Digitalmafia

New York Life denied my 1M life insurance policy due to skydiving (well my agent basically said we need to look elsewhere, so I suppose they were going to price it out of what would be reasonable). DM.

"I have two tandems out of Lodi " I would suggest AFF - you have already been up and out of a plane (if you can afford it). Personally, I wanted to be a skydiver and AFF got me right into it immediately. I didnt even do a tandem first- it was challenging, intense and kept me working hard and moving forward. I never had any issues with landing so im not sure, personally(!), what I would have gained by static jumps - AFF I got a skydive and a canopy ride and a lot of training. Now I am working on my A (20 jumps after the 3 I did Saturday)-so i vote for AFF :)

Think theres probably threads on it already, but no I wouldn't think you tip them with money (and I couldnt afford to as AFF was $$$) - I tipped my instructors by working my ass off, giving (and still giving) them the massive amounts of respect they deserve and trying to become a great and safe skydiver - now that the warm fuzzy shit has been said I think no one says no to beer or lapdances.

I was in Egypt in November and met 2 guys who had been to Iran a year before (Aussies) - they had to get some special visas but once in country they were treated very well and almost taken too good of care of (they felt like everyone was being too nice cause they were foreigners)-certainly many would joke about going there, but the history and culture would be amazing. This comment must be a troll: "I prefer to live in the U.S. where the government respects me regardless of my religious or cultural affiliations, and where people don't have to fear persecution because they're "different". " If your culture is white (which i am sure it is) and if your religion (implying you must have one...) is Christian or some other sect of Christianity-or anything Jesus/Bible based...ya your good to go ;)

Man...I smoke a bit - Skydive and ride my Ducati to the drop zone...and married a hot blooded Mediterranean girl..im probably already living on borrowed time... Seriously tho -If the life expectancy was 1/150 I dont think we would have any instructors or DZO's around to help us become safer skydivers. I too as a student working towards my A have been bothered by reading too much, but I am much more concerned about my wife n 2 year old driving to the grocery then I am about skydiving. A lot of people watch TV n dream of doing 'stuff' - turn off the TV and start doing it!

Interesting questions posed in this thread. I have one BIG problem with a non-commercial rated pilot at a DZ: It is very unfair to students and tourists (tandems) as neither probably know enough to ask the right questions about this AND I am positive that they would (I would) take it for granted that the guy flying the plane isnt properly licensed... Two follow up questions: 1. Are balloon pilots commercially rated? what does this mean for jumping from Balloons? How does that work. 2. IF you are one of the guys who thinks you shouldnt rat out the dz etc for pilots that are not properly certified-what about instructors (not properly certified) too? Getting to altitude is dangerous, jumping out of the plane is dangerous - so would you turn a blind eye as well? -this is not a challenge as much as a hypothetical question as I dont think most DZ's would condone or allow it-but it poses an interesting question as I see the pilot and the instructor as an important part of the jump..

Hmm interesting question and the quick answer is of course it is - just ask anyone who has never done it... So someone I work with finds out i am skydiving..they say WOW thats such an extreme sport. To which I reply - its only extreme if you dont do it. Extreme sports has become a marketing label to sell Mountain Dew, sport drinks and clothing-so pretty much everything sport-wise put to rock music shot with lots of angles and cuts can be and looks extreme-heck they can make golf look extreme filmed right... I even have a book called Extreme programming-I must truly live life on the edge:skydiving and object oriented programming done as a team with unit tests all the way man !!! yea! The chicks are lining up...dangers my middle name ;)

Interesting question-I remember similar questions being posed when I was sufing daily in Northern California. I went through my AFF1 course with a guy who was from India - here for a contract gig for a few years. He told me that he wouldnt tell his family (mom/dad etc) in India what he was doing because no one really skydives in India (they would NEVER understand) - Just not something culturally that they do (he said). We both graduated AFF n I see him once in a while at the DZ - always thought he was pretty cool as for him, skydiving, was probably a much more difficult thing to attempt then it was for me (I grew up wanting to do it). The cool thing about skydiving is: No matter who you are or where your from if you skydive - you simply are a skydiver...there is no grey area - you toss yourself outta planes like I do (we all do) and that makes us the same on several levels-this isnt the case in many sports-I see no segregation in skydiving- you either do it or you don't. It surpasses gender and race in that way. If your not a skydiver...you just wouldnt understand ;) dm.

