Skydiving kicks butt!

[masraum]

Went skydiving today with my son. It was spectacular. If we had arrived 20-30 minutes earlier, we would have done it a second time. A girl from the previous group actually did just that, her second jump was with my group.

We had a cold (well, for Houston anyway) front come through a couple of days ago, so the weather yesterday, today and tomorrow was perfect, clear blue skies, cool air, warm sun. I don't think we could have asked for a better first time experience.

14,000 feet, jump, freefall for 60 secs or so to 7000 feet, pop chute, then 4 minutes to landing. It felt like 3 separate experiences, jumping out of the plane, then once you're stabilized, freefall, then the floating down under the parachute. All three were amazing and slightly different.

My instructor said he's been doing it 22 years and has about 13,000 jumps under his belt. He reminded me of a slightly skinnier version of Woody Harrelson.

The outfit that we used is on the south side of Houston which is perfect for us. It seemed like a very professional outfit.

Here's my instructor, Chad (looks like Woody H, don't you think) walking me to the plane.



Here are a couple of still shots.







It was interesting, I saw a few other videos before and after I jumped and what I noticed is that a lot of people are so captivated by the experience, that they don't realize when the instructor is giving them cues. A lot of folks forget to let go of the harness and put their hands out when the instructor taps their shoulders and my stepson didn't pull the cord, the instructor did, because he just didn't realize what was going on. I think I miss some of the emotional aspects of the experience because I'm spending so much time thinking about what's going on.

If I had gotten to the place 20 or 30 mins earlier, I would have jumped a second time today (they give you a 1 time deal of almost half off if you pay the same day).

Temporarily pulled the video because youtube blocked it for the music that they embedded.

[Joeaksa]

Steve,

Glad you enjoyed it. Its really a blast, been doing it for 30+ years and its a hoot!

Joe A

[kimlangley7]

skydiving > yeah good stuff - I made my first jump in Lopburi, Thailand at age 14 [1965].... My father was the JUSMAG advisor to the Royal Thai Airborne school, Infantry Center [DET VII, JUSMAG Thailand] .. so I went through the Thail airborne school -

later took up skydiving - made a sport jump in Lopburi - then we moved to Colo Springs - jumped a 7-TU > 28foot surplus USAF bail out chute [this is 1966] ... I stayed with it and finally got my Gold Wings [1000 freefalls] in the mid-80s... did alot of jumping at Ft Bragg... Z-Hills, FL... Korea [2ID]...

great sport - lot of adrenaline - lot of control doing RW [relative work]...

[syncroid]

Cool! I did a 15,000' jump out of Hollister a few years back. Great fun!

[vash]

both of those guys look like woody.

[pete3799]

Woody is the one without the brown stain in his pants.

[masraum]

The place that made the video added a couple of songs, apparently, youtube didn't like that, so the HD video was blocked, at least in the US. I muted the sound and then clipped the video down to just the jump and landing. The quality isn't as nice, Windows Movie Maker managed to reduce the quality of the video.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by pete3799

Woody is the one without the brown stain in his pants.

I'm not afraid of heights, but three miles really isn't "heights". It's a bit more than just "heights". I was very surprised, I wasn't actually the slightest bit nervous at any point. I felt extremely securely connected. The thought of anything not working out just never crossed my mind even after the guy at work told me about two guys dying at the same place about a year and a half ago.

[masraum]

I'm going to be doing this on Sunday. 3-seater F1 car.
https://formulagpexperience.com/

[mikeesik]

Either you are the currently bravest poster on the list, or recently you've just found out you have just so many days to live?

[masraum]

Originally Posted by mikeesik

Either you are the currently bravest poster on the list, or recently you've just found out you have just so many days to live?

Hahahah. Neither I'm sure. Actually, I've had a few folks ask if I have cancer when I told them. I've been busting my hump, averaging over 60hours a week for almost 1.5 years now. I decided that I should enjoy the fruits of my labor, and since going to the F1 race in Austin, wasn't as expensive as I thought it might be, I decided the 3 seat F1 thing would be a blast. I mentioned skydiving this summer to my son and wife and my son said that he'd love to do it so my wife said that we should. The 3 seat F1 website says:

The closest adventure experience you can compare it to is skydiving.

