Did you really know the risks?

[shermanator 4]

I've been watching a thread in the womens forum, and it made me curious. how many of us really, really, knew/ UNDERSTOOD the risks of skydiving when we first started. I know I didn't, I did, they were told to me, but it didn't really sink in.

I'm just curious, "Did you really know and understand the risks when you started?

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CSA #720

[jtval 0]

There are risks to skydiving? How so?
Do you mean that pervy guys will go into the womens forum?



Yes, Of course I knew the risk. I knew I could die or get injured.

If you are asking did I know how many diferent types of malfuntions could occur, then my answer is Not at the time. During My AFF gournd school I was pretty well educated on the basics, weren't you?

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[pchapman 279]

I didn't understand the exact nature and level of risks in different aspects of skydiving.

However, "I knew the risks" in the sense of knowing that I had better keep my wits about me, and that even then there would be some risks I had little control over.

All that came from previous exposure to aviation -- getting a private pilot licence a few years before, and being involved in the field of aerobatics.

Pilots also have that whole ethos or frame of mind of always preparing and practicing for what might go wrong.

And there's the thing about "somebody you know will die". Well, aerobatics took care of that.

[diablopilot 2]

Yes. But I had instructors that were willing to let me walk away rather than fool me into a false sense of safety.

----------------------------------------------
You're not as good as you think you are. Seriously.

[LongWayToFall 0]

I think the question is flawed to begin with. If you said no, I can prove you wrong, your signature on the bottom of the release on your first day proves it. The risks are: death or injury. Just like getting into a car. Now, surely you cannot know where the risks are coming from, and as you learn more you see that you need to pay attention in areas you might never have expected, but you DID know the possible outcome.

[KennC 0]

It was only through the training and people at our DZ that I gained a realistic view of the risks, .. I had invented a bunch that weren't there.

[DSE 5]

I guess it depends on where you're standing...
It's a safe supposition that we all know we could/will die under certain circumstances, some within and some beyond our control.

When I first started, I didn't understand how the airplane might kill me, I didn't realize how another jumper might slam into me so hard I could suffer a broken back or neck, I didn't understand that a hard opening could potentially snap my neck. I didn't understand that someone could do a 270 above/behind me and take me out. I didn't know a wingsuit would tremendously restrict my movement, and I didn't understand that someone could cork in a VRW jump and take me out.

All I knew when I first got into the sport was that I could die. I just didn't know how many different ways it might happen.
Did you?

[shermanator 4]

just because one reads and signs that they understand they can die or get injured, does not mean that they actually grasp the idea. Yes, in the sense that i read, and knew things could go wrong, I understood. But it wasn't until i had over 200 jumps under my belt that I really understood the risks involved.

It's hard to explain what I mean. Yes, I did know the risks, but i didn't KNOW the risks. .. maybe a better question would be did you blindly accept the risks. .. no, that is not a good question either. oh well.

CLICK HERE! new blog posted 9/21/08
CSA #720

[jtval 0]

Sounds like you were jumping with luck for a while.

When you got in the plane did you know that it was a mechanical beast and could fail?

When you jumped with your friends did you know that they weren't a guarantee of your or their own safety?

When you opened your parachute did you know that is was just fabric and could have many failures?

When you landed did you know that the earth does not give way for fast falling humans?

When you were walking to the hangar did you know that someone could slam into you?

Those are just the very basic questions. If you said no to any then you had shitty instructors/comprehesion if you said yes to any of them then you did know the risk and learned how to avoid the possible incident.



I wonder if you mean, How many of you KNEW the risks but believed "it'll never happen to me."
There are some people that I beleive have that attitude and it scares me because those are the people who arent ACTIVELY thinking of way to avoid kiling/hurting themselves/others.

EVERY jumping day I try to think of a different malfunction that hasn't been discussed recently.
I go through a bunch of differnet scenerios and make the decision process in the plane/ on the ground.

On EVERY JUMP I check my handles and run through my cutaway procedures at least a few times. I also encourage others to do that.


I can't tell you how many times I've seen someone (not just newbies) touch their handles out of order.

I always check my hackey/pud then I go to my cutaway then I go to my reserve.

Then I go through it again. as if I had a line stuck on my helmet.
Hackey/pud, helmet cutaway, main cutaway, reserve.

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[Orange1 0]

Quote

When I first started, I didn't understand how the airplane might kill me, I didn't realize how another jumper might slam into me so hard I could suffer a broken back or neck, I didn't understand that a hard opening could potentially snap my neck. I didn't understand that someone could do a 270 above/behind me and take me out. I didn't know a wingsuit would tremendously restrict my movement, and I didn't understand that someone could cork in a VRW jump and take me out.

