3 jumps. 2 coach jumps w/ Casey

Chilly, very little wind. Cessna 182 all day.

Got on load 1 to do a 2-way with Rick. Never met him before. I went out on the step, he dove out after me. Got together, did a 360, got together again, broke off, tracked away, open at 3000.

Packed to get on load 2 with Casey to do fall rate changes. I went out on the step, he came out with me. I floated up to catch him. I thought we would dock for a second, but as soon as we touched hands, he backed off and sank. Surprised me a little. I got down to his level and we just about redocked again before we were at 5000 and had to turn to track away. I went a little further on my final leg and was near the little hills before the cornfield. I flared based on the top of the hill, realized that I was going to land in the lower part, so I held the partial flare, flared the rest of the way a second later, and slid in the landing.

Packed to get on load 4 with Casey to do swoop and docks. We went out on the step, I dove out after him. Waited half a second too long. I kept my arms in the normal position for a few seconds before remembering that I was supposed to be swooping down. Got easily into the dive, and overshot. Admittedly, I was trying to make up the time I lost, so I overcompensated. He sunk again, I swooped and overshot again. Didn't get it right, but I definitely have the feeling of what swooping is supposed to feel like for next time. Landed in front of the white building, about 8 feet before the taxiway.

3 jumps today

Chilly day, low winds (temporarily over 16, but I spent all that time packing anyway).

Jump 1 - Out after a 7-way. Worked on fall rate changes. Yeah, I got that squared away. Worked on steeper dive for the swoop & dock, but felt a little unstable, so I backed off. Braked deeper and deeper until stall started. Landed in front of the other hangar. Packed.

Jump 2 - Tracking & steeper dive while tracking. Stayed stable this time, and felt the angle change downward. Horizon was gone, and I was looking at the ground. The sound of air going by my ears went up a lot. Easily got stable in a belly-to-earth position afterwards. Opening seemed slow, but maybe I'm just hypersensitive about my own pack jobs. Landed in front of FBO. Packed again.

Jump 3 - Steep dive in freefall again. Canopy opened fine. Turns & spirals under canopy. Landed by other hangar.

The coaches and instructors were crazy busy with tandems. I wasn't able to squeeze a jump in with any of them. Oh, well, maybe next week...

4 jumps, and I jumped a rig I packed. Finally.

There was almost no wind today. Made for some interesting landings.

Jump 1 - King Air, only got 4,500 feet. Jumped, got stable, hung out for a few seconds, pulled. I jumped the 240 last weekend because Doug had the 230 all day, and I forgot just how responsive the 230 is. Had a lot of fun under canopy, then had a less than perfect landing with no wind.

Jump 2 - I was going to pack the 230 with help, then jump it. Jim Smith was looking for one more to fill out a Cessna load, so I grabbed the 240 and got on. Spotted. First out at 4,500. Got stable, hung out a bit, pulled. The right toggle had a big loop of line that should have been stowed. It took me about 30 seconds of looking at it following the line, but I decided that the handle did no go through the loop, and released the brakes. On final, I realized I was heading for the taxiway. Put on some brakes, and landed well clear.

Jump 3 - I packed the 230 with a little help from Autumn. Took the King Air all the way up. Worked on turns using just legs. Did some tracking. Pulled a little higher just to have some extra time. Canopy opened fine with a little right turn when it inflated. Nice landing in front of the FBO.

Jump 4 - I packed the 230 with no assistance. King Air all the way up. Turns using just legs, including a 360. The canopy opened a little slowly, and seemed to be skinnier from front to back for a few seconds, then popped out into a perfectly good canopy. Maybe I was just overanalyzing it. Landed in front of FBO.

Talked to Van about getting some things signed off, and what I have to do to finish up this A license.

2 jumps, packed, but yep, wind again

Jumped twice today. Both times were full King Air loads.

On the first, I followed a 5-way out. I mostly watched them, did some turns just with my legs, and tracked. Landed the 240 right in front of the hangar. The winds were coming over the buildings, and we landed heading toward the buildings.

I packed the rig with some help from John Howard.

I did a floating exit on the 2nd jump. I felt like I was a little far from the airport. First out was a 5-way that took a long time to set up in the door, then a 2-way, then Chris, then me. The combination of being long and jumping a rig I packed made me decide to open a little higher (5,000 instead of 4,000). I got a hard left turn when it opened, but other than that, it was a perfectly good canopy. Landing was toward the buildings again. I slightly misjudged my downwind leg, but I was going to be in front of the other hangar. No big deal. Then I saw the plane taxiing, and I really didn't want to be anywhere near him, so I let the downwind leg go a little longer and landed on the far side of the runway. In retrospect, I should have known the plane would not go past the taxiway. Oh well.

