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I'm glad I was able to remember my log-in! Thank you for flirting with me, all the way back in 2006. Have we ever paid Sangiro for his pimp fee? You had me at hello. Some of the best times of my life were with you in the sky, I miss it! I love you! Hi to anyone who remembers me!!

I hope you are trolling for the sake of spirited conversation, but I fear you are not.... Yielding to the lower jumper is NOT OBSOLETE! In fact, your suggestion is dangerous and I encourage jumpers to disregard it. The reasons we yield to the lower jumpers are simple. First, jumpers in the pattern are (correctly) focused on their landings, which dictates giving primary attention to what is BELOW them. Jumpers are ALWAYS responsible to clear the area in their flight path - like clearing the area to the left or right AND below before making a turn. This includes pattern flight and final approach. Second, it is often impossible to see traffic above us because our canopies block much of the view. Yielding to the higher jumper simply doesn't make sense and much of the time would be impossible because of the blocked view. It also distracts from the mission at hand - clearing the flight path ahead and below, and landing safely. The "low person has the right of way" is a basic premise in all of aviation. CFR 92.113.g states in part "When two or more aircraft are approaching an airport for the purpose of landing, the aircraft at the lower altitude has the right-of-way...". Additionally, the USPA Skydiver's Information Manual agrees with this rule. SIM Section 6-1.C.3.c states "the low person has the right-of-way both in freefall and under canopy". Deciding on our own to buck accepted practices leads to confusion, and that leads to problems. As for high performance canopies and the jumpers who fly them, they are ALWAYS responsible to yield to lower traffic. This makes perfect sense. The higher jumper has the best field of view of the jumpers below them, they can monitor lower traffic without looking away from their flight path, they have more altitude to make an avoidance maneuver if necessary, and it's consistent with aviation and skydiving norms. I am a former high performance canopy jumper (and still have a rate of descent faster than many others) and can say in practice that yielding to the lower jumper works. When I am descending faster than the jumpers below me, I have the best opportunity to observe what they are doing and have the best field of view to decide how to avoid conflict. There are a lot of great ideas out in the field. Suggesting lower jumpers attempt to yield to traffic above them is a really, REALLY bad idea. My suggestion to other jumpers - no disrespect intended - is to COMPLETELY ignore your advice.

The other card-carrying woman here (though I have been absent a bit!). Anyone impregnated should be able to get her own treatment from a provider who is trained and still willing to perform the procedure. "Late term" is not a thing. "Later abortions" happen after a fetus is expected to be developed to viability and can survive outside the uterus but are necessary due to something non-viable about the fetus (it will never be viable outside a uterus). To force someone to continue growing a fetus that will never grow a brain, or statistically speaking has a 98% chance of not surviving due to ruptured amniotic sac or other complications, or for myriad other medical issues that none of us NOT trained in obstetrics fully understand, is cruel, dangerous and unethical. Anyone trained in the science who is willing to perform the procedure in-office or by medications (has taken an oath to do no harm and still feels the procedure is appropriate), should be able to provide that health care to the patient who wants it.

Odd to even have to say this but - no blood libels. Your next ban will be your last. Either start discussing things without the Russian playbook in front of you or find a new forum to work on.

On June 6, 1942, Adeline Gray made the first jump by a human with a nylon parachute at Brainard Field in Hartford. Her jump, performed before a group of Army officials, put the world’s first nylon parachute to the test. The Pioneer Parachute Company of Manchester fabricated the new nylon material, which was developed as an alternative to silk. Working in concert with the Cheney Brothers Company of Manchester and the DuPont Company, Pioneer Parachute developed a material that combined “compactness with lightness, resiliency and strength.” Gray, who was 24 years old at the time of the jump, was from Oxford and worked as a licensed parachute rigger and packer at the Pioneer Parachute Company. She began jumping at age 19 and at the time of the nylon “jump test” had completed 32 jumps and was the only licensed female parachute jumper in Connecticut. https://connecticuthistory.org/first-human-test-of-a-nylon-parachute/#:~:text=On June 6%2C 1942%2C Adeline,nylon parachute to the test. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adeline_Gray_(parachutist)

Interesting how "life" is defined by these folks as a "heartbeat" at this point, but "not alive" is measured by brain activity. If you have to terminate a pregnancy at the 20th week, it's usually because there is no (or will be no) brain activity, but women have been forced to carry a non-viable fetus for several days/weeks because it is "alive." These morons should first agree on a definition of "life" that covers the whole span. If a heartbeat (don't even get me started on what that zygote really has at 4 weeks past fertilization) is the definition of alive, then we can stop learning CPR and dispose of all defibrillators. They're already dead, so you just have to call it when the heart stops. If you pound on someone's chest, or shock them, after their heart stops, then you should be charged with mutilating a corpse.

