billvon 3,057
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homesick anvil is my personal fav
If a Blonde throws a pin at you RUN, shes got a hand grenade in her mouth!
vonSanta 0
LOL some great responses there. Than you for providing ammo 
Santa Von GrossenArsch
I only come in one flavour
ohwaitthatcanbemisunderst
Santa Von GrossenArsch
I only come in one flavour
ohwaitthatcanbemisunderst
Head an old saying something to the effect of "piloting an airplane is about as close to flying as driving a boat is to swimming" or something like that. You get the idea.
The older I get the less I care who I piss off.
QuoteRealistically, we can't do much in freefall. We can vary our fallrate a bit, we can translate a bit (barely 1:1, and that's a very good skydiver) but it's not really flying
What about wingsuits? You can get a glide ratio of, what, over 3:1? And having seen the video of Loic at Verbier... that's either not falling, or it's falling with a shitload of style.
What's the correct definition of "flight" anyway?
Quote(from Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary)
flight (MOVEMENT) noun
1 [U] when something flies or moves through the air:
vonSanta 0
Heard from a Swedish (I think) skydive video called "pushing limits" (available from headdown.net)
"If riding in an airplane is flying, then riding in a boat is swimming. If you want to experience the elements, get out of the vehicle."
Well put methinks.
Santa Von GrossenArsch
I only come in one flavour
ohwaitthatcanbemisunderst
"If riding in an airplane is flying, then riding in a boat is swimming. If you want to experience the elements, get out of the vehicle."
Well put methinks.
Santa Von GrossenArsch
I only come in one flavour
ohwaitthatcanbemisunderst
Quotehomesick anvil is my personal fav
Don't forget Lawn-Darts
Huh?!? What cloud?!? Oh that!!! That's just Industrial Haze
Alex M.
jumpy 0
Quote
What's the correct definition of "flight" anyway?Quote(from Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary)
flight (MOVEMENT) noun
1 [U] when something flies or moves through the air:
OR (from www.dictionary.com)
flight1 ( P ) Pronunciation Key (flt)
n.
The motion of an object in or through a medium, especially through the earth's atmosphere or through space.
An instance of such motion.
The distance covered in such motion.
The act or process of flying through the air by means of wings.
The ability to fly.
A swift passage or movement.
A scheduled airline run or trip.
A group, especially of birds or aircraft, flying together. See Synonyms at flock1.
A number of aircraft in the U.S. Air Force forming a subdivision of a squadron.
A round of competition, as in a sports tournament.
An exuberant or transcendent effort or display: a flight of the imagination; flights of oratory.
A series of stairs rising from one landing to another.
I am hearing that they don't understand what it is we have, and choose to make judgements about it instead of learning more. Despite that, I will always wish to introduce them to this wonderful sport of ours. That is one of the most rewarding parts of the skydiving experience for me - sharing someone's first skydive experience through tandems or AFF.
Arrive Safely
John
John
mctyeire 0
exactly right.Quote>Well, claiming that we fly in freefall is...
Looking at jumpy's dictionary definition, I see at least three applicable senses of the word.
Using words to coherently describe the experience of skydiving is an art form in itself. One of the most expressive phrases I have come across is "high-speed vertical aviation."
Chad
good friends, blue skies, and sweet, sweet altitude...
steve1 5
Lot's of people wonder what it is like in freefall. I tell them it's just like being Peter Pan when a bunch of us are out there doing R.W. There's always somebody who's ready to call you nuts. We've all heard the one about why would anyone jump out of a perfectly good airplane. But let's face it: It takes a lot of courage and determination to jump. (particularly when you start out in our sport) A lot of folks know that down deep that they don't have what it takes to be a skydiver. I mean the thought of jumping scares they hell out of them. By putting us all down they can build themselves up to our level.
When I first started jumping there was another guy I trained with. This guy was huge bully growing up and never let an opportunity pass to put someone else down for being chicken or inadequate or somehow inferior to him. He's still that way. We trained and he made two jumps and then quit. He and I both know it was because he didn't have what it took to stick with it. He still scuba dives and does other things of that nature but jumping scares the bejesus out of him. I love to visit him and talk about all the cool parachute jumps that I've just made. I love it........Steve1
When I first started jumping there was another guy I trained with. This guy was huge bully growing up and never let an opportunity pass to put someone else down for being chicken or inadequate or somehow inferior to him. He's still that way. We trained and he made two jumps and then quit. He and I both know it was because he didn't have what it took to stick with it. He still scuba dives and does other things of that nature but jumping scares the bejesus out of him. I love to visit him and talk about all the cool parachute jumps that I've just made. I love it........Steve1
Heard normal private pilots call skydivers 'rats of the sky' and people who paraglide have used 'canopy size is directly proportional to penis size - that's why those dumbarse skydivers are so macho, to make up for their inferiority.
Years ago I remember skydivers being referred to as "bikers of the sky". As far as pilots are concerned, I just tell them that they are the cheapest part of the airplane and the easiest to replace (I will concede that a good jump pilot is worth much more). If anybody starts jumping to impress their friends, they will be disappointed. Skydiving seems to upset people with fragile egos. If you start jumping, most of your friends will be jumpers anyway.
never pull low......unless you are
billvon 3,057
>What about wingsuits?
Yep, and canopies. There's a continuum here, from plain old falling to flying. I don't think anyone would say that a rock that falls off a cliff is flying; that's what many skydivers do early on in their training, just do solos and fall straight down purely ballistically. And BASE jumpers are 100% ballistic during low exits and short freefalls.
But after a while you learn to turn and move in freefall, and do RW with people near you. This is a little more like flying, because to the people in the formation it looks like you're moving a lot relative to them. Plot their motion on a piece of graph paper, though, and they are still 99.9% ballistic. To a distant viewer they are still following the same trajectory that rock will take.
Then you get to big-ways, and people have to translate long distances (in some cases hundreds of meters) to get to their slot. That's starting to show some control in the horizontal plane, although they are still falling 10 feet for every foot they move. On breakoff they might get even better, falling only 2 feet for every foot they move. That's a lot closer to the conventional definition of flight as opposed to a pure fall. Trackers are actually beginning to use the aerodynamic forces available to them to move long distances, instead of just deflecting some air in the constant stall we fly in when we're in normal freefall.
Wingsuits are probably the next step closer to 'real' flight. I'm not sure if they can get past 3:1 but they can probably get close. And it's possible to come out of that stall with a wingsuit; you can feel the air stop separating from you as it passes by you. You can actually use the air to pull some G's in a turn.
From there, canopies are the next step. 3:1 is definitely doable, with many canopies approaching 4:1. Under some conditions (light tandem, hot and bumpy day) you can gain altitude, and use that altitude to help you get where you want to go. This is very far along that scale, much closer to flight than falling - although we're still relying primarily on gravity to give us drive.
I suppose it's all semantics, and it's relative as well. In a 4-way, from the jumper's point of view, he has complete control over motion in all 3 directions - so from his point of view it looks like flight, even if it is straight down overall.
Yep, and canopies. There's a continuum here, from plain old falling to flying. I don't think anyone would say that a rock that falls off a cliff is flying; that's what many skydivers do early on in their training, just do solos and fall straight down purely ballistically. And BASE jumpers are 100% ballistic during low exits and short freefalls.
But after a while you learn to turn and move in freefall, and do RW with people near you. This is a little more like flying, because to the people in the formation it looks like you're moving a lot relative to them. Plot their motion on a piece of graph paper, though, and they are still 99.9% ballistic. To a distant viewer they are still following the same trajectory that rock will take.
Then you get to