Eddles

Skydiving in Cuba was AMAZING! Fantastic experience! A word of warning, when I was there, they only did one lift for the entire day of Saturday, and none on Sunday, even though they were fully staffed (about 20 staff in total) twiddling their thumbs. It was due to very few tandem passengers buying jump tickets and they rely heavily on tandem income. So I only did one jump the entire weekend. It was very well worth it though. As I jumped solo and was the last person out, the JM followed me out, filmed me and we played in the air. If I jumped on Sunday, they'd have let me land on the beach. The people there are fantastic, so incredibly friendly, made me feel as if I was a long-time jumper there. On Saturday evening, the CCI gathered everyone in his office, using my beer fine, gave everyone a can of beer and everyone toasted my first day at the DZ and stayed to chat with me for a while. Amazing. Wonderful friendly & welcoming people, completely typical of Cubans. They are also chilled as fuck like Cubans are, we took off 2 hours after the scheduled time not because of delays, but because they took their time. I had to really chase up for the DZ brief - I was only shown where to land literally 2 minutes before take-off! 1 1/2 hours before actual take-off, 30 minutes after the scheduled take off - "Can I have the DZ brief please?" "Yeah yeah, will do it later, chill bud, here you go, have a can of drink". 1/2 hours before actual take-off, "DZ brief?" "Plenty of time, don't worry". And so on until 2 minutes before take-off "Hello? Anyone?" "Oh bugger, oh just follow me, I'll show you where to land". I had absolutely no concern about safety though, they were very thorough with my paperwork and asked lots of questions to establish my experience - I had the opposite experience at some foreign DZs! To my surprise some people there had tens of thousands jumps each, very experienced. I'd recommend calling them for a chat, and I *highly* recommend jumping there - they're now one of my favourite DZs. The only downside was the beer fine was absolutely mandatory and had to be paid along with the jump ticket, believe it was 20 CUC (USD 20) but was well worth it, trust me, the best beer fine I've ever paid! The AN-2 wasn't there unfortunately, but the MI-8 was a fun experience!

Brilliant thank you both for your help! I had a look on Google, and on Dropzone.com in past threads for skydiving in Cuba and surprisingly missed both of them! Sorry about that! Fantastic info, I appreciate your time! Cheers!

Hi all, My wife and I are going to Cuba next month, and I have found the sole Cuba DZ to be at Varadero. I'm considering visiting and doing a few lobs - can I just turn up on the day? Or should I contact them? Are they open Mon-Sun or weekends only? Where could I find any other info please? Many thanks!

We've found a 3rd member - we only need one more - anyone interested?

Yeah I know, I have a cochlear implant and I've got 350 jumps. The issue is that the friend's DZ wants official documentation. Cheers everyone for advice, much appreciated ;-)

Hi guys, I've got a French friend who has a deaf friend with a cochlear implant who wants to skydive, but her skydiving centre told her she can't jump due to her having a cochlear implant, even though it's perfectly possible to skydive with a cochlear implant. She wants to find official documentation saying "Yes you can skydive" - I'm hoping someone on here has something? I've found something from the British cochlear implant society but it's just a couple lines, so I'd like some more to reinforce the message. Some advice would be appreciated!

Wanted - committed Inside Centre and Point Wanted for 2014 to form new A-Class Team to win the Nationals. Coach arranged, commitment will be minimum of 1 hour per month tunnel in Manchester starting November, plus 1 week training in Spain in May. Jumping to be agreed and will be based at Hibalstow. Please contact to discuss further.

The current container and reserve is old (container a FF friendly Javelin, both DOM 1998) and in a serviceable condition, and I'd be surprised to get more than £250 for both. Optimum is too new and thus too expensive. I've been told that the Optimum isn't as docile as the PDR but this is from an unreliable source. I'm more than happy with the Sabre, I brought it only 9 months ago ;-) I think the best way forward is to get a new container and a second hand PD 176R - I should have time to find a second hand reserve while the container is being built. However I'm not yet 100% certain I should get a 176 reserve over the 193. All your advice is much appreciated!