I packed the rig on my own.

The winds went to 17, never dropped again until I had to leave.

4 Cessna jumps

First time jumping out of the Cessna 182. Seats 4, but you really have to be OK with giving up personal space.

#1 - 4 of us. Cloudy. Got 5,000 feet. We were the first load, and were testing how much altitude we could get. Exited off step, stable quick, pulled at 4,000. Played with brakes under canopy (the 230). Landed in front of the other hangar.

Started to pack, but JR suggested that if I get Tara to pack it, I could get on the next load. Sounded OK with me.

#2 - 4 of us. 5,000 again. Exited over a thin cloud that I could vaguely see through, and I could still see the runway beyond the edge of it. Pulled @ 4,000 just as I was at the bottom of the cloud. Played with brakes under canopy (the 230). Landed in front of the other hangar.

I planned to pack, but Doug wanted to switch off and jump this rig, so I couldn't.

#3 - 3 of us. I spotted. John Howard said that he was a little long on his last jump, so I got us out a little earlier. We exited at 8,500 feet, so I worked on fall rate changes. I was completely stable when I slowed my fall rate, and I could really feel the speed change. Brakes and turns under the canopy (240). I must have flared a little more quickly than I should have on this canopy, because I ended up getting a little lift. The canopy just sort of set me down after that, so not really a big deal. Just need to remember that when I jump a different canopy, I should do more practice flares before landing.

Didn't really want to pack the bigger 240 sq. ft. canopy.

#4 - 2 of us. 5,000 feet again. Exited from step again. There was some rain in the air (not on the ground) that really stung my face. Felt like ice, but at only 5,000 feet it probably wasn't cold enough. Turns and spirals under canopy (230). Landed in front of the other hangar.

1 jump, wind.

I got one jump in today. Load 2. I was spotting. Surprised to see a plane directly below us. Grant said it was on final to the airport, and it turned down the taxiway. I wanted to extend jump run a little bit because of the wind. Green light on, Grant said go.

Got out just before the rainbow field. Did some tracking and turns with legs only.

Opened roughly over the 6. By the time I did control checks, I was in front of the hangar. Flew back to the 6 easily enough. On landing, I realized the winds were definitely higher than the 15 kts when I got on the plane. Got just enough penetration into the wind to land well into the grass up from the picnic area. Ground winds were 20 when I landed. Still, easy landing.

Spent the rest of the day waiting for the winds to drop. Swapped skydiving stories, watched malfunction training videos, worked on packing. My flaking part of packing seems to have taken a step backward.

One jump, packed, then wind

Sounds like the last entry doesn't it?

I arrived a little late today. Ended up on load 4, which went at a little after 1:00.

Floating exit, nice easy freefall. Did 3 backflips to send some love up to Celene, who was going to be getting out after me and trying to finally get a backflip right. She didn't, but mine were great. Also worked on turning with my legs rather than my arms. Tracked 90 degrees from the flightline for a solid 10 seconds. Much more stable than last time.

Slow opening, which was fine. Flew easily back to the holding area near the 6. Somehow, Celene got down to my altitude. We were sort of heading toward each other, so I turned right with no real concern about any accident, just to make sure we were separated. I did some spirals to get below her. When I started my approach, I knew where she was. As I turned, she ended up behind my canopy. I decided to land in front of the other buildings just to make sure she had plenty of space. Easy landing.

Then I packed the 230. JR gave me an assist on the canopy. John gave me some tips on closing. I wanted to jump it, but the wind got up to 21. It dropped as low as 17 once, but never low enough for me to jump.

A jump, packing, and wind

I only fit one jump in today. The first load I could get on was load 3. An 8-way, and me. After the 8-way got out (including Tonya, Rocky, Jim Smith), I moved to the door, watched them for about 5 seconds, then dove out in perfect position to watch them come together. I just hung out watching, checking altitude, and correcting body position with as little thought as I could until it was their pull time. I had another few seconds, then I pulled.

With the 45-50 mph uppers, I got out well past the end of the runway. Jump run was 240, 1/2 mile past. By the time I pulled, I was over the road past the field at the "6" end of the runway.