So it seemed like I should try to do them close together so I can compare.

[mikeesik]

I envy your bravery.
Mine is usually noticed -to myself anyways-when both feet are on the ground.
Perhaps when your finished, you can send your gonads via Canada Post so I could possibly enjoy another dimension of life.

Sixty hours per week for over a year is very commendable.
Enjoy yourself.

Whats next?

[masraum]

Originally Posted by mikeesik

I envy your bravery.
Mine is usually noticed -to myself anyways-when both feet are on the ground.
Perhaps when your finished, you can send your gonads via Canada Post so I could possibly enjoy another dimension of life.

Sixty hours per week for over a year is very commendable.
Enjoy yourself.

Thanks, it's been tough. I started out alternating between 5 day 55 hour weeks and 6 day 66 hour weeks, but earlier this year I changed to 6 day 60+ hr weeks. The good news is that I've been getting paid for it, so it's really done wonders for our financial situation.

Whats next?

Well, getting licensed to skydive would be cool. That would be 17 or 18 more jumps. It would be nice to be able to do it without a someone else strapped to your back. And after getting certified, it's actually pretty cheap to jump.

Or there's
http://aircombat.com/



I've never taken any of my cars to the track, 911 or either miata. I've always thought that this might be cool. 3 days behind the wheel of someone else's car on the track.
High Performance Driving | Bondurant.com

[aigel]

i am the only one wondering about being strapped to a guy's front side for that long? I would only go if I'd be strapped to a female instructor. She could be big and strong but definitely female please. I am not homophobic but do not enjoy being that close to a man unless it is a close friend. Females? I'll make an exception.

G

[krichard]

Originally Posted by aigel

i am the only one wondering about being strapped to a guy's front side for that long? I would only go if I'd be strapped to a female instructor. She could be big and strong but definitely female please. I am not homophobic but do not enjoy being that close to a man unless it is a close friend. Females? I'll make an exception.

G

seriously?

[aigel]

Originally Posted by krichard

seriously?

LOL - not very serious, but it'd deter me for sure on a paid for / for fun activity. Don't they have female instructors?

G

[fastfredracing]

I did it 5 times . We did not go out with an instructor, we were tethered to a static line, that pulled the shute automatically. I went out on a Friday night, and got rip rocked drunk did not wake up the next morning on time, and my buddy and I blew off our 5th jump , in which we would have been signed off to jump solo with no static line, at higher elevations.
The plane crashed that morning. No one got seriously hurt, but I never went back.
I agree that it was a total rush. We jumped out of an old Cessna, and it required that we climbed out of the plane and stood on a little foot stool, and hung on the the wing strut for dear life before letting go. This was the scariest part. Once out of the plane, I would describe it as peaceful.

[Joeaksa]

Originally Posted by aigel

i am the only one wondering about being strapped to a guy's front side for that long? I would only go if I'd be strapped to a female instructor. She could be big and strong but definitely female please. I am not homophobic but do not enjoy being that close to a man unless it is a close friend. Females? I'll make an exception.

G

Then you would not jump tandem! A really important thing is that the instructor on a tandem is at least as big as you are and bigger helps. Finding a girl instructor that is bigger than most guys is going to be hard... if not impossible.

If you guys want to go further, its only a matter of $$. If you are going to do it right, try one or two tandems and if you still love it (which I really do) then do an AFF, or Acc Free Fall. If the instructors feel that you "can hack it" they put you in your very own rig and you jump with two instructors. Each holds onto the students harness as you three depart the plane.

They stay with you through-out the free-fall and when its time signal you to pull the drogue chute. You do so and when they see that you have a good main they let go. Should something happen they stay with you until you pull your reserve (or they pull it for you) and you are under a good chute.

Now you can also go the old fashioned route, with 10-15 "static line" jumps. You go out of the bird, the chute opens immediately and you float down. Fun but just not as much fun as the free fall. Just depends on how much $$ you want to spend and how fast you want to make it until you are signed off on your own.

The landing is easy, I have friends who had no legs who did it just fine. Its the free fall thats the rush...

Joe A
D-9114

[Joeaksa]

Like this:

[masraum]

The place that I went does not have a static line option. The only option is something similar to AFF. You have to do 2 Tandems, then you have 18 more jumps that are essentially AFF style jumps.