I'd counter that there's a virtually limitless supply of tools chasing this Hunter Biden angle.

Personally? It guides my morality and worldview. I didn't know anything about how people in sub-Saharan Africa lived, and imagined they were all poor, ignorant people who lived in poverty and misery. Then I spent a month there and learned they were some of the happiest people around. When I told them I was a skydiver, one of the kids pantomined an entire RW skydive, including throwing a hand-deploy at the end and releasing the brakes. They all spoke three languages. I thought the US was a good influence there. And I discovered in the cities and larger towns that everyone hated Americans, because they'd come in and steamroller over local businesses, homesteads and farms (often literally) in the name of profit. "It never their fault" one guy told me, who explained that Americans always blamed their boss, or the shareholders, or the (Niger) government for whatever trouble they caused. But when you got to the smaller towns, the only Americans people had seen were Peace Corps volunteers. And they saw Peace Corps volunteers as sometimes misguided, sometimes clueless, but clearly there because they were trying to help. And thus I was welcomed with open arms. And that taught me that ultimately it's what you do, not what you say or what you profess to believe, that determines your morality and how you are seen by the world. I thought I was "woke" and really understood people. Then I managed a transgender woman and realized that I really didn't understand much of anything, and I never would, since I'm a straight cis middle aged white guy. But that that was OK as long as I could accept that her point of view was as valid as mine - even if it didn't make sense to me. I've known people who were great guys, would do anything for you, who turned out to be pedophiles. I've known miserable people who would curse you and never say a good word about anyone - but years after they were gone, I found out they'd been supporting several families and paying for their kid's college education for no reason other than he thought they deserved a chance. From that I learned to not judge people so quickly. True of Barack Obama, too. (Or as you preferred, Barack HUSSEIN Obama.) But I bet you don't think that the reaction to his name defines his significance.

BOROWITZ: Stormy Daniels not surprised Trump’s defense was small and didn’t last long

We are really in a crappy place today. Justice Clarence Thomas is arguably in cahoots with his Qanon and conspiracy theory believing wife who participated in the January 6 insurrection. Both Kavanaugh and Coney-Barrett apparently lied to get their seats and, by any honest rational opinion, Gorsuch sits in a stolen seat. If you read this and think "sucks to be you libtard" or "it's about winning and we won" you are no patriot. You are no true American. You are a traitor to our fragile constitution.

Here’s my $0.02, for what it’s worth….if your faith makes your life better and you wanna share that then fill your fucking boots, I’m happy for you. If you want to start telling me I’m going to burn for eternity because I don’t believe in your imaginary friend, I’m happy to write you off as a person worth giving another minute of my time.

The Republicans should be forced to carry Trump to term, even if it threatens the life of the Republican Party.

Crimea river...

You are WAY off base with that comment. USPA encourages skydivers to chase their passion, and promotes best practices regardless of the discipline. Is canopy piloting safe? Nope. Not even close. CP is dangerous - damn dangerous - but that doesn't mean USPA should discourage it. Is freeflying safe? Nope. How about CRW? FS? And then there's speed skydiving. Consider a premature deployment at 300 mph. Nothing we do is safe. The CP culture is the most peer-policed discipline in skydiving. Go to a CP comp sometime and observe. You will see the best pilots on the planet coaching, mentoring, and critiquing - all with the goal of keeping one another safe. CP has come a long, long way since the days of toggle hooks and ditch digging. Today's pilots have a deep understanding of the science behind the discipline and continuously hone their skills and education to stay as safe as possible. They are also acutely aware of the risks. From an organizational perspective, the ISC (International Skydiving Commission) and national-level organizations like USPA have and do modify competitions rules and practices to make safety a top priority. One great example is the change in distance rules that now require pilots to stay below a certain height for a portion of the run before climbing their canopies. This was done specifically because folks were getting injured by climbing so high that landings were becoming sketchy. I have been following the competition CP community for over a decade. My son is one of the top pilots in the world. Do I worry about him? Every single day. Would I ever dream of discouraging him from doing what he loves? Never. USPA does not "endorse canopy piloting competitions that encourage skydivers to land in very unsafe ways". USPA encourages skydivers of all disciplines to conduct their activities as safely as possible. Some disciplines are more dangerous than others, but none of them are safe. Canopy piloting is not safe. Neither is any skydive you have ever made or ever will.

I just had my retirement request approved. Come Dec 1, I'll be joining the club!