I had the 230 today, and I'm glad I did. It wasn't making much movement at all when I steered into the wind. The ground winds were 13-14, just at my legal limit. When I turned downwind, I was screaming along the runway. Turned to base across from the corn, turned to final over the corn, and watched the corn get closer as the wind almost balanced out my canopy speed. I landed well past the corn in the grass. Very soft easy landing with into the wind.

Rocky and I talked afterwards about adjustments I could make to my landing pattern in this kind of wind. Start 200 feet lower, turn to base roughly parallel to where I want to land.

Then, I worked on packing the rig I just jumped. I hovered over Tracy as he packed the training rig for JR and he talked me through it. I started on the 230 I had just jumped, and got completely stuck on the lines. Tracy gave me some help, then Dave gave me some help. In the end, Dave told me it was definitely jumpable. Unfortunately, the wind never came back down. In the end, I put the rig on the floor and put a ticket on it.

2 more solo jumps

Today, I made two solo jumps. On both, I spent some of the time in free fall just hanging out, relaxing, enjoying the view. This month's profile in the magazine offered advice to try that.

The first jump was uneventful, except for getting kicked off the plane. There was some miscommunication between manifest and one of the instructors, so 2 of the 3 solo fun jumpers had to get off. It would have broken my heart to make Celine get off, so I volunteered. I got on the next load, which was a turn-around load. A couple of turns, some tracking with less de-arching, but mostly just freefalling. Landed in front of the hangar.

The second jump gave me a little scare. Van and Brent went out first for a D-2. I waited 5 seconds, watching them the whole time, then dove out still watching them. I watched Brent tumble, then spin for a while until Van came in and stopped him. I turned 90 degrees away from them to track a little. When it was almost time to pull, I saw a canopy starting to inflate pretty close to underneath me. I quickly got into a track, got clear of him, got stable, and pulled. I looked for Van later to talk to him. He was pretty laid back about it, but said that I should have waited longer to get more separation. OK, lesson learned. Landing patterns were all over the place. Not sure what happened there. I followed Gary down, and landed into the wind, which was coming over the buildings, near the picnic area. There are some little hills there, so I didn't quite stand up the landing.

Another day went by when I really had no opportunity to pack. Maybe I really need to come up on a Friday. It wasn't very busy today, but there were no dedicated packers, so the coaches were scrambling to get the tandem rigs packed.

3 more today - short stories only

I'm a little tired, so I'm going to keep it short today. 3 jumps, very cloudy, a couple of weather delays, very little wind.

Jump 1:
3-way out first, then me. Tried some back flips to prep for my check dive. Worked fine, but I ended them a little flat and had to remind myself to get back to a good arch. Tried some front riser turns. Very difficult to get any leverage. Maybe the 240 is too big for this? Beautiful landing by the fuel truck.

Jump 2:
Only got 10,000 feet because of cloud ceiling. Turns and tracking. My tracking has become a little wobbly, and I'm turning a little. I clearly recognize the turn and can correct it by dipping a shoulder, but it's still there. Beautiful landing by the fuel truck.

Jump 3:
I got yelled at by Grant for not getting out quickly enough after he spotted. He only had his head out the door for about 10 seconds, so I thought he was just coming in to check the light or redirect the pilot. Dove out, turned to watch Grant climb out to do video for a tandem. Turns and tracking. Wobbly tracking with a turn that I can fix. I talked to Casey about it at the end of the day. He thinks I might be de-arching too much. Makes sense, because I felt like I was really trying to flatten out my body to track. I realized that I was going to hit the taxiway again, so I tried to fly in some brakes to extend my glide. Not enough. I tried to keep pulling my feet up as I flared hoping to clear the taxiway. Stupid. I skidded on my butt for about 1/3 the width of the taxiway and stood up in the grass. I never completed my flare. I should have just stood up the landing on the taxiway and taken the verbal abuse, which I got anyway. No injuries, except for a little blister on my finger.

3 jumps

The weather wasn't great. Hazy all day, and a couple of storms came through.

First jump:

3rd out. Dove out. Turns & tracking in freefall. Tracked before pulling @4500.

Tried some braked turns under canopy to see how they felt. Did some spirals.

I checked my altitude at 1,000 feet and entered my landing pattern. Since it was such an easy wind day, and since there wasn't any other canopy traffic at my altitude, I flew the rest of my landing pattern without checking the altimeter. Everything felt right, and I landed straight out in front of the hangar.


Second jump:

Spotted with Mike M. First out. Dove out. More turns and tracking. Worked on how to slow my fall rate.

