Has anyone gone skydiving?

[trbig]

I had a buddy that had done all of his static jumps where the chute opens automatically and was going to do his first freefall dive. He asked me to come take pics for him. We had a plane that BigRay just described. The thing was such a POS that they put me in a chute also, just in case. It was a bit small for me and could only imagine the feeling of those straps when a chute opened... they hurt a bit just sitting there.

So when we finally got up to altitude and the instructor opened the door, he told me that if I wanted to jump also, that they would only charge me $20 (What he got to re-pack the chute). I looked around.. listened to the plane sputtering, jerking, and groaning.. shrugged my shoulders and told him, "Still sounds like it's sorta running to me?" Besides.. I didn't see the 5 guys my size that it would have taken to get me to take that first step.

I got some cool pics. Then a few seconds later, the pilot turned the plane sideways, nosed over and went into a nosedive that I was sure was going to rip off the wings. I got to freefall for a bit after all.. it was just inside the plane.. and the pilot got to hear some profanity for a bit longer than the freefall lasted. We ended up beating my buddy down to the ground and I filmed him landing.

I wouldn't have called it a perfectly good airplane by any stretch.. but I still couldn't come up with a good reason of why to jump out of it. That's the closest I've ever come.

Tod

[BlackD1114]

Well, I did the jump and it was fun. It wasn't quite as exciting as I thought it would be but I think that there are few reasons for that. The first is that I think I was just anticipating too much. Second, the instructor I had was a guy in his late 60's who has over 12,000 jumps and was the most calm human being in the world. And lastly, I must just get a bigger rush with vehicles(I've raced in a couple of seasons of SCCA solo in very built vehicles, I've had the chance to beat on my favorite kind of car(a Dodge Viper), and I've regularly pushed my limits on my buddy's R1). I won't complain at all about the experience. It was a big rush and I had fun. I would definitely want to go again and I would want to go solo, but with the price, I'll probably tandem again first. The plane was actually pretty nice; a two prop plane that held about 15-17 poeple that jumped.

We had to watch a safety video before we jumped, which was delivered by a long-bearded dude who looked like he was a refugee from ZZtop.

Apparently that's still the exact same video that everyone plays for the newbies.

[DiverRay]

Glad to see you liked the jump!
I've only 16 military jumps, but I can remember five of them REALLY well! The first one, I was just "hanging" and enjoying it, and when I saw the C141's coming back for pass #2, and realized I was STILL at their altitude, I started climbing the riser so I could dump air and FALL!
That was at Ft. Benning, my first airplane jump!
My 23 year old son has talked about trying it, but I've told him, DAD has to go also!

[petejw]

Good to hear you did it and enjoyed it,
at least you can now say youve jumped out of a plane. :-)

[dbeardslee]

I used to be a tandem master, and there is a training method known as tandem assist. Basically you do three or four tandem jumps (depending on your proficiency and stability). Then you do three or four instructor assisted freefall with a solo rig. Careful with the landings - that's where most of the injuries occur (as the herneated disk in my back will attest). Many dz's will provide radio equipment so they can talk you down - flair too high and you will be truly screwed. For that reason most dz's also tie the brake lines off a little long so you don't stall the canopy, but it also means you don't get a full flair on landing which is why most students land on their butts. If it wasn't exciting enough on the first one, trust me on this - if you do it enough it will definitely get exciting - usually when you least expect it. Keep at it! It's the most fun you can have with your clothes on .

[Trainzz]

Btdt

Like Diver

Ft Benning -circa 1971
(jump pay is extra)


'nuff said

[dbeardslee]

Ray - I've seen jumpers get caught in circulating air pockets with dash 1B's and T10's and just get stuck in the sky. Looks really weird when all the other canopies are descending, and one looks like it's painted on the sky. Trust me on this fellas - there's a big difference between a 180 knott static line blast, and freefall. The initial exit is more severe on a military jump, but what comes afterwards is nothing like the feeling you get from freefall. We used to do a jump called a 12-way tube. Basically it's twelve people falling with the surface area of four. The last time I did one my dirt-finder recorded the max speed at over 250 mph.

[Ken Talbot]

All this talk about skydiving and bungy jumping, then talk about it being the most fun you can have with your clothes on. Who says you have to keep your clothes on?

[DiverRay]

Ken wrote:

All this talk about skydiving and bungy jumping, then talk about it being the most fun you can have with your clothes on. Who says you have to keep your clothes on?

Ken,
Sometimes you need to have fun with your cloths on, to have MORE FUN once you take them off!

[dbeardslee]

Ken - I tried clicking on the link and it didn't go anywhere. I hope it wasn't that video of that german naked skydive with the guys tail wagging . You're right, they do naked skydives, but things tend to wave in the wind that weren't built for it. It always brings the spectators in close on landing though .

[Erik the Red]

I've got 34 jumps under my belt, which puts me at the 'newb' level by skydiving standards. That was 12-15 years ago, though. I miss it, but it's not a cheap hobby (I would be renting equipment), so I'm still in the 'hopefully again someday...' category.

Best skydiving memory. It was among my first freefalls. It was October, and the leaves were just past peak color (UP of Michigan). I jumped at sunset, and there was a full moon that night. So, as I'm falling, I look west and there's a magnificent sunset, as the sun creeps below the horizon. I spin around, still in freefall, and watch the big fat full orange moon cresting the eastern horizon over Keweenaw Bay. I go back and forth watching one then the other. Every full moon in October reminds me of that time, and every time I think about it, I just smile.

[Chuckster]

Different kinds of people

True story, up in Wisconsin for skydiving lessons. We're beginners so we have to wait until the wind dies down before we can jump. We're hanging out in the room where they pack chutes. One guy comes in, talking real loud, bragging about how many jumps he's done, etc. He proceeds to pack his chute on this long table, then head out and get on this plane, which takes off. I'm standing in the doorway, just watching, and this guy walks up to me and says "that guy's chute is going to malfunction, just watch". I'm a little shocked, to say the least, and I ask him how he knows that. He tells me that he watched the guy pack his chute upside down. "Did it occur to you that you should tell him? I ask. "Didn't sound like he needed any advice from me" was the reply. Sure enough, I watched as he jumped, his chute had a "Mae West" which is the lines come out across the top of the chute and everything is tangled. He had to cut away the main chute and come down on his reserve chute. He was white as a ghost when he got off the plane. Skydivers are different people. As one t-shirt said, "one man's ceiling is another man's floor".

[dbeardslee]

My all time favorite is "If you're not living on the edge, you're taking up too much space." "The sky's not the limit - the ground is" is also a good one.

So do you know the difference between a bad golfer and a bad skydiver? A bad golfer goes 'thwack...oh s**t!' A bad skydiver goes 'oh s**t...thwack!'