There are 2 speeds: Indicated airspeed and true airspeed. The speed that the jumper will feel in freefall is always indicated airspeed and for a jumper that falls at an indicated airspeed of 120 mph, he will fall at that same indicated airspeed regardless of altitude (except when going so high there is no air at all). If you could take an airspeed indicator with you in freefall, it would always register the same airspeed, indicated airspeed, regardless of altitude for a give body position. Your true airspeed will change with altitude and at 41,000' your true airspeed, with an indicated airspeed of 120 mph, would be about (depending on temperature) 245 mph. However, your body would only feel the indicated airspeed of 120 mph. Mike Mullins Oh yes I will. Mike

"When a coup attempt goes unpunished, it has officially become a training exercise." - Author Unknown

He's out of the ICU now but still hospitalized.

https://skydivingmagazine.org/browse-issues/ I started skydiving around 1987 and reading theses old magazines have given me such great pleasure and sadness. There is so much that I missed before I started skydiving and since then, so many great people are no longer with us. On the plus side, I really enjoy the history and the great memories of all that has happened. I knew Mike, but not very well and now can really appreciate the writing and history. Thank you Sue for making them available.

Hi, Jerry, If he weren't a strong contender for the office of POTUS, I would be laughing. Unfortunately, the situation doesn't make it funny right now. Maybe when he loses the election and continues to "lose it," we can laugh at him.

NINE YEARS!!!!! Flirting with each other here was the start, then the flirting at boogies and drop zones. She had my heart the second our eyes met. I love you baby, let's continue our adventure filled journey through life together. now to get her back here to see this.... *Chuck Blue was right. Thanks brother!

dozens of felony counts. Trump is not walking away from this with no convictions. Pardons still mean you are guilty, so they don't mean shit to anyone with a fucking brain. He's a fucking crook. he always was. He's a fucking con man. He always was. Arguably he is guilty of sedition, given the Seditious conspiracy convictions of Jan 6 already... and that may be coming yet. 6 dozen felony counts might give the other prosecutors the balls to proceed as well. This is as close to actual treason as we could find if there is ever evidence that he shared any docs with a foreign entity. Fuck that seditious cunt. fuck anyone that supports that seditious cunt at this point. Stop making excuses for the worst president we have ever had in the white house. There is no comparison to this fucking mutt of a human being. When he dies (and he will someday) I will be hosting a neighborhood BBQ and open an 18 year old bottle of single malt. that.....fucking....seditious.....cunt.....

A few months before I got out of the tandem game (after 10 years and probably 5000+ tandems): I exit on a handcam jump that had outside video as well, and right out the door I realize I didn't buckle my full face helmet. So I'm flying the entire jump with my right hand on my head, filming with my left, and cursing the camera flyer who decided (not for the first time) to film everything while carving around us on his head. Apart from that helmet annoyance and the freeflying camera guy, we get to 6000' uneventfully, whereas I reach back with my left hand (wasn't going to sacrifice my helmet for the opening shot), pull, and nothing happens. I switch hands, hold down my helmet with my left, and pull the right handle. Nothing. Now we're getting to 5000', and everything I know about release blockages and drogues in tow on Sigmas flashes through my head. I give the left handle another go, then say a quick prayer and fire the reserve past the trailing drogue. It clears, and we have a brisk, but totally manageable deployment, and I fly us down, hoping the people on the ground aren't too freaked out by the drogue dragging behind us, trying to get some good canopy HC footage to make up for what would definitely be suboptimal freefall. We land, and I look back to locate my drogue. And it's not there. And that's when I realize it's still in the BOC, where it's been the entire time because I was too busy holding down my helmet and filming the jump, and the camera guy was just trying to keep up with us, and we went straight to reserve from drogueless terminal. And I was generally pretty proud of myself for not being one of those TIs who need the drogue to get them stable, but the dumbfuckery I managed to cram into this jump still makes me a bit sick to my stomach.

I've recreated all of the witness and crew testimonies in their unredacted format and put them all in one place. Many of the copies floating around the net look terrible and have gross watermarks, etc. norjak.org/testimony

