One of my fears

[Smokis 0]

My biggest concern as a new skydiver is mid air collisions.

How do you avoid them?

I guess my biggest fear is being under canopy and someone, for whatever reason, ends up doing a low pull and crashes into my canopy. Or something like that.

[Zoter 0]

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How do you avoid them?

I guess my biggest fear is being under canopy and someone, for whatever reason, ends up doing a low pull and crashes into my canopy. Or something like that.

Get out last..........

No really...its a valid concern.....and something you can help avoid yourself.
Get your instructors ( and do your own research) to learn about spotting, correct separation on exit....as well as what YOU should do in a group at breakoff....
and what to do when your canopy has just opened.... ( Tracking and making sure your airspace is clear )

In each discipline you do your position and dive plan relative to the 'run in line' of the aircraft is very important, especially when learning a new discipline..........learn about why from the instructors teaching you in these disciplines....

AWARENESS under canopy.........expect traffic and plan ahead !

Being honest on the flightline.....let people know what you are doing and what height you are pulling

Acceptance and knowledge of these things and more will reduce the chances of someone running into you and you running into others......so talk to your instructors about your concerns and learn......

[tso-d_chris 0]

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My biggest concern as a new skydiver is mid air collisions.

How do you avoid them?

Keep your head on a swivel. It's like riding a motorcycle, you have to imagine that you are invisible, while simultaneously being a huge bullseye that everyone is aiming for.

Remember, it takes two people to have a collision. Also remember that you can do everything right, and still die, on any given jump. It's not common, but not unheard of.

For Great Deals on Gear

[NWFlyer 2]

I'm sure there are folks with much more experience than me who will chime in, but here's my thoughts on prevention and managing risk:

Freefall collisions:
Know the skills of those you are jumping with. Keep groups small until you develop better skills. The bigger the group, the higher the skill level of the group should be overall.

Communicate before the jump. Have a plan for what happens if someone goes low or otherwise gets away from the formation. Stick to that plan.

Those who freefly more than I do can address the increased collision risks of beginning freeflying.

Deployment collisions:
Make sure you have horizontal separation before you deploy. If you have horizontal separation, "low" or "high" pulls don't matter as much. This means breaking off as planned and making sure that you and others in your group track away. The best thing you can do as a new skydiver is work on your tracking skills and your awareness of others in the sky.

Another way to prevent deployment collisons is making sure there is adequate exit separation between groups so that your group doesn't end up deploying right near another group.

"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

[Smokis 0]

Thanks for the replies.

I think one of the things I'm going to really focus on is tracking and how to pilot.

I know I really want to learn how to move myself around in the sky well before I start attempting things that are a little more outside of the box.

[FlyinseivLP2 0]

Sorry, but keeping your head on a swivel will not help someone coming through your canopy in freefall. I had it happen to me. By the time I heard her coming and started to look up she had already clipped the nose of my canopy and then hit my foot on her way past. Another 6 inches and it would have been a doulbe fatality. In this case the We had a 3way freefly with a solo sit out behind us. We knew she was just learning sit so we asked her to give us good seperation before she exited. I broke at 4500 and dumped at 3K then turned my canopy perpendicular to the line of flight. As I started to stow my slider is when she hit me. She said she rolled over from her sit a 5K and was in the middle of our opening 3 way. She decided to try to track past us and the open. Turned out to be a bad idea, but we got lucky. Just her constant backslinding in sit brought her right over top of our group.

Suggetions to aviod this:
Get out last or trust the group behind you. If you don't know the person behind you, ask them what they are doing on the jump, if thay are are practicing things such as tracking sit or headdown, make sure they know to do it perpindicular to the line of flight. Make sure they give you proper seperation at exit and you do the same for others. Once you open make sure you are not flying your canopy down the line of flight and under the groups that exited after you. On the other hand if you open at 1K on every jump you wouldn't have to worry about it too much.

[kelpdiver 2]

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I guess my biggest fear is being under canopy and someone, for whatever reason, ends up doing a low pull and crashes into my canopy. Or something like that.

So what's your profile? Are you belly or freeflying?

It sounds like you're more worried about others groups in the sky, not your own. Esp a concern if you're solo bellying right before the FFers.

Making sure you're not backsliding (or at least orient yourself perpendicular to jump run), and tracking at the end off jumprun if alone is a starting point.

[MarkM 0]

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My biggest concern as a new skydiver is mid air collisions.

How do you avoid them?

I guess my biggest fear is being under canopy and someone, for whatever reason, ends up doing a low pull and crashes into my canopy. Or something like that.

Talk to the person going out after you and make sure they know to give you a good exit count.

If you're going out solo and don't know/trust the person behind you, you can watch them exit the plane and get an idea if you have the seperation you want. Talk to your instructor about how to safely create more seperation in this type of situation.

Avoid DZs that rush people out the door and ones that don't do go arounds.

Start flying wingsuits as soon as possible

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[JohnMitchell 16]

I wanted to read your profile but I drew a blank.

What kind of plane do you jump from? If there are multiple groups on one pass, the possibility of collisions goes way up compared to jumping from a C-182. Discuss jumprun spacing with an instructor at your DZ. Also be aware of what the group behind you will be doing. Don't open your chute and fly into someone else's airspace. Brief the group behind you in the airplane. Make sure they give you enough space. If you go tracking, go perpindicular to the jump run.
Canopy collisions at low altitude are another big killer. Do you land with experienced jumpers or a satellite field? A mix of fast and slow canopies can be hazardous.

[tso-d_chris 0]

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Sorry, but keeping your head on a swivel will not help someone coming through your canopy in freefall.

That is why I specifically did not reply to that portion of his post. Sorry for the misunderstanding.

BTW You are absolutely right. The head on a swivel does little good if the person/object you are about to collide with is coming from a blind spot, and you do not have a clear line of sight to see them/it coming.

For Great Deals on Gear

[riddler 0]

That's a good and reasonable fear to have. But it's hard for us to give advice if we don't know who you are. Please fill in your jump numbers and years of experience, and we might be able to give better suggestions.

If you are a new student jumper, what I might suggest is NOT landing in the main landing area of your DZ. There's a tendency to come down on teh target - the problem is everyone else is doing that too. Suddenly, the "big-sky" narrows in an inverted cone to a single point that everyone is shooting for - tandems, AFF, students, maybe even swoopers if your DZ permits them landing there. I encourage all of my students to pick a safe open spot away from the "peas" or landing target and make that their primary landing area. That keeps them away from all that other nonsense.

Trapped on the surface of a sphere. XKCD

[tr027 0]

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My biggest concern as a new skydiver is mid air collisions.
How do you avoid them?

Skydive alone only. Abstinence is the best prevention. Awareness is the 2nd solution.

"The evil of the world is made possible by nothing but the sanction you give it. " -John Galt from Atlas Shrugged, 1957

[thegreekone 0]

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My biggest concern as a new skydiver is mid air collisions.

How do you avoid them?

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My first instructor always reminded of the fact that "it's your ability to track that seperates you from the rest of the animals"....and he was right.

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