I got into my landing pattern with another jumper to my right at about the same altitude. Since he was coming down faster, I expected him to cut in and under me, so I stretched out my pattern to avoid a problem. Well, he didn't, so I ended up turning lower than I wanted to to get into base and then final. Not dangerously low, just lower than I should have been. I landed on the taxiway. Beer. Grant and I talked about what I did wrong, and what I should have done. I easily could have turned into base sooner and landed in the other field.


Third jump:

A bunch of tandems, AFFs, and me. By the time we got to 3500, the clouds were coming in pretty heavy. The pilot and the guys up front decided that we weren't going any higher. Kathie asked Mike M and me if we wanted to do a hop-and-pop. Sure. Beats landing with the plane. Mike went first, and I waited about 5 seconds. I got stable in about 5 seconds after diving out, and pulled at about 3000 feet.

Not my smoothest landing. Very low winds. I did a nice landing pattern and landed in the main area a little toward the picnic tables. Ran a few steps, bounced off one knee, and stood back up.

1 jump today

After last week's freefall debacle, I wanted to do a solo jump just to get myself back into shape. Frank and Rocky went out first, I got in the door, counted to 5, and dove after them. I made sure that they were a good horizontal distance off, then stopped looking at them. I just thought about having a nice, relaxed skydive. I stuck in a couple of 360 degree turns for fun. Nailed those. At 5000 feet, I turned roughly parallel to the runway (to be perpendicular to the flight line), tracked for 5 seconds, got stable, and pulled.

I was amazed at how quiet it was under canopy. Very little wind? No, that shouldn't be it. I figured it out later.

I played around under canopy. Some flat turns, some aggressive (for me) spirals.

The landing pattern was pretty much straight into the buildings on final. I talked to Frank & Rocky before getting on the plane. They gave me some tips about burning off some altitude with S-turns, flying in half-brakes, making a flat turn into the wind when I was fairly low. In the end, I guess I blew it a little by not being far enough upwind when I entered my pattern. I solved my problem by flying next to the runway for a little extra distance and landing on the flat, grassy area on the other side of the picnic tables. Seemed like a good second choice, and the walk back to the hangar was about the same as from the fuel truck. Stood up the landing.

Now, about the peace and quiet... When I was gathering up my canopy, everything sounded a little funny. When I got back to the hangar, I realized that I could barely hear. After a minute of talking (yelling?) at Brian and a couple of other people, I grabbed my nose and blew. Both ears popped, but the right one hurt. I guess I'm not really quite over that cold from earlier in the week. I decided to call it a day rather than screw up my ears. I still hung around for about another hour and a half just soaking up the drop zone energy.

Only 1 jump, but it was a good one, and I learned a couple of things.

2 jumps, mixed results

After dropping off Matt's foot locker and working the temperature table for the summer camp departure, I got on the road for Chambersburg. Drizzly rain, low dark clouds, thought about going back home. I arrived at about 10:15, and got on the first load at about 12:15. Ugh.

NW winds, 11-13 kts. Jumped the same 260.

Jump 1 - solo
Dove out, keeping my eye on the other solo jumper. In freefall, I used him as a point of reference for some 360 degree turns in both directions. Fast turns, stopped them easily, right back on heading.
From pull to fully open canopy - completely on heading the entire way. I attribute that to a good pack (not me) and a stable pull (me).
Worked on braked turns with different amounts of brakes and different amounts of letting up a toggle to see how it felt. Flew around some clouds. Playing a little by skirting the edges of the clouds and trying to stay out of them but close to them.
Flared a hair high, held it for a second, flared the rest of the way. Half-hearted PLF that I easily could have stood up. Landed in front of the other hangar.

Jump 2 - 3-way (sort of) with Brian (Marine) and Frank (coach)
Frank was front-float, Brian was rear float, I exited right after Frank from inside right in his chest. Plan was that Frank and Brian would be gripped, and I would dock with them, then undock so they could back off and sink, then I would redock. I ended up way lower, and they never stopped a slow spin. I didn't think they'd be able to sink down to me (which was the plan), so I tried to spread out and come up part way to them. Never made it. I got unstable, and ended up on my back. No biggie, I just rolled out of that. Then I started spinning horizontally. In my mind, I said that a spin is just a turn, so all I had to do was stop the turn. I still spun about 4 times very rapidly. I think that I was trying to hard, and stiffened up, which was what led to the whole problem starting with the flip. I stopped worrying about fixing the spin, arched fully, relaxed as best as I could, and the spin stopped. Altitude said under 4500, so I waved and pulled. And forgot to track away from Frank and Brian. Honestly, this was the worst freefall I've had since Cat B or so. Very strange, since I've been having so much fun in freefall this summer. Writing this off as atypical, but using it as a reminder that I need to remember to relax.
I had some fun under canopy. Some slightly more aggressive turns and spins. Stood up a nice landing in front of the other hangar.