Penn & Teller are from this time period. If you're trying to use the "Well Regulated" meant "Well Organized" argument - I'm not even sure where that originated. The colonialists (the people) were the militia and not any part of a standing army (which caused Hamilton great concern for the US to have one - but we do). In his Federalist Papers No. 29, he outlines all "three sides" of the coin. The militia, a standing army and the people. "Well Regulated" meant training to a military standard. It was proposed, that the people from each state would gather once or twice a year and train to military standards, but make no mistake they were "the people" of each state - not a paid military. In fact, they could be made to support another state in the event that other state were invaded by a standing army. There is an ongoing myth about what the forefathers "meant" about a "well regulated" militia and "the people" being separate by a single comma. "The people" were "the militia." The right to bear arms was to allow the people to support the militia UNTIL a more formalized militia could be developed at a later date to protect these US from a standing (foreign) army. If you don't believe the government can regulate weapons and ammo, then how has the NFA stood as a law for so long. Did you know that the Supreme Court didn't acknowledge individual gun ownership as a right until 2008. 219 years after the US Constitution was adopted. If you don't think the US can ban certain weapons, then why is there still a ban on gravity knives. Why is there still a law on who can or can't own machine guns and a rather lengthy "well-regulated" process to own one. Having said all that, I personally, don't like the "left's" attack on the 2nd Amendment, but I also don't like the "right's" belief that gun ownership comes without some form of responsibility or accountability, or regulation. The "left" needs to agree to leave the 2nd Amendment alone and the "right" needs to agree that children getting killed in school warrants regulation of firearms to prevent it from happening again. We claim to be morally superior to other countries - let's start with protecting children from even having to have "active shooter" programs by regulating ownership - not banning guns, but banning nut jobs from owning guns AND ensuring everyone who owns a weapon gets the proper training as Hamilton outlined as "the People" being "Well Regulated."

An excellent example. By reframing the Civil War as a "war of northen aggression" having nothing to do with slavery, whites in the south could avoid any residual feelings of shame associated with the position they took on slavery. They could instead take pride in their ancestors who stood up to an evil north, rather than trying to reconcile their heritage of slavery with a more modern view of civil rights. We are seeing the same thing happen today with the attempted cancellation of both CRT and the 1619 project. These studies of history make many white people feel bad, because it reminds them that a significant part of this country came from the labor of slaves. This make them feel - not bad, exactly, but like they cannot be as proud of their history as they otherwise could be. "Make America Great Again" doesn't work if those halcyon days included slavery (or enforced segregation, or redlining, or any of the other structural racisms that the early and mid US incorporated.) So they try to ban it. They realize that banning history is something of a bad look, so they dress up the ban in flowery language and mix in a few "won't someone please think of the children" memes. We've seen these a lot lately - "why are teachers teaching our children to hate themselves?" CRT teaches kids "to be ashamed that they are white." One theoretically real child tearfully asked her far-right mother "Why am I hated so much?" - and then supposedly needed therapy to overcome all the damage that CRT did. (How fortunate that that child did it just in time for Marsha Blackburn's political campaign.) Others spend thousands of words trying to define CRT to mean something other than CRT. It's an "unremitting attack on Western institutions." It teaches that "America is systemically racist and must be dismantled." It was created by Karl Marx to destroy democracy. It is a "monstrous evil" that gives black people "the whip handle" over white people. (That last was from Pat Robertson; what a fascinating metaphor to use when one is advocating ignoring what slavery did to the country.) Underlying all this blather is a simple belief common amongst the right - that education can and should be curtailed because it makes some people feel uncomfortable or threatened. We have seen several examples right here on this forum. George Orwell once said that "he who controls the past controls the future." Conservatives are trying to take control of the past and alter it to something that works better for them. The question is - will we let them?

OK, Slick what's your fucking plan other than throwing "follies" around? Wait you just want to throw rocks at everyone else's shit. Go play with the other kids - the adults want to have a conversation.

Response to the nipply one: Your first jump will be a recurrency. To make sure that you obey your jumpmasters, you'll be required to wear eye shades along with the face mask. The instructors will pull off the eye shades when they deploy you. With a frap hat, the options are endless. I'd go with the standard little blue face shield, and just let freefall blow it off. Then you can wait for it to land and re-use it again. Make sure you weight it appropriately -- you do want it to come back down on the airport, after all. There's a whole new sport of mask accuracy, with people building special accuracy masks, studying the wind currents in detail, and adjusting the mask weight based on the exit altitude and direction. Wendy P.

Wow, you found the "Public Health and Medical Professionals for Transparency" document. When anti-vaxxers give themselves a fancy name and buy a URL with a '.org' domain they can post all types of bullshit and people looking to confirm their biases will eat it the fuck up! Here's a link to the original document: https://phmpt.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/5.3.6-postmarketing-experience.pdf These guys got a bit crafty trying to make it look like a legit Pfizer doc: the header has the research name of the vaccine, they're lawsuit-seekingly close to claiming that the whole thing was prepared by Pfizer on page 1, and they even put a file-path stamp on the side of the document...from that stamp, you can clearly see that it was in the 'approved' folder, so you know it is extra verified and totally good. Come on, Doctor! Put that big, multisyllabic brain of yours to use before you regurgitate this type of shit

I disagree with just about all of Rep. Cheney's policy positions, but to punish her for not promoting a huge lie is about as low as you can go.