I cant complain too much about the weather being in AZ. but I like to watch videos with my 2 year old daughter so I downloaded a ton of videos (base, swoop, freeflying) from http://www.skydivingmovies.com I watch them via my xbox (which has a hacked media center that plays anything) but I have also burned them to dvd to show to friends with decent results. My Lil one loves to dance to the music and jump up n down clapping while watching the BASE videos (I prefer the freeflying stuff, but she trumps me for first up ;). SO me- I make my own mixes!

http://www.netflix.com/MovieDisplay?movieid=60023839 Looks like it might be fun. Just netflix'ed it.

Ah no offence man - I was just giving you some friendly coder sh*t ;). I wonder - are you building your model in a way that you can 'drop' different facades onto it for vertical markets? There are a lot of industries like skydiving that have heavy mom and pop support, but also have a group of whales. The Martial Arts community as well as several others genres come to mind-lots of small businesses, but a bunch of chains as well all using win98 pre .net software. Could benefit from monthly billing as well as one time (in the case of martial arts) belt test billing etc. I know, first hand, how difficult it is to build an app that can support multiple vertical markets but it would allow you to continue growing your company and leverage additional markets to benefit all of the individual verticals. Any thoughts? Cheers, DM.

Ha-dude you did fine! Try to drill your routine on the ground while your waiting - a lot (I did this over and over and over and over - I still do it for my coach jumps! -it helps me) and enjoy-heck you did pull your own rip cord! You let no one down - not even yourself- you jumped out of an airplane - you rock! Keep on it and you will be laughing about your first couple of nerfed AFF's in no time. Enjoy, dm.

DotNetNuke sucks for all the obvious reasons - bloat...code and db. Ya, you can make it work...But I do see why you would choose it and I would like to compliment you on this effort you are undertaking to create something useful and (hopefully) profitable for the skydiving community. Cheers and good luck! ps: Your website (www.realskydiving.com) needs mucho love and the Nav dosent render correctly in Firefox (it hops on roll over...BAD Js Script Bad...u must be a VB'er! :)

I got through all my levels without a repeat BUT i was so motivated as the cost of 2 instructor and even 1 instructor jumps was adding up fast! I would stand in the corner prior to my jump and just drill my routine over and over and over. Although on my 7th jump I turned 180 and tracked away and really liked it so I tracked a lil more then realized it was about time to pull...so I went to a wave off and pull....POW on my back (forgot to transition to a stable arch-i was flying!)..on my back trying to "roll outta bed" ..on my back...second try made the turn over and pulled fast! - turned out to be a nice deployment but I was pushing my altitude. So that was a gimme :)

Ah...Welcome to skydiving with student gear!! I recently passed AFF and am working on my A - lots of solo and coach jumps (huge fun man!)- I still come home and a day later I have bruises on both sides of my chest (outer pecs) and every jump or so I have a nice bruises on my leg...hehehe I wear them with pride! Cheers and have fun! dm.

I think its swell that at 19 you are looking for your parents to back you or ok your jumping - but they are making arguments about a subject they know nothing about. Honestly, no offense, but stop being a pussy and go live your life - get a small side job or something to make jump cash - jump. Free advice: dont go to mom n dad when you end up with two sorority girls after ten beers at a house party...JUMP!