I'm considering buying a new container and I've been thinking about the reserve canopy. My current set-up is a Sabre 2 170 with a PD 160R. The main is loaded at 1.3, and the reserve is pushing 1.4. I'm a novice jumper with about 350 jumps and I started skydiving in 2010. I've been jumping this rig since jump #80 (far too early, I'm well aware) starting with a Sabre 170 before changing to the Sabre 2 170 100 jumps ago. Even with my current level, I feel the Sabre 2 pushes the limits of my experience and I'm comfortable with this. I have no aspirations to downsize for a very long time, I'm extremely happy with the current canopy. However I've never been comfortable with the size of the reserve - I've been told that it's more docile than the Sabre 2 so it should be roughly equal, apparently, but in an emergency things might be different. With my current container I'm hamstrung with the size of the reserve so I'm happy with a 160 reserve. I've had a cut-away but it was with a 260 reserve. However, with the new container, I have more freedom to choose, so I'm considering upsizing the reserve to a PD 176R or even a PD 193R while keeping the 170 main. I will find out whether the manufacturer can make it so that the container will be able to take a 150 main for future downsizing if any. I would rather avoid the Optimum if possible, but would consider it if necessary. Is this a good plan, or am I going up too far, or restricting myself in terms of choices of containers due to the large size difference between the 193 reserve and the 150 main? Will there be an issue when there's a 2-out with different sized canopies? Shouldn't I worry too much and keep the 160 reserve, considering it'd cost me a lot to replace it with a new one as my PD 160R's DOM is 1998 (with 0 jumps) so I wouldn't get much for it if I sold it, however I'm happy to jump it. A 193 reserve would be very hard to buy second hand, whereas a 176 would be a little easier, however probably would have to buy new. If I stick with the 160 reserve, I would definitely look to demo jump the 160 reserve to learn how to handle it. Advice would be greatly appreciated!

Good idea, unfortunately they have to be enabled by the owner of the video - which for these videos, doesn't seem to have been done. Also, if you read the captions on other videos, you'll quickly figure out that they're based on voice recognition and is usually very inaccurate with occasionally laughable results. If you chance on those rare videos with perfect captions, chances are that it was transcribed by a human operator. Good try, though!

My rig came with a 1998 Sabre 170, jumped it on my 80th jump - and replaced that with a 2004 Sabre 2 170 on my 280th jump. I didn't want to change canopies, but I had enough of the hard openings. Everyone told me that both canopies were similar in speed - but no, the new one was so much faster, I was in abject fear the entire time between opening and landing! I was glad I didn't listen to my mate urging me to buy a Sabre 2 150. Right now, I've got a little over 300 jumps in total, and have no interest whatsoever in downsizing - I want to learn how to *fly* my canopy, I can plainly see I have lots to learn on this canopy. I actually wish I brought a 190 the first time around, and fly a 190 right now and not a 170 as I think it's too small for my current WL (1.3), but my instructor recommended me get a 170. Recently, I was talking to my mate and I said "I could see myself jumping this 170 for several hundred jumps, however I wouldn't be surprised if I never ever downsized" but he bets I'll be downsizing some time. We'll see!

The visio 2 *can* give you your rate of descent, I've done it a few times to see how much flaring affects the rate of descent, however it'll be in mph (imperial) or km/h (metric).

Sweet videos - they're getting downloaded! I'm hoping someone will have subtitles or transcription for those videos somewhere, I'm deaf and don't understand the dialogue. Also would be useful for other deaf skydivers, present & future.

I don't believe they make much difference to be honest, as the chances of nice openings increased only slightly. One was to roll the nose and push it down the middle of the pack job and not into the centre cell like I was doing, second was to not roll the tail so much, just roll it until the front of the wrapped canopy crinkled, and third was to fold the stabilisers in a specific way I've now forgotten. Remember I'm not a packer or advocating this packing method - I am now of the belief Sabres open hard because they're designed that way and the only REAL way to avoid true hard openings (the ones that puts you in a hospital) is to ensure that the slider is fully down to the stabilisers. The above advice MAY or MAY NOT help. It could kill you, so take this with a pinch of salt.

When I brought my current rig, it had a 1998 Sabre 170 that opens quite quickly. I got obsessed to get it to open better, tried hard to pack it better, even going as far as getting a rigger who owns a Sabre to teach me how to pack it. I eventually got good openings 80% of the time, but I wanted to start working filming tandems, so I decided to bite the bullet and get a Sabre 2 170 - sold my Sabre for £450 and got the Sabre 2 for £650. Well worth the upgrade, feels like I'm jumping a Spectre! I even made a video here, risking my C spine in the process.... https://vimeo.com/47827559