In my church there is controversy about taking the vaccine. Many have taken it, including my wife and I, but some refuse. Those refusing are not vocal with their reasoning. It comes across as, mostly, the government is not going to tell me what to do. To me that is very weak and not very enlightening. Some of us have had the virus and some of those have died or still suffering long term effects. My wife is in this situation. To date we have had 8,254 infected and 214 deaths. I would guess around 50% of the seniors are vaccinated. Getting an appointment is a stumbling block. Personally, I think it is better to be as safe as possible than to be as sick as possible.

So do actions. There was a time (it seems long ago) when elections were bitterly contested, but when the survivors made it to Congress they would roll up their sleeves and try to get some work done, and this meant working across the aisle. Hard though it may be to believe, Republicans and Democrats often socialized together and even had some pretty solid friendships. For some time now though, Republicans have adopted a scorched-earth strategy of total obstructionism when they are the minority, and ram-it-up-your-ass policy making when they are in the majority. This policy has been carried to the ultimate extreme by McConnell, who has pretty much destroyed the Senate as a deliberative body. Once upon a time the Senate required 60 votes to confirm Cabinet appointments and senior judgeship's including the Supreme Court. In Obama's first term McConnell was minority leader but still pushed the Republicans in the Senate to block several of Obama's nominees for his Cabinet, and also many nominees the judiciary. He was not coy about using the filibuster to try to castrate the Obama administration, so that Obama could not seat a full cabinet or fill judicial appointments in a timely manner. This forced the majority leader, Harry Reid, into a Hobson's choice. A Hobson's choice is where you have to make a choice but you only have one option. He eliminated the filibuster (the 60% rule) for most positions that required Congressional approval, but he did not eliminate it for Supreme Court appointments, arguing that such an important appointment should require more than a bare 51 votes to confirm. Leaving the Supreme Court at 60 votes meant any nominee would need to attract at least a few votes from the minority party, so they could not be too extreme. The problem with the Democrat's approach is that they still assumed some measure of good faith on the part of the Republicans. Instead, when the Republicans gained control of the Senate, McConnell blocked almost all of Obama's judicial nominees, creating a huge backlog of empty positions and also a huge backlog of cases waiting to be heard, and ultimately of course he blocked Obama's nominee for a Supreme Court seat. Then when Trump nominated Gorsuch, McConnell eliminated the 60 vote rule for the Supreme Court so he could ram through Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and now Barrett with not one Democratic vote. What I meant by "actions have consequences" is that McConnell's legacy will be a Congress in which Democrats will have learned the lesson to never allow the Republicans one inch, because if you do they will fuck you. The Senate is dead as "the world's greatest deliberative body". It will for a long time be focused far more on screwing over the other side than on doing any actual bipartisan legislation. Good job, Mitch. I have voted for Republicans in the past, when I thought they were the best candidate. Not for president it is true, but I would not have been too alarmed if McCain or Romney had won as I was confident they actually had the best intentions for the country. No longer. The Republican "party" has shown itself to be interested only in cementing their own power in place, establishing one party rule, and prostrating themselves before Trump and their corporate masters. Even if I think a particular individual is OK the party is so corrupt I can never again consider a Republican for any level of government.

Hooray. Good news. I got a job offer today! It’s not quite what I was after, but with so many people unemployed right now and companies having a freeze on hiring just finding a job is a godsend.

Yesterday, this post had over a hundred views and no responses after 6 hours, and this was a good thing. Then all it took was added bait from the second most ignorable poster on the entire forum, and you all had to take a bite. This was a great opportunity to leave him shouting into the void, and you failed. Every one of you should be ashamed.

Hello To ALL..... Just checked in here, to find this thread.....Thanks to Each of your for your posts and good wishes......The worst Is now Over. I was discharged on Oct 20th.. " They turnt me Loose " " said I was Well " …. And I AM.... I had gone to Skydive The Falls on Saturday September 14th and after a bit of a wind hold it calmed down and they started sending up loads. I enjoyed a Nice 2 way from 12 grand with a long time buddy....The view of Niagara Falls during the climb to altitude was Fantastic . While Packing my rig afterwards, I found it to Be, a bit of an effort.. and I had to stop 3 times and sit to rest...… Hmmmm. Got home that night and was just feeling wrung out... No real pain, no numbness, but I felt lousy..It was around 10 or 11 pm and Nancy had already gone to sleep. I saw NO value in waking her and having her SIT in an E R waiting room, wondering and Waiting,,,, so I wrote her a note , left it where she could Easily Find it. and said " I am going to the hospital " Got there in a few minutes because it is only a couple of miles away. It was NOT busy and they took me in quickly. They did an EKG on me. and the next thing I knew they were calling for an anesthesiologist AND a surgeon !! Yikes !!!! Well they did a big time bypass on me , had me on a heart pump and a respirator throughout... I was out of it for a few days... and feel terrible about putting my FAmily through those first few days, post Op... I got great care from the doctors and nurses and a few in particular were top shelf, in their encouragement and insistance that I "get UP and get Moving"... I was walking around and improving each day, by about 2 weeks post op and little by little they removed the trach... and the drainage apparatus and the nasal feeding tube and got me back onto swallowing and a bit of a sense of normalcy... I have been Home now for 10 days or so, and I am pain free and no longer need the walker I had been using. Kind of glad we are coming into the end of the year as I am on a hiatus from work and will be doing Physical therapy and building up my appetite the next few weeks. I lost 22 pounds and was Under 170, for the first time since high school..... Anyway things are improving. I am proud that I Did NOT ignore my sense of malaise and instead sought medical care...... I was told I was getting close to a cardiac arrest..... Follow your instincts my Friends No One is bulletproof and certain issues CAN sneak Up on us... I feel blessed that in addition to Great Friends and Family, I also have a Guardian Angel or Two... sitting on my shoulders... Thanks skymama,,, for initiating this thread. I am glad that I checked in here,,, to Find it.... skydive often, skydive safely, skydive with friends . jimmytavino uspa # 9452 A3914 D12122