Glad I read this post (from skymama). I am done with AFF and on solo and really becoming hooked-my wife is pretty cool about it (she gave me jumps for xmas :) but I have been playing the thinking game and fu*king my head up thinking about my amazing lil 2 year old daughter not having me around-Being a student pre A jumper it dosent take much more then a few busy weeks tween jumps or reading a ton of post about Mals to let the itch of fear creep in (course one jump and im cured). 3 of us at my office all had kids within 3 months - everyone kinda trips on my skydiving while at the same time they get something from my monday morning tales of jumping out at 14k n chasing cars on the hwy while tracking my ass off - while they spent their Sunday at Home Dept...:) Although I did have one wife say that her husband would never do that because of their child (who plays with mine)...I told her I wanted to be the kind of Father who lives life to its fullest - not a football watching, couch potato, passenger of life and I thought my daughter would be better off with a Dad like me. I did triple ck that my life insurance covers skydiving and I did change it to payout at 4x's my salary...does that mean im paranoid?-hehe. Any how enjoyed the post skymama. I think i simply need to jump more often ;)

My friend is a Base jumper and he told me that when he started jumping he had a BASE mentor who pretty much helped him stay alive long enough to learn the ropes. I dont have any Base ambitions(I just want to be a great skydiver) but I guess I expected and found a whole group of people who are my mentors - Sure I am a bad ass chopper riding, skydiving, martial arts blah blah blah kinda guy (in my own mind ..;) but if the people I respect and am learning from tell me that I shouldnt do "that" man I jump on their advice - the only way to be great is to listen and learn from great people. Posers dont last long in anything they do-and this guy your talking about...his ego is doing the driving and he will never be great (although he will likely be humbled...eventually).

Ah humans debating their creation/creator or lack of... I woke up faithless and in terror one night as I realized that we are simply shells, vessels if you will, for the true god DNA. It has but one desire to replicate and spread. Man is the highest level that DNA has been able to reach and with it DNA will someday leave the Earth and spread itself further (the cosmic joke I guess is that we deem ourselves important and unique enough to have a god along with our attempts at reason-the DNA is clever that way). Disturbed, I turned on the TV and caught a little Reality Television (I think it was American Idol or something) and remembered that I have my wife, my SUV, my pool (which is bigger then my neighbors) as well as an excellent deferred retirement plan, xbox360 and more toys then I have time for AND my house grew in value 70K in the last 10 months. God? Creation? Christians?? Islam and Terrorism...somehow my terror faded and I felt good...I am at the moment sedated by the light the tv gives off and happy that I have spent most of my life consuming and consuming like a good host. My Movies are canned and marketed for me, My food is faster and cheaper then ever, My religion forgives and forgives while holding its hand out (the one behind its back has its fingers crossed), My boss lets me leave early on friday, My time is spent not searching inward for a spark of humanity but discussing regurgitated CNN headlines over my Starbucks while debating how it really is from the point of view of the poor silly Iraqi who has to suffer collateral damage while trying to get water for his children AND he should be thankful of me because my taxes pay for saving him.... Heaven/Hell - Ohio/Afghanistan - whatever. I will consume with you and call you my brother because WE are ALL unified under one religion - Capitalism. Would you like frys with your God? DM.

I thought that when the cypres fired the main was auto cut away? Was this a malfunction-or do I have my facts wrong?

Thanks to everyone who replied. I researched gear and asked a lot of questions (and visited a local DZ) and will be doing my AFF training at Desert Skydive Center in Buckeye-soon! I was also very impressed with SkyDive AZ (top notch). I vistied Buckeye with my 15 month old daughter (father n daughter day ;) and I have never felt so welcomed walking up to a group of strangers and having them instantly start up a conversation (not a sales pitch in the house). Easy going, but serious skydivers. I imagine that many years ago all DZ's had this feel to them. Thanks again.

I am about to embark on my AFF training and could not be more excited. But being a new dad I feel like I need to make sure I have covered my bases when it comes to safety (A few years ago I was more balls then brains and would not have asked). I apologize if this seems a redundant post or thread, but I have read several others and they either digressed away from what I was looking for or were not specific enough. My question is as follows (with some thoughts mixed in I honestly believe that instructors at any reputable DZ will do everything to ensure my safety ..but is the gear on my back as good as theirs? AAD's. I like the idea that if all else fails, the aad will fire n at least put something over my head-What AAD's would you not put on a student (I dont know much about them, but are there old series and new ones that I should watch out for?). I understand (or guess) that student gear gets used a lot and isnt as new or cutting edge as what a personal rig might be...but any obvious things that I can research in advance (with a phone call to the DZ)? Thanks for any advice!