TomAiello

How about Felix "God of the Skies" Baumgartner? Whatever else you may think of him, the man is a marketing genius. I'd bet that outside the US, he's the best known (to non-jumpers) skydiver around at the moment. I bet Troy has him inside the U.S., though. All time? I think I'm going with DB Cooper. Or maybe Paul Quade. Now that guy is famous. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

A thought: My judgment on the risks of BASE jumping may, in fact, be more informed (so, in one way, better) than your judgment about it. Your point is very valid for skydiving. However, I, as an experienced BASE jumper, feel that BASE is not worth the risk for something like 80% of the people who try it. The problem is that they either (a) over-estimate the return they will get from it, or (b) under-estimate the risk involved. As a generalization, for the average skydiver, I think the costs of BASE outweigh the benefits. Usually, this is a combination of (a) and (b). However, there is usually more of (b) (under-estimation of the risks) in their decision. Unfortunately, because the person in question has not participated in BASE, they cannot accurately assess their personal return from the activity. Further, because they are generally uneducated, they cannot assess their personal risk. While experienced BASE jumpers might not (or might) be able to assess the return, they are certainly better equipped than the newbie to assess the risk. In my estimation, based on the limited information I have about Emmie's friend, she will fall into the vast majority of BASE newbies who are making a poor decision based on mis-estimation of the risk/reward ratio. This is especially true given her (high) risk at her current level of experience, and her (lowish) reward (which could be as low as pleasing her boyfriend). I guess what I'm saying is that the Pilot-Skydiver:Skydiver-BASE Jumper analogy is flawed because the average experienced skydiver feels that the benefits of skydiving outweigh the risks. I do not believe this is the case for most BASE jumpers. My personal belief (in case you are wondering) is that no one, ever, ought to get into BASE. Heroine addiction is probably safer, easier and less disruptive to your life. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

http://www.sierratradingpost.com/ Limited, ever-changing selection, great prices. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

Link to column on Dropzone.com. I have attached a (slightly) updated copy of the article to this posting. I'm glad you liked it. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com BASE.pdf

Hi Mike! I started jumping in Lodi, too. Unfortunately, Bill wasn't too happy with some of my antics, so I'm not welcome back there. Does Bill still run around saying "quickly, quickly" and fluttering his hands? Maybe I'll catch you in California some time. Welcome to the forums! -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

Thanks to everyone who responded to this. I made two nice flights from 1700' last night, holding the wingtips. It definitely helped make my flights smoother. It also eliminated that crazy "flutter" noise, which was both quite loud (always bad, considering the cirumstances) and rather disconcerting. Now, if only I could get flying sooner. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

Hi Omar, You might want to post this on the BASE board at BLiNC. You are far more likely to find a local BASE jumper reading that board. Also, you might want to be a little less specific on site locations. I suspect that some people are jumping in that area, and they probably don't want anything even close to a site location given out in public. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

A BASE pack job should take as long as is necessary to make you feel comfortable with it on your back. If that means you take three days, tear it apart six times, and re-pack it repeatedly, then that is what you should do. There is never a good reason to take a substandard pack job off an object. Anyone who tells you differently is wrong. Never let anyone push you into packing faster, or fool you into thinking that better jumpers pack faster. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

Thomas and Zennie, I have edited your posts to remove site names. Please remember that it is bad BASE etiquette to name sites (legal or otherwise, commonly jumped or otherwise) in this, or any other public forum. I will continue to edit any posts I see that name sites aside from a few very well known ones. Even then, I would ask everyone to refrain from naming sites at all. Referring to a site such as "the legal span in the Western US" or "the popular legal big wall in Southern Norway" ought to be sufficient for the purposes of any public discussions. If for some reason you really need to discuss a particular site, please PM or email me first, and we'll discuss whether or not that is a good idea, and how to go about it. Thanks! -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

Well, since I don't wear an alti anyway, I guess that should be ok. I've definitely noticed that you can hear a wingtip fluttering (flapping) noise when a skyflyer isn't holding the tips. Several people have commented on hearing that kind of noise during my flights when I am not holding the tips. I really need to get some airplane time to iron out my technique. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