All I knew when I first got into the sport was that I could die. I just didn't know how many different ways it might happen.

What he said. So, to answer did I really know the risks, I would have to say no, even though I was well aware of the possibility of serious injury or death. And I don't believe any FJC details all the above - and other stuff (eg: a spinning mal that is so bad you can't reach your handles) because they don't have to at that stage. You really learn the risks as you go along, and as you learn each new risk you reassess.

Skydiving: wasting fossil fuels just for fun.

[Beerlight 0]

I had been flying jumpers for 3 years before my first (thanks DZO), so in my case, yes I knew the risks quite well...... but I would say I saw lots and lots of tandems come out that prolly didn't know a lot.

[pontiacgtp00 0]

Well I knew I could die or be seriously injured.

Being my pessimistic self, on my first solo I convinced myself that the main canopy wouldn't open. I practiced the emergency procedures so much that I could do them in my sleep with my hands tied behind my back (a real talent! ). Of course it opened and everything was fine....but I was prepared incase it didn't.

Yeah I'm still a beginner, but I think I understand a lot of the dangers now.

I'm not really afraid of equipment failure as much as I am getting hit by another jumper though, or hitting another jumper. So I try to stay aware of the locations of the other jumpers while we're in the air.

[tbrown 26]

Back in 1974 we got a very enthusiastic presentation that emphasized just what a safe, fun, and legal high skydiving was. The usuall rah-rah about the drive home being the most dangerous part. Of course the way we partied in those days, it probably was. This was in the days of round canopies, gut gear, and capewells. We did at least have Sentinel AADs on the student reserves and I do know of one Sentinel save an a first freefall student who simply never pulled anything. We thought it was pretty safe.

But in my first three years, our dropzone had four fatalities. One was ruled a suicide by the coroner, two were midair collisions between freefallers with opening canopies, and one was a reserve that got wrapped on a horseshoed main. Another well known jumper friend was killed on a demo when he had to cutaway and horseshoed his chest mounted reserve on his open capewell hardware. Then we wiped out a plane on takeoff when it hit glare ice on the runway. Nobody died, but I was onboard for that one. And I still thought it was pretty safe, I even went back up 20 minutes later on another plane - as did two first jump students who were DETERMINED to jump (hey now).

Also saw two hair raising low reserve openings. One was a friend who tried to cutaway his Strato Star and could only get one capewell to release. In desperation he punched his reserve with the main still trailing by a riser, and fortunately the reserve cleared below 200 ft. The other was a US Army Golden Knight at a public demo who dicked around way too long with a streamer, cutaway somewhere below a grand, and finally got his reserve open around 100 ft off the deck, just as I was turning away not to see him bounce (bet he got HIS ass chewed out for that...).

I began to get the idea that the real dangers were not the kind the public imagines, which is still the way I see it nowadays.

Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

[grimmie 186]

When I first jumped in 1980 I never imagined the plane could crash on take off, or I could get wrapped up in the tail of it on exit. Like nearly everyone else on their first jump, I was just worried about that parachute opening.
Since then I have had a wonderful time in the skydive world. Some of my dearest friends are fellow jumpers. But like many of you that have been around a while, who knew this sport would take so many people we loved away in some terrrible ways.
So yeah, I knew I could frap, but didn't know in how many different ways.
And I think many of the low timers have no clue as to the risks, as witnessed by some complacent attitudes, until they see it with their own eyes.
And I think many of the "experienced" have a "it won't happen to me" syndrome.
Would our sport die if we put the real facts out on the brochures?????

[jakee 1,536]

Did I know the specific risks, as in what specific ways can you get killed, and which are most likely? No, I didn't.

Did I know how dangerous it was? Well, I'd say I actually overestimated how dangerous skydiving was before I started. I think it's safer now than I did then - and I think a skydiver has more control over the risks now than I did then.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[billvon 3,031]

>"Did you really know and understand the risks when you started?"

From the condition of the DZ, to the totalled C182 sitting under the tarp by the loading area, to the duct tape on the reserve containers - there wasn't much question that there were safer sports out there when I started.

[Joea 0]

I think I know what you're getting at shermanator. I only have three jumps... barely even a beginner. I certainly knew I could die on the first jump or be injured, but I'm aware of that every time I climb behind the wheel of my car.

I have one close friend that I started jumping with last year, other than that... no one. I haven't built up the relationships or had the camaraderie that most of you have. I haven't lost anyone I know to this sport... I'm sure to many of you who've been doing this a long time, I'm in a very enviable position and I hope to be here a long time. However, when I joined this site, I started to read a bit of the "Incident" posts. I also read some very touching posts in Blue Skies, to those who have passed. This put a very human face on this sport for me and has not only made me think that there is not only a risk, but a very real and possible one. Not only to me, but to those friends I have, and those friends I hope to make.