I thought all the QAnon, MAGA nutters quit watching football when that negro boy took a knee.

These are the same people who think that The Donald is well-characterized by their T-shirts likening him to the second coming; who think that it's better to hurt someone you disagree with than it is to improve your own lot, because perception is reality. Me, I moved to a place where I can buy local produce and meat much of the year, and support local businesses instead of big box stores. Where I can hike and bike from close to home, and where small towns DO try things. Like setting up community care departments, to offload mental health calls from the police. Like improving rather than defunding their libraries. Like buying hybrid vehicles for public departments. Like helping to fund public transit. Like having local newspapers. Like valuing education to the degree that nearly every kid in the state has access to a good vocational school (most with a waiting list) as well as a regular high school. And, yes, studying reparations. Life is good. Wendy P.

Donald Trump called Georgia looking for 11,780 votes. Fani Willis is only going to need 12.

No you won't

Intro As there are not a lot of ressources regarding a transition from skydiving to paragliding/speedflying available online, I decided to share my experiences and impressions in this post here. Even if you are not planning to get into paragliding yourself, it might still give some interesting insights. If you like, I can keep you updated on my journey. About my skydiving background Originally from Austria, I started skydiving in southern Germany back in August 2012 and got pretty hooked on it. After spending every weekend at the dropzone for about a year, I decided to quit my regular job, move to the dropzone and pursue a career there, although I always had to support it with at least a part time "normal" job. Living off skydiving alone is almost impossible within Germany. After about two years (as soon as legally possible) I got my coach and tandem instructor rating. I was able to earn money with skydiving from that point on, mainly doing videos, tandems and coaching jumps. My AFF rating followed soon after. My favourite discipline in skydiving has always been canopy piloting, why I invested lots of time, money and effort into that. I quit skydiving in the beginning of 2020 as I was starting to burn out after 7 seasons of 7-day-weeks during the summer and moved back to my origin in the Alps of Austria at the beginning of this year. Alltogether I did about 3500 jumps of which about 2000 have been on solo-canopies. My canopy progression was: * PD 170 (~150 jumps) * Pilot 150 (~150 jumps) - started working on high-performance landings with that canopy * Pilot 132 (~200 jumps) * Katana 120 (~200 jumps) * Velocity 96 (~300 jumps) * Valkyrie 84 (~1.000 jumps) - loaded with up to 35lbs of extra lead (total exit weight around 220lbs) (sample landing) Do not take my personal path as advice for your own downsizing. I went through some downsizing steps rather fast, but keep in mind that I did many of these jumps in shorter timespans than many other people and always had direct mentoring from more experienced pilots available. In retrospective I have to say, that the step from the Pilot 132 to the Katana 120 was the most challenging. My paragliding experience until now I started my training at Cloudbase, a professional, commercial paragliding school in Zell am Ziller (Tyrol, Austria) - huge recommendation by the way - last Saturday and completed my final exam yesterday. Usually training takes a bit longer (40 flights) but due to local regulations a shortcut for licensed skydivers is possible (15 flights, although practically not appropriate in many cases). Theoretical instruction is easy, but covers topics that many skydivers have likely never had any contact with. It might have helped that I also hold a commercial pilot license for airplanes and have quite some knowledge regarding meteorology and basic aerodynamics, but I doubt that my skydiving experience gave me an advantage in that area. During training (and some test flights today) I had the chance to fly the following paragliding wings (surface area in brackets although less relevant): * Mescal S (240 sqft) * Masala S (235 sqft) * Susi 23 (213 sqft) * Susi 21(190 sqft) * Kode P 18 (173 sqft) * Tonic 2 S (172 sqft) How do paragliding wings compare to skydiving canopies? I was surprised how much performance even large student paragliding wings offered in comparison to skydiving canopies for students. While a skydiving canopy for students (and to be honest - also most intermediate skydiving canopies) allows the pilot to hang in the harness like a bag of water and yank on the steering lines without any requirement for sensitivity, a paragliding wing requires immensely more coordinated inputs by harness and brakes to achieve an acceptable amount of control. I suppose a docile student paragliding wing would likely still not kill you, but it will be a very uncontrolled ride, if you fly it the same way a skydiving canopy allows you to fly. Techniques required to fly real high-performance skydiving canopies transition very well to paragliding. From the first flight on paragliding felt very natural and I had the feeling of having a good amount of control over the wing. I got lots of compliments to be the very first skydiver at the school with sensitivity for brake inputs. Aside from techniques like doing big ears, that are not used/available in skydiving, a huge difference is the