DougH

30 minutes ago, Phil1111 said:

Boobs for brains?

My wife recently gave birth to our first child in January. She is breastfeeding, and I have been amazed and the innate intelligence in that whole biological system. In other words I am sure boobs everywhere would be insulted by this comparison.  The boobs are way smarter than that.

17 hours ago, Westerly said:

the best way to catch tandems is not all. those guys are looser.s seriousaly, go fun jumping instead. why would you want to hang around those clowns?

Spoken like a true bridge troll. At most dropzones fun jumpers help catch or shag tandems because the instructors are their friends and are fellow jumpers. The tandems keep the big plain flying and two ply in the porta-poties. Have a little respect.

To answer the OP when you are catching alone grab one toggle and run with it until the brake line is pulled until it is fully collapsed. It is very frustrating to have some one run out, grab a toggle and then run pull it while I yell and them to go and run all while getting pulled backwards!

Also try to anticipate being along side the tandem so the instructor doesn't have to worry about a collision course.

The question is a bit dated for sure.

"On all other tandem container systems, the main container closing and the drogue attachment are two separate systems, at two different locations. While not unreasonably dangerous, such container systems have inherent problems. They are complex and time consuming to pack, and this complexity sets up the possibility of multiple packing errors. But by far the most important problem is, that these systems allow the possibility of the main container accidentally opening, while the drogue is still attached. Since 1989, this scenario has killed 9 tandem pairs. It is the leading single cause of tandem fatalities, accounting for almost one third of the total. By combining the container closing and drogue attachment systems, the new Tandem Sigma eliminates this deadly malfunction."

Do they no longer discuss the main deployment system in the sigma manual? I am being honest, the answers are in there.

What do we call it when the main container opens before the rogue is released? An .................   .................. deployment. Fill in the blanks.

Those are all in there, go back to the book grasshopper.  You should understand this stuff.

I will throw you one bone. The answer for 96 is right in the explanation the design of the sigma main deployment system.

Know any kids? Maybe you can inspire some future photographers. 

This was an interesting post that I dug up, from back in 2006. Beezy Shaw shared some information that he was told, also mentioned that it may have been pollution.

Further scrolling in that thread led me to find a post that I made, so maybe I heard it there from Beezy?

My understanding, I think someone at Aerodyne told me this, was that part of the reason production ceased on the gelvenor fabric was that it manufacturing was more environmentally unfriendly. That could be bullshit?

Maybe 10 year back Aerodyne found some left over rolls of the fabric at the South Africa factory. At the time I was in contact with people involved with the company and they called me up. I had only mentioned the fabric about 1000x because I had an old hornet in addition to being an Aerodyne fanboy.

They made me a custom Mamba 104 out of the fabric, one of a kind I guess. 

I have been jumping since 2006, and I got my TI rating back in 2012. All that time I had a full-time salaried job in Public accounting, so I literally worked 7 days a week for most of the year, with no down time unless you count sitting around on a weather day.

That was 7 day weeks during busy season while the staff was on their 5 month off-season going on cool trips or going down south. A mix of great days at the DZ when I wasn't at the office when the weather and students were awesome, but also days spent wasting my time with bad weather. During the summer Saturday and Sunday could be longer "work" days than my full-time job.

At first what kept me going in the beginning was that I was one of only a small group of instructors. There was three of us on the weekend, and as a result there was zero flexibility, but I could expect to get 30 jumps on a weekend if the weather was good. I got to be a legend in my own mind, and walk home with a bunch of bonus money.

Then later on I kept things going because the DZ was purchased by new owners that are awesome people who respected my time. I didn't drive out days with bad weather forecasts unless I just wanted to hang out. I love working for them, and the flexibility has made it work.

This January my Son was born, and then COVID hit. I still haven't been out to the DZ because work has been nuts, and for now I let my ratings lapse, but I think this year will be another time where my involvement changes. Wanting to have some time for my son is probably the best way to motivate change after so many years.

I think you need to respect your time. If the DZ isn't respecting your time you need to evaluate whether you can make change in that area, or if you need to beat feet.

3,000 feet before it is armed.

https://dl.cypres.aero/userguide/991002_cypres_2_user_guide_en.pdf

All the freedom fighters are busy using their 2A to squabble about masks.

19 hours ago, sfzombie13 said:

it does exist and i am getting near the age where a hard opening could kill me.  i rather like the idea of someone looking into it.  it does not make a difference if it rips unevenly or even one side and not the other.  it prevents your torn aorta and allows a cutaway and reserve deployment, even if the canopy starts spinning wildly right away.  it may induce one to pass out very quickly, but i like that idea much more than just dying right off the bat without getting a chance at all.  of course, all this depends on whether it would work or not.  even if it weren't cost effective, it would be nice to have the option if i want to pay for it.  like an aad.