2 jumps to get back in the swing of it

I jumped twice today, just to really get back in the swing of jumping, and to work on the stuff Casey talked about last week.

Jump 1:

Floating exit, stable quickly. Worked on snapping my 180 and 360 degree turns around more quickly. I used the runway as a reference point.

I planned to land in front of the hangar. At around 2000 feet, I realized there were about 6 other jumpers in the same spot, so I switched to landing behind the fuel truck. Stood up the landing exactly where I planned.

Jump 2:

Clouds were coming in. Grant went out with Meghan to do a check dive first. I waited for 5 seconds and dove out after them. I used them as a reference point to work on turns more. Before I pulled, I tried to track over to an area where there was a better view of the ground.

When I opened, the clouds surrounded me. The opening turned me and I was not sure what heading I was on until I got below the clouds and saw that I was over the neighborhoods on the far side of the railroad tracks. I flew in some brakes to try to keep altitude. It was pretty clear that I wasn't going to get back to the main landing zone, so I started checking for alternate places. My options were to land into the wind in a clear area on the far side of the tracks from the airport or to land downwind at the bottom of the hill just past the runway. I wasn't sure how I would get back to the airport from the first choice, so I decided on a downwind landing in about 12-13 kt winds. Lined up, brought the toggles down, and did an excellent PLF, in my opinion. I ended up with some little scratches on my right wrist and a bruise on my right ankle.

The guy with Tammy suggested that I could do a flat turn even pretty low to get into the wind. Grant suggested that I could pull the risers apart to flatten out the canopy while trying to get back to the landing zone. I need to try both of those things in the air next time.

I'm finally back in the sky!

It's been a long time coming, but I finally jumped today. Fall sucked - one mandatory social event of the century after another. February grounded me until after Memorial Day with the finger injury. Well, today I came back.

Jump 1
I spent about an hour with Casey in the classroom covering some of the basics. We discussed emergency procedures, changing landing patterns based on wind, equipment, etc. Casey thought I was good with the classroom stuff, so we got on manifest for a jump.

He wanted me to jump the 240. I've jumped it before, so I pulled it, fired up the AAD, and ran through a gear check. This year's King Air doesn't have the souped-up engines, so it took a little longer to get to altitude. I climbed out and took the front position in the door. Casey took the rear. Good exit count, and I got stable on the hill as soon as I remembered to look back at the plane. I turned to face Casey, closed in on him as he dropped down to my level, and we got started. 90 degrees right, 90 degrees left, 360 degrees (with a little stall at about 270), then closed in on Casey again. Gripped from about 7000 to 6000, then I turned, tracked away, got stable and pulled. Enjoyed my canopy time and landed with a PLF in the field just past the picnic tables.

Casey told me to work on getting my turns snappier. "Lumbering" was how he described my 360. How can anything be "lumbering" at 130 MPH?!?!? He also said I should speed up my transition from neutral to tracking.

Jump 2
I went solo. Doug (first time I've met him) asked if I wanted to do a 2-way with him since he was also solo. I really wanted to work on what Casey suggested, so I declined his offer. He was completely cool with it.

Exited as if I was the front float guy. Good arch, watched the plane, stable almost instantly. In freefall, I worked on speeding up my turns and transitioning to tracking quicker. I ended up getting "chippy" a few times, mostly because I was concentrating too hard and tensing up. I get it, now I just have to relax and do it.

When I pulled, I saw that the front and rear right risers had a twist to them, and that the front and rear left risers had a twist. The brake lines went up to the back of the canopy, and in free flight seemed to be completely loose. The canopy was completely controllable. There might have been a slight tendency to pull a little to the right, so maybe that brake line wasn't quite as loose as I thought. It was definitely not something to cut away, but it also wasn't something that I was 100% confident with, so I flew it pretty gently. Disconcerting seems like the right word.

I landed on Rocky's canopy. Ugh. Whether it was gusty winds or the twist in riser, when I went back to free flight after steering left, I got pulled back to the right. Rocky gave me a couple of tips for situations like that.

So now I current. Time to keep jumping and get that license!