possibility of (unintentionally) inducing extended rolling and pitching oscillations and the inputs required to stop these oscillations. Standard skydiving canopies do not really require such inputs and will quickly self stabilize (or at least keep the oscillations low). High-performance skydiving canopies require such inputs but still stabilize quicker than paragliding wings. While angle-of-attack control is not necessarily required to safely fly a skydiving canopy, like it is on a paragliding wing, it certainly allows much better flight path control even on less performant skydiving wings (Did you ever feel your controls become "mushy" after recovering from a turn input? Surprise! There's ways around that...). Some skydiving pilots might bring that skill, some might not. Paragliding wings are a lot easier to flare than their skydiving counterparts. I did not see a lot of really bad flares during the course on my coursemates without any pre-experience. That is likely due to the much lower sink rate and more lift that paragliding wings provide. I would not expect any skydiver to have much trouble correctly flaring a paragliding wing. Paragliding wings seem a lot less critical regarding low turns. While even very docile student skydiving canopies react with a good amount of dive to any turn, I have seen safe turns at heights that sent shivers down my former skydiving instructor spine during the past week. There are other dangers that come with paragliding wings, but the risk coming with low turns seem a lot lower with paragliding. I do not have any numbers on that feeling, so take it with a grain of salt. Conclusion I have a hand full of paragliding flights by now, so my opinion might either be false or have to be revised by myself in the future. High-performance canopy flying experience transitions very well to paragliding and should allow you to feel comfortable on a paragliding wing quickly. Controls are different but follow very similar principles. If you got the feeling for a high-performance skydiving canopy, you will likely have the feeling for a paragliding wing. At least a docile one (like to ones I used to fly during the past week) and at least in my case. I doubt that limited, other skydiving experience will give you a huge advantage on paragliding. Some things might feel similar, certainly taking away a good amount of stress. Some of your habits might be very counter-productive. And it is very well possible that you will have to seriously extend your "toolbox of canopy control". Recommendations In any case, do not assume that you know how to fly a paragliding wing, because you know how to control a skydiving canopy. It's different. I for my part decided to go with the Tonic 2 S for now. It's very slow in comparison to the Valkyrie 84 I used to fly, but it still behaves reasonably agile and I have the feeling that I got a good amount of work to do until I can fly it perfectly to its limits. It outperforms similarly sized skydiving canopies by far. Speedflying is my goal, but I do not see any reason to rush it. Doing some paragliding training could be a good addition to becoming a great skydiving canopy pilot. I can see paragliding skills and knowledge transition extremely well to skydiving canopy control, if you already bring some skydiving experience. Paragliding training is super cheap in comparison to skydiving. And it's a huge amount of fun.

Wow. You are really out in left field. I didn't assume the conclusion; I provided it. You have been provided facts and your response is Twitter and YouTube opinions from those that align with your position. They are wrong. You are wrong. Try reading the depth of research rather than regurgitating the gospel of others who are wrong. It's like JohnRich and 100th Monkey had an illegitimate son.

It's worth remembering that the only really consistent Trump policy was to cancel every program, treaty, policy, or law from the Obama administration, and replace it with nothing. He cancelled the CDC's collaboration with the Chinese to monitor for emerging viruses, with the result that we were unaware of the Covid outbreak for months. He ignored the national pandemic response plan that was developed after the H1N1 outbreak, and failed to develop any national plan of his own. He went so far as to tell states they had to order their own PPE, setting up a scenario where states had to bid against each other and drive up the price, then he seized shipments destined for blue states and sent them to states whose governors sucked up to him. It's true he did allow the government to fund fast-tracked vaccine development (though that was a "no-brainer") but then he failed to develop any sort of a plan to distribute the vaccines, and blocked the incoming Biden administration from getting the information they needed to develop their own plan. Apart from Covid, he cancelled the program for dealing with black lung disease, and replaced it with nothing. He withdrew the US from the WHO, leaving us with no mechanism for collaborating with other countries to deal with a world-wide pandemic. He withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal and replaced it with nothing, with the result that Iran stopped abiding by the deal and is now closer to a nuclear weapon than the have ever been. I could go on and on and on. Hatred of Obama is not a substitute for a national policy on anything. Hundreds of thousands of people died as a result, and people will be worse off for a long time because of Trump's obsession with erasing Obama from history.