So I assume that right now you are jumping a slow opening canopy like a pilot, with an oversized slider, and dacron lines?

If you aren't, why aren't you first gathering up all of the low hanging fruit that will reduce your risk.

58 minutes ago, accumack said:

It seems a more reliable solution would be something like a urethane bumper in maybe a metal sleeve (think shock absorber) the urethane is available in different hardness / compression would make it tunable and reusable and wouldn't cause uneven risers. With stitching it would degrade with jumps and be difficult to know it's strength was degraded.

They have that technology already. They are called dacron lines. 

My apologies. I guess I thought you had a point to make when you posted after a 11 year hiatus, and you selected this particular link to break your silence, and you titled your post "Jump Pilots Behaving Badly".

I should have known that you were making a completely neutral post, that is very clear to see now. 

8 hours ago, riggerrob said:

The problem is protecting that tear-strip until it is needed. Protection is easy inside a sealed ejection seat or reserve container, but more difficult on main risers that are expose during every jump.

Perhaps you add a tear-strip just below the 3-Rings and protect it with a fabric cover. ???? Mind you, the most painful openings tend to force all the opening shock onto one side of the harness.

This challenge requires a brighter mind than mine.

Hi Rob,

Some fall protection for industrial workers has the shock dissipating device encased in a heavy plastic shrink wrap.

It sounds like you are suggesting it be below the three ring on the harness, that raises TSO problems, but maybe I am misreading what you wrote.

To the OP

I see few problems myself.

The main one is balancing the risk of a fatal hard opening, against the risk of a fatality cause by uneven activation from a hard opening that still manages to incapacitate the jumper but would have be survivable without the device. If you tear one side only the canopy is going to dive the rest of the way to the ground in a turn.

This is going to be a bulky device.

Also the potential need to have it vary by weight it problematic from a cost perspective. Now you need risers of different lengths, and different weights. There is going to be no economy of scale here, and what happens when the fat guy grabs the skinny guy's rig? 

3 hours ago, FixFly said:

Stick with skydiving, you've peaked.

It sounds more like you are are the one peaking and are getting more crotchety as you are heading over the hill.

We get it, you are a pilot, and this is very serious business.

I listened to the first 4 or 5 minutes. What is the complaint here?

Clearly communicating all necessary information, clear jumpers away, providing updates about the location of parachutes in the air.

Should he be more robotic, or is he missing a mandatory stick in his ass or something?

I wouldn't mind hearing this on the radio, sounds like a good time.

People have died, I know someone that had a stroke after a hard opening and had lost partial vision on one eye for a period of time.

A hard opening is no joke, you are coming to an abrupt stop, from 120+ mph, on the equivalent of steel cables.

On 5/1/2020 at 2:07 PM, 20kN said:

Several DZs are opening this weekend. Even more plan to open within two weeks. For sure people will get infected. It will happen. It's just a question of how long and who gets it first.

Unless you are running a POPS or SOS event an argument could be made that most people at the DZ either wouldn't know they became infected there, or would be minimally impacted. The bigger question to me is how many of them are going to visit Grandma at the nursing home. 

never heard of it. that should be your first clue.

I guess I should have expected this thread to devolve into this typical exchange by page 74. And we started off right.

This is why SC can't have nice things.

We have an active glider club at the airport. The pilot and the DZO discuss the spot with the club and update them on changes during the day. We don't knowingly exit over the gliders, and the gliders try to avoid soaring into the area around the spot. 

It has never been a problem. I actually really enjoy seeing them looking for thermals when I am flying under canopy with a tandem. Just another great visual to add to their experience.

I don't think a full face will do shit! Most are vented to keep the visor from fogging. The airflow in freefall is going to be coming up from the student. I have cleaned some nasty snot off my full face visor from students that didn't have the common sense to reschedule their jump despite being sick, or the courtesy to disclose that extra information to me.

Jump with a full face and a customer who chain smokes cigarretes, or has a unique body odor due to ethnic food, and you will still smell it in freefall, sometimes more than when you were sitting in the plane. Blech. 

You also have to consider the plane ride to altitude.

https://www.facebook.com/juan.rs.16

Just now, turtlespeed said:

I agree - so in those areas where there isn't any overwhelming cases - loosen the restrictions.  

This isn't a black or white issue - it needs to be done responsibly, and with forethought.

New York should have the tightest restrictions, where small towns in rural areas should have the loosest.

Re evaluate the process continually.

I don't have an answer and I see both sides to the argument.

Surely there are more variables than population density alone. I don't want to be the one doing the trigonometry to figure it out.

A rural area, far from a metro area with a more developed ICU infrastructure, could get absolutely hammered if you have a large social event where mass transmission occurs. Everything is an anecdote, but look at some of the spread that resulted from Church choir groups, or large funerals.

You need to constantly adjust, but we don't even have the infrastructure in place to do a good job at testing and contract tracing.