogul-free steep slope, but some other skydivers/wingsuiters/skiiers may have the guts to realize they're comfortable at 50mph-60mph going downhill skiing while wingsuiting -- there are recreational ski slopes at some resorts in the world that can allow you to go this fast on quiet ski days and/or special close-off requests (rented slopes) -- these are now speeds theoretically sufficient enough to do short takeoffs from a ramp-free slope while wearing a wingsuit (by flaring the wingsuit). Eventually you'll need a really long steep run for the final practice attempts and the eventual wingsuit landing. This would help figure out the proper ski gear, given the constraints of the wingsuit restriction on legs, and leg separation, ability and timing of spreading apart legs versus bringing them back together at the last moment such as touchdown (ala ski-jumping spreading skiis V-shaped, then bringing skiis back together just right before touchdown), what is discovered to be risky or more risky during training during faster skiing, etc. You would not need to ever decide to skydive with the wingsuit, if you're just practicing towards wingsuit takeoff from a slope, as you're just doing big ski jumps using "wingsuit launch" rather than "ramp launch". Create a larger audience to increase pool of potential 'extreme atheletes' It's quite easy to just wear a wingsuit while skiing on a bunny slope. People jumping in the freestyle park of a ski resort, may resort to trying to wear a wingsuit to get 1/2 second more airtime during a plain freestyle jump. People who have no intention of doing anything else with a wingsuit other than to get a fraction of a second extra airtime. A few skydivers who are also skiiers, reading this post, might actually try to wear their wingsuit at their next ski resort visit, just to try it out, in just very ordinary situations. Even at slow speeds, 20mph, 30mph, 40mph, that some of the everyday speedy skiiers often do, you can jump from the slope, and the wingsuit simply increases airtime a tiny bit because of the drag. Perhaps even a full second of airtime is possible, for a jump-assisted liftoff at ski speeds slow enough for harmless ski wipeouts. Therefore, I think that wingsuit takeoff from a ski slope is probably much easier/safer than doing a skydive and landing wingsuit on a slope without parachute -- since the risk escalation is so easily controlled (just simply start skiing on bunny slope with a wingsuit, and progress from there). Wipeouts are no big deal even at 30-40mph, as long as you're wearing proper protective gear. It seems like it would be safe enough to theoretically become a possible niche downhill-skiing discipline as popular (or moreso) than para-skiing, for people who might never skydive and land a wingsuit. At 30-40mph, you wouldn't need to choose much special gear other than a stock wingsuit from one of the main manufacturers, and lightweight stock skiis with freestyle ski bindings, and wearing a ski helmet with face shield, and off-the-store-shelf protection, all stuff you can get at a good ski gear store, you're ready to try jump-assisted wingsuit hops for a little extra airtime on existing slopes with what is probably low risk of extra injury over regular skiing that people already do anyway on the ski slopes... Who knows, maybe my post gives some skiiers some idea to try wearing a wingsuit at the slopes just to try it out at low speeds. (Disclaimer: It's not risk free. You can still die. Downhill skiiers still die too!) Then, once a few dozen people have gotten the hang of plain skiing with wingsuits on for a second or two extra of airtime during hops (that many of us downhill skiiers often like to do anyway), some may be daring to go fast enough (60mph+) to go into the territory needed to do really huge ski jumps from a steep slope without needing a ramp. This will then, therefore, trailblaze the path to wingsuit landing on a slope without parachute.... (special skiis, custom made stuff, GPS gear, feat-engineering, Red Bull sponsorship, etc). Allow progressive gear changes/adjustments Obviously, you can call off/abort training at any point when things start to feel too risky, until gear adjustments are made (wingsuit, skiis, ski boots, bindings, helmet, knee/shoulder pads, neck braces, etc), and then resume training. I think that we really don't know what final gear is needed for actual wingsuit takeoff/landing on slopes, until people begin skiing down slopes while wearing a wingsuit. The Daredevil Factor: Strive to eliminate untrainable territory Once the extreme skiiers become proficient at doing big hops (liftoff from a ski slope), say 100, 200 and possibly 300 meters approaching the ski-jump world record, then the question now becomes, what needs to be trained for before you can do the wingsuit landing from an airplane? Instead of a wingsuit landing from a wingsuit takeoff from the slope? The recent wingsuit landing by Gary on cardboard boxes, provides some very useful information on the ability for a human to control a wingsuit flight to a precise landing. But that's only one wingsuit landing. All the Wingsuit BASE jumpers, including Jeb's trailblazing, show excellent proximity flying that are possible, but all of this is at extremely high speeds (>100mph) rather than an intent to land (50mph or less). You need to train through this overlap, and presumably, this will be via practice skydives at high altitudes and GPS tracks, some of which advice may be gained from people who have dreamed (or done!) a wingsuit landing without a parachute. Now, the bigger risk is probably the skydive practice portion, if you're going to the next step (wingsuit landing on a slope from a skydive -- without deploying a parachute). Special emergency release mechanism becomes a much more risky endeavour -- due to the known BASE deaths, obviously. But it appears the wingsuit BASE jumpers and ski BASE jumpers are blazing that trail (for ski-release techniques), and eventually enough knowledge may start to exist where there's a relatively safe release mechanism (for skydive practice situations, to be able to release skiis before deploying parachute), although they're often using cheaper/heavier skiis than expensive ski-jumping skiis or racing skiis that one needs to practice keeping on for longer periods while flying wingsuit, and probably need to practice angling them ski-jumper style to make the skiis aerodynamically support your flight (such as this)

***I beleive it has to do with him removing her hand from the door of the ac. I think BlindBrick was referring to the freefall part, where the videographer docks and apparently moves one strap within reach of the TM, allowing the woman to bend knees a little more, which means the videographer may possibly have contributed to saving her life? (so it seems, if watching the video carefully frame by frame?) Dangerous manoever, but imagine the feelings going through everybody at this point.

Same. I've been keeping an eye on space news almost every day for years. Keep it up. They need to avoid disasters for the next few launches to strengthen their launch manifest! Add to that, Bigelow, Virgin America, Blue Origin, and many other endeavours. But SpaceX is ahead of the pack right now, with actual business and a real manifest.

About LED: Not an LCD screen, but a single flashing LED. I already use an LED with my LED Optima audible from Larsen & Brusgard (the makers of the Altitrack, Protrack, Optima, etc). You could even use the same connector, so you wouldn't even need to manufacture the LED cable -- just tell them to buy a Larsen & Brusgard LED, and it'd attach to your device. You can get a lot of feedback through just a LED. Just flash the light for every, say, 100 feet of descent. (Or even 50 feet of descent). If I'm diving, the pulsing will be very fast. If I'm flying very slow, it will pulse very slow. It's like using sound for glide ratio for paragliders, where the clicks go faster if you altitude is changing faster (ascend/descend), but using light flashing instead... You don't get the color feedback of using a bicolor LED, but if you went that approach, I'd probably want the color to change with glide speed, and the flashing to change with vertical descent rate. ________________ About the iPhone app idea (basically iPhone in pocket while wearing head phones to listen to feedback) GPS speedometers are very, very, very accurate for average speed, but become much more inaccurate for instantaneous speed. Therefore, GPS is better for speed 'that happened a few seconds ago' than for 'speed that happened less than half a second ago'. This becomes a problem for real-time feedback devices. The addition of accelerometer/gyroscope in many smartphones adds 'dead-reckoning' capabilities that can also enhance the real-time accuracy of real-time GPS speed measurements. Outlier data can quickly be ignored (i.e. spurious GPS position changes that don't have surges in accelerometer/gyro). This greatly enhances short-term (aka real-time) precision that can be verified by long-term precision. (log the gps/accel/gyro data, and compare the short-term gyro/accel adjusted GPS calculations with longer-term precise GPS calculations, or compare data to an external higher-precision GPS logger) A proper app programmer, with the right knowledge in mathematics, will know how to properly combine dead-reckoning data with GPS data, to enhance instantaneous GPS accuracy. This will be good for real-time feedback apps.