I don't think anyone should be forced to get a vaccine. MOST (not all) people on the left agree there. I do think that if you don't get vaccinated, or you don't want to wear a mask, there are things you won't be able to do. Go into a NICU or a hospital room, for example.

This trend - the dumbing down of discourse to the level of angry soccer fans - is something that was predicted years, even decades ago by authors like Al Gore, Mike Judge, Susan Jacoby and Carl Sagan. I'm sure you've seen Carl Sagan's quote from 1996: I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or my grandchildren's time — when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. The dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30-second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance." Replace that with "clutching our crystals and consulting our horoscopes" with "taking Ivermectin and reading Twitter" and you have today's level of public discourse. And 10 seconds? That's forever by today's standards. Today what people consider "substantive content" includes "Let's go Brandon" "Hunter's laptop" and "I did that!" Under a second.

It's not like he banned K-Y Jelly, Mr.concerned about Biden's behind. Reaching around to a more topical area of concern did you notice, in your excitement, how masterfully Biden played Putin in the lead up to the Russian invasion? Instead of constantly thinking that guys nuts you might have noticed that when everyone else was buying Putins legerdemain Biden consistently stated that the Russians were in fact going to attack. By doing so he denied Putin his own Überfall auf den Sender Gleiwitz pretense and coalesced international opinion against Putin at the get go. So, in that sense he most definitely took Putin from behind.

Let's be honest, for you it really won't matter what he says. Like most republicans you don't stand for anything anymore, all you know is you are against anything the Democrats do.

Have you been taking “false news spreading” lessons? I love the technique of sprinkling just enough true statements among the complete bullshit anecdotal based lies in this rambling unfocused post.

I do indeed. Your sources for what CRT is are about as authoritative as that whuffo's ideas of what skydiving was from years gone by. Yep. No wonder you believe the right wing strawman version of what CRT is. I am only surprised you did not include George Carlin, Andrew Dice Clay and Bobcat GoldThwait as sources for your understanding. Nope. But race played a role. Attempts to understand what role it played are worthwhile, and are not Monty Python-esque, or Marxist, or racist. I do indeed support it, and I am just fine with you thinking I am a humorless twit. Due to my work in it, I have realized a few things. I used to think I understood transgender people. Then one of the women who works for me came out to me as trans. She did this because of my support for DEI, and it was a good thing - I could be a better manager if I understood her perspective a bit better. From her I learned that I was not "woke." I did not understand what trans people go through, nor do I understand now, since I am a straight cis guy. But at least I understand the issue a little better now. I used to think that rape was a rare crime, and that it was something that happened when women got careless. Then an old friend told me about her rape. It shook me a bit. When I talked to another friend about it, she told me about HER rape. Now half the women I have talked to have their own stories about it - including women who are tough as nails, and are about as far from a careless pushover as you can get. I used to think that blacks (and other minorities) had had it bad centuries ago, but nowadays all those laws had been changed, so now it was 100% up to them. Then in high school I got to know the Indian kid next to me in band. He was one of four non-Christians allowed entry. I also got to know one of the four black kids in the school, and we're still friends on Facebook. I did a little digging, and found out that if my high school admitted a certain percentage of non-Christian and non-white students, they qualified for a federal financial assistance program. (One of those 'structural' things that you think is a joke.) I don't really understand what it's like to be a minority, but after talking to them I at least understand it a little bit more. From your posts it sounds like you believe you know it all, and are smugly confident that you have nothing left to learn on the topic. Black scholars who research the structural basis of racism are Marxists, and their work is comedy. Trans people are mentally ill. Muslims are violent, insane criminals. Black people who talk about racism are the real racists. If that lets you sleep better at night, then I guess that . . . works for you. Rest assured that I do not have the vast, superior and unquestionable understanding that you do. The more work I do on understanding the issues under DEI (and for me it does take work) the more I understand how much I have to learn. If that means I am a humorless twit in your eyes, so be it. Feel free to, in the future, disregard my posts, and converse only with people at your (much higher) level.

OK. Bill, I'll own that and apologize to the group. Not the impression I was trying to give, but obviously missed the mark.

We'll miss you Gary. He was a rock of stability on the USPA BOD.