Andy9o8

I read a story in Readers Digest very similar to that you mention last year. I was very angry to hear that he was posthumously awarded something for bravery. The signal he sent was that he did not trust his students equipment to work. We must trust our equipment, but only after we have checked it

Pretty harsh response to my pointing out that there is more than a single legit point of view on this issue. I had hoped we could have a mature discussion of this topic without name-calling or anger. There really is room for more than one opinion, you know. No, of course you’re not supposed to die trying to save a student; nor do I expect someone to die for my daughter – but then I never said that, either, so let’s not re-phrase each other’s posts to make them sound worse than they are, ok? That doesn’t advance the discussion either. If you look at my original post, I made it clear I respected the opinion of those who felt they should stick strictly to their hard deck. What I’m saying is this: We all understand that skydiving presents an enhanced risk, and by engaging in the sport, we make the conscious decision to accept that enhanced risk. Well, by the same token, making an instruction jump as an AFFI is not just another skydive; there are certain enhanced risks that are inherent to that particular type of jump (that is, as compared to some other types of jumps). And when you become an AFFI, you choose to accept the enhanced risk inherent to making AFFI jumps. Part of that enhanced risk comes from the fact that, if your student gets into the shit, you have some responsibility to place yourself more in harm’s way to try to help him than you might with another jumper on a “routine” skydive. That’s one reason I have such incredible respect for all the instructors in our sport. Is that enhanced risk properly defined as “putting your life on the line” (which was not my choice of words, it was another poster's)? I guess it’s up to each individual person to decide what that enhanced risk means to him/her. How far into harm’s way should an instructor go? I really don’t know; despite the hard-deck rule, I think there probably isn’t one single correct answer that covers every situation. But the issue isn’t always a simple one to resolve, and if you scroll back up, you’ll see posts from several other parents, skydiving instructors all, that acknowledge this. ------- By the way, Beverly, I read your posts on "showing students horror pictures" and I agree with your feelings on that issue completely.

The difference is that a "student renter" is required to rent the DZ gear (unless he owns his own personal Manta & student Cypres, which is pretty doubtful), on top of the high price of his student jumps. A non-student renter has the option of renting the DZ's gear or getting his own gear to jump. If a student is uncertain, due to his inexperience, whether his spinner can safely be screwed around with for awhile (before chopping), he's already in a high-stress situation. When he's making that decision whether or not to chop that spinner, he needs to put his safety first, and not worry about whether the DZ will second-guess whether he "should have" chopped. As it was said in previous posts, a student shouldn't be thinking "can I afford to chop this?" if he thinks he has a mal. Nor should a student or very inexperienced canopy flier chase down his cutaway main into a potentially dangerous out landing, unless there are plenty of wide-open outs at that DZ, like big farm fields or desert. Also, an inexperienced canopy pilot is more likely to interfere with another canopy's landing pattern (DANGER!!) if he's paying more attention to keeping his eye on his cutaway main than on the canopy traffic around him.

I agree, I wouldn't want them to do that for me either. If someone went in trying to save my sorry ass, it might drive me out of the sport, too. On the other hand, it might drive me to become an instructor (I'm not one) and pay back to the sport by mentoring students myself.....hard to say.... However, I'm not so sure I agree with that.

Also, if you're a bit anxious from not having done a hop & pop yet, doing 1 or 2 hop & pops prior to the course might not be a bad idea, either

Yes. I have lots of dreams about skydiving, and most of them are good, but the thought of having a hard cutaway or one of my risers not releasing gives me the willies - Bad Dreamsville. Yes.

Right on, bro!

Fine, that settles it; she’s going static line, like her old man did. OK, no she’s not. Probably not. A few more months till she’s 18. As her father, I’ll just be glad once she’s off student status. I think. I definitely need to think with my head and not my gut on this. Maybe I’ll get her some tunnel time before her FJC.

By all means disagree with me - I openly invited a debate of the issue. But I really think that kind of inflammatory language about "my child's corpse" was uncalled for. Perhaps not technically a personal attack, but it comes pretty close. I was posing a reasonable question, in reasonable language, and simply urging that both sides of the issue be discussed reasonably. Anyone wishing to do so will have my full attention.

Yeah. Just to add a little detail (for the original poster's benefit), a free-flown exit is completely un-linked - any jumper exiting the door may not be in physical contact with any other jumper, in or out of the plane, at the instant he/she exits the door. Also, there's no one set number to the size of the star - DZ's with smaller aircraft, like Cessnas, often did smaller stars. For many of us, it was our first introduction to RW competition at smaller regional meets.

I recognize that, Mykel; I'm just saying there are genuinely two sides to this issue, and it's reasonable to discuss both sides.

