base615

No tunnels available (at least accessible ones with enough wind speed for freeflying) when I learnt to fly head down so all in the sky. How long did it take me? Longer than some I jumped with but far less than others. Maybe 25-30 jumps to hold it steady down the tube, 100ish to be relatively comfortable flying relative to someone else and taking grips and perhaps 3-400 or so to feel comfortable doing bigger stuff but I also had a fair bit of coaching from some of the gods back then like Olav and his crew for example. Still though, we’re talking maybe 10 minutes of practice time on a good weekend, usually less. Skills back then weren’t what they are today because of tunnels. I don’t know why anyone would take the hard route these days. The other thing is that I developed some really bad habits which were still deeply embedded even after a near 20 year hiatus from skydiving so now I fly funny (and badly) with zero chance of ever getting rid of them. I highly recommend tunnel coaching to avoid getting those bad habits like I had.

I have traveled to the US for jumping many times. Sadly, the rest of the world is affected by the land of the unfree, in skydiving and other things. At least for the time being.

No, thank fuck

Count your lucky stars that you have customers with that attitude

Are you drunk? Because you are literally making no sense. I have no right to talk about something I’m heavily involved in (including helping to organise BTW), not to mention paying a significant chunk of my salary to support? Going by your argument, if you don’t participate in it then you have even less of a right to talk about it.

I already jump at a regular DZ that is supportive of it and seems to be able to do it without issue. There are rules in place to limit turns to 90 degrees on height loads and you have to do hop and pops to do bigger turns or run the pond. You have to do a Flight-1 course to run the pond and people do regular canopy courses. It works just fine and we have regular canopy piloting competitions, including ones for beginners, attended by spectators. There is a real culture of learning to fly your canopy and we often have entire caravan loads of hop and pops. If you guys are unable to organise a piss up in a brewery by putting similar safeguards in place then I guess complaining about swooping and trying to eradicate it are the only options available to you.

So… not banning it, just basically killing it through inconvenience.

The sport I love is competitive canopy piloting. This entire thread is about banning the sport I love, not keeping it alive.

Let’s just ban skydiving altogether

Luck not judgment.

What a shitshow this whuffo thread is, right from the get go suggesting big turns be banned while advocating for the most dangerous turn of all - the 180. In Australia, we’ve had 9 tandem fatalities in the last few years and exactly zero swoop comp fatalities. Maybe we should ban tandems instead. We have a rule of 90s only on height loads while big turns and pond can be done on hop and pops (a ticket costs the same regardless of where you get out). You also need to have done a Flight-1 309 course before being considered for pond approval. As a result, almost every load does a hop and pop pass and we often have several passes of hop and pops and a small number going to altitude. We also have a large number of jumpers undertaking regular high performance canopy coaching. Do things properly and it can be done safely, don’t just ban things you don’t understand.

I’m not sure to be honest

Nagambie (VIC, Australia) shuts down in 5 weeks. Owner retiring, tried to sell it for months with no joy.

Yep, happened twice

All good advice except he said his current 135 is worn out. He should absolutely spend money on canopy coaching (and not downsize at his current experience level) but let’s not encourage him to forgo replacing an end of life canopy in favour of better canopy coaching and getting into gear trouble. A couple of people here in Australia have been injured relatively recently from worn out canopies ripping in half on final. Canopy coaching is super important but, in my view, significantly less important than jumping airworthy gear. OP, stick with the 135 for now. Buy a newer one (first priority) and take Chuck’s advice on the best canopy coaching you can get.