You almost always pack for a particular jump. I have, occasionally, jumped a pack job I intended for something else (for example, been weathered off a terminal cliff, and taken the pack job to a terminal antenna a few days later. Just as often, though, I end up tearing apart my pack job and switching it around when I go out to do something completely different. Often, people pack for a possible set of jumps, then pick their jump based on how they are packed. On the other hand, many people prefer not to pack until they know what they are going to jump. So, for example, I might pack slider down, not knowing which of the local slider down jumps I will do, then put on an appropriate PC once I have an object in mind. Or, I might just wait until I know what I am going to jump tonight, then pack in the afternoon, before leaving for the jump. Many jumpers are in the habit of packing one rig slider up and one rig slider down, so that they are prepared for whatever opportunity presents itself, with merely a PC switch (of course, if you are in the habit of tucking your nose or using a sail slider, this is more difficult to manage). -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

Funny, funny, funny. Your pierced-tattooed-mohawked friend is sitting on my couch right now... -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

I'm flying a Skyflyer, and I was wondering: Do you hold the tips of the wings with your hands while flying? I have seen several people using this technqiue. Good idea? Bad idea? Any thoughts? Thanks, -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

Emmie, I just wrote, then removed a rather long rant on this subject. The basic premise was that often, unqualified guys "teach" girls they are interested in to BASE jump, and the result is often (I can think of four cases in the last three years) serious injury or fatality. PM me if you want the actual text of the original posting. It was politically incorrect enough that I decided to remove it to avoid creating a flame war on this forum. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

I think that was actually their multi bridle attachment project. As I recall, they concluded that the weight of the lines in the tail pocket was causing the tail to slump and invert during deployment. The fourth multi line (the rear one on the center cell) was intended to support the tail pocket and address this problem. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

Best Adrenaline Sport Ever. - Tim Hutchings -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

The Little Aussie. Not kidding. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

Legal action is still pending in this case. We should probably hold off public discussion of it until after all legal action is resolved. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

248. I don't think that bit about being arrested is fair, given where I live and what kind of parachuting I do. Come to think of it, the bit about hallucinogens isn't fair either... -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

I actually met a guy who had dated her semi-seriously. He had photos to prove it. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

I moved this posting here from the BASE forum. I figured everyone ought to share these photos. Plus, I'm a mean, hard-nosed kind of guy, and I was trying to keep the long string of one liners and sexual innuendo in the talk back forum, where it belongs... -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

In the interests of keeping this thread from devolving into a long series of off topic one liners, I have moved the full set of Leading Edge photos into the Talk Back forum. Sorry to ruin the fun. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

Sorry, I guess that should have been "Where is the capitol of Canada?" This engrish so hard for me... -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

I made my first jumps on a PD235 7 cell main. According to the guys who taught me, the main and reserve were manufactured the same at that point. I don't know if that's the case, and since I moved on to real BASE gear around 20 jumps, I never bothered to find out. Anyway, a few thoughts on that canopy, many of which ought to apply to yours. 1) It had two smallish crossports (BASE canopies have three--and they are bigger, or extended). This gave it less consistent openings than a BASE canopy should have. Pressurization was slow, and often acompanied by weird pressure waves. 2) Time to secondary (full) pressurization was definitely far greater than on a standard BASE canopy. 3) Riser responsiveness early in the inflation sequence was non-existent. The canopy had to get full inflation and begin moving forward before I could get it to turn on a riser. This led to at least one very scary moment, when I nearly (5 or 6 feet) clipped a wall in a national park on my 15th jump. 4) It had a weak flare, probably because the canopy was quite old. That probably won't apply to whatever canopy you are considering. 5) The stabilizers were a bit big, and the tail symmetry was odd, making it far harder to pack than a BASE canopy. 6) The topskin tabs were set up for standard skydiving flat packs (not pro-stacks), making packing a bit harder, especially at first (not sure how they are on the reserves, though). 7) The bridle attachment point was not reinforced as much as a BASE canopy's (with a reserve I guess you'd be retrofitting a bridle attachment--I'm not sure how easy that is, since the bridle attachment should be built into the canopy reinforcement). 8) Canopy coloring was not as packing friendly as a BASE canopy (aren't most reserves all one color? I'd hate to mistake the center cell while packing). Do you know what kinds of jumps he is doing on them? It sounds like a good setup for terminal jumps with high deployments. I personally wouldn't jump a skydiving reserve on a slider down object. But, it would probably take imminent threat of arrest or injury to get me to take one off any object at all. They may open with better heading and faster than a skydiving canopy, but I doubt they are going to compare with any BASE canopy in either of these areas. A skydiving reserve is designed with different parameters than a BASE canopy (for example, no one tries to reduce pack volume on BASE canopies, and no skydiving reserve is designed for slider down openings). I'd recommend getting real BASE gear. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com

You are correct sir. The other major city is Bobo Dialaso. For some reason, those names just stick in my head. -- Tom Aiello [email protected] SnakeRiverBASE.com