I’ve been watching this interesting thread, but haven’t posted (til now) because I’m not an instructor & so I can’t put myself in the shoes of those of you who are. I understand and respect those who say that they will stick to a certain hard deck if the student freezes, and trust the student’s AAD. I also understand instructors who feel that nobody forced them to become an AFFI, and if a student's in deep trouble they have a responsibility to try to get to him as long, and as low, as humanly possible. I guess my attitude is this: If I were the student, I wouldn't want the instructor to endanger himself on my account by going way low. If one of my kids were the student, and got into trouble, I’d hope the instructor would take it down to Cypres fire if need be. Flame away if you feel the need.

I have a very similar one, except mine says "United Federation of Planets"

I'm just glad the jumper in trouble wasn't the very last guy out of the plane. Brrrrrr.

Learning visual altitude awareness is an important survival skill. (For those of us who learned on the S/L progression method, it may have come a little more naturally because we started low and gradually worked our way up higher, so we got used to seeing lots of different altitudes on jump run). You're right that altimeters can (and sometimes do) malfunction. Once you've finished AFF (if you're not off it already) it would be a good idea make a jump not doing any manuevers, but just spending the entire freefall alternating your eyes between your altimeter and the ground to start getting this dialed in.

It's very normal to want to talk about skydiving all the time, but you WILL bore the shit out of your whuffo friends if you do, so you have to learn to keep it in check when you're with them. You'll also find that YOU will benefit by not discussing skydiving around whuffos, because that will reduce the same, old, f%@#ng whuffo questions you'll be getting over & over & over again. Believe me, it won't be long before you get sick of hearing those, and giving the same answers, and basically having to have the same conversation over & over again, just with a new person each time. Because of that, I almost never mention to whuffo acquaintances that I skydive. Trust me, most of the time whuffos ask you to explain the sport, what they're really doing is asking you to explain yourself ("Whuffo you do that?"). After a while, it gets pretty old.

Is that type of mal covered in the SIM? Yes. SIM 23.22.87(a)(3)(ii) states: Interference from birds. Certain species of birds, especially raptors, can mistake the throw-out pilot chute for rodents or other prey. Some hackeys do look like gerbils. If a bird captures your pilot chute, creating a bird-pilot chute in tow, assume the track position to intimidate the bird into thinking you are the superior avian. He should drop the pilot chute. If that fails, treat this situation as a high-speed malfunction. Note: never use a hook knife on a bird if you suspect it is an endangered species.

Mapquest will give you a map-location of any city or town you plug in. You don't need an address.

As well you should have been. And that's my point. Like you're really gonna yell up to the pilot to abort the takeoff, right? (Maybe another skygod could get away with that, but not the mere mortals). I suppose you could blow the guy in to the S&TA, but again - unless you're a skygod yourself or are very friendly with a lot of the DZ skygods - it's really not that easy a decision.

Face it - your brother is cursed. Buy him a set of golf clubs.

You've obviously never been forced to go along to a Barry Manilow concert.

Tell them to kiss you ass and get off the plane. It's your life they are screwing with. Sparky In a perfect world he could do this. Unfortunately, in reality, it is often very hard for relative newbies (and especially novices) to speak up about safety issues without risk of getting ostracized. Sucks, doesn't it?

If no other canopies are in the pattern at the same time, sashaying (S-turns) to bleed off altitude might be ok. But if other people are also in the pattern, doing it risks, at dangerously low altitude, either colliding with other canopies or making other jumpers feel the need to make unexpected evasive maneuvers. At the very least, you may piss off other jumpers and/or the S&TA and get yourself a sharp talking-to.

I know that buying discounted season-long ticket blocks is pretty common at very many DZs. But it’s still a bit risky, even if it’s a well-established DZ and you know and trust the DZO to be honest and ethical. Face it, owning a DZ is a tough way to make a living, and just like any other small business, DZ’s sometimes go out of business, or need to file for bankruptcy, etc. If a DZ files for bankruptcy, holders of pre-paid ticket blocks will probably be well down the food chain in priority to get paid maybe pennies on the dollar, if even that. I’m not saying you shouldn’t buy blocks of tickets, I’m just saying be careful.

You really want to do 2 things: (1) Get some recourse for yourself, and (2) prevent him from doing this to others. For numerous reasons (which I won’t get into here), getting your money back may prove to be very difficult, so you may have to satisfy yourself with revenge rather than reimbursement. But if what you describe is accurate, he’s more than just a cheat, he’s a criminal, and should be treated as one. (He isn’t stealing other DZs' websites, is he?.....never mind...wrong criminals...). You (and the people cheated in Austria, etc.) are the victims of crimes. This should be reported to law enforcement authorities in Spain and Austria, etc. Let’s see how easily he moves around Europe once an Interpol arrest warrant is issued for him.