The fear I have now is different. It's deeper and more tangible... I know how to overcome it though... I'm going to jump out of an airplane.

It's better to have it and not need it, than need it and not have it. - Clarence Worley from "True Romance"

[stayhigh 2]

Yes, we all knew some risk, such as a ground that is coming up...

But WE never knew how dangerous 2-way can be...

Right sherman???

Bernie Sanders for President 2016

[popsjumper 2]

Quote

...It's hard to explain what I mean. Yes, I did know the risks, but i didn't KNOW the risks. .. maybe a better question would be did you blindly accept the risks. .. no, that is not a good question either. oh well.

Not putting words in your mouth. What I understood you to be asking is:

Did you understand the probabilties of injury and death.

It seems to me that any idjit would know that there is risk...just as any other human activity. What's missed at first is the real probability of something bad happening.

For example: "Yes, I know you can die. What I don't know is how many things can cause that and what the likelihood of it happening to me really is."

Sorry you got hammered for no valid reason.

My reality and yours are quite different.
I think we're all Bozos on this bus.
Falcon5232, SCS8170, SCSA353, POPS9398, DS239

[kallend 2,070]

I thought it was MORE risky than it really is. My perception was of 1960's era gear, etc. and instructors like Truman Sparks (I hadn't actually investigated skydiving at all, just went along as part of a group outing).

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[ficus 0]

Less than 6 months after I graduated AFF, I spent 14 hours driving a dead jumper's car home to his girlfriend. After the guys in my caravan and I had carried his things inside and given her hugs and our condolences, we left. On the steps outside her apartment I said "Well, that wasn't on the waiver."

[JohanW 0]

Really really? No.

But a FJC is not the time or the place to explain that stuff. Students die, too, but in different numbers and ways than experienced jumpers.

What you need to know later, you learn later. Sometimes the hard way.

Johan.
I am. I think.

[airdvr 210]

The day before my 2nd jump in 1981 Neil Weiss put his belly banded gear on with a twist in the PC bridle. On opening he decided it was a pilot chute in tow and reached back and pulled the pin on his container. His round reserve never cleared the resulting horseshoe.

I was scared silly on my first jump but it did seem a bit surreal. I'm pretty sure it was when Neil went in that I understood you could die...and also that people were dying regularly.

Someone once told me that knowledge replaces fear and I think that's true...but in this sport it goes full circle. You'll eventually gain enough knowledge to be fearful for completely different reasons.

Please don't dent the planet.

Destinations by Roxanne

[wmw999 2,485]

Risks are always changing, to me. There are always the macro risks (e.g. "I can die", "I can get majorly hurt"), but if you try to break the chain, then you have to look at the pieces.

Equipment is a risk. How're the brake lines, lines, and closing loop? Each of those have risk scenarios associated with deterioration. How am I feeling today? Who am I jumping with, and what are we doing? What's the weather? How's the pilot feeling?

And they've changed over the years. The risk of getting something tangled with my capewells has gone way down , and others (e.g. pilot chute in burble) have changed. The risk of damaging myself on landing has changed with the advent of ever-smaller squares.

So I still don't really know all of the risks. But as long as I keep learning, and trying to keep things in mind, and understand when it's time to say no, then at least I can feel pretty good that I'm considering what I can.

If you spend all of your time in risk management, you never get anything done. If you spend no time in risk management, you'd better have either a prepaid accident plan, or a really big bucket of luck.

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[Jewels 0]

I think learning to understand the risks comes in stages. My jump numbers are nothing to boast about, but I think I've already gone through a couple of the stages. When I did my tandem, I knew you could be seriously injured or die. It took me a year to get from that tandem to my Level 1, but that time was spent talking to jumpers and instructors and, yeah, reading dz.com. In that time, I learned a lot about the different kinds of malfunctions that I might see and have to deal with. I saw a lot of canopy collisions in the Incidents forum, and I did my own research about other kinds of things that can go wrong. I think I probably had a more complete grasp of things that can turn sour on a jump than a lot of other AFF students do just because I'd been eavesdropping for a while. In that sense, generally, I would say to the OP that yes, I understood the risks pretty well before my first jumps.

That being said, though, I haven't had my first mal and I haven't seen someone else struggle with one. I haven't felt that extra shot of "save-yourself" adrenaline and the pressure of making the right decision when I'm burning altitude. So, in that sense, no, I don't *really* understand the risks. It's kind of like getting a degree and having your first job--but still not having any real experience.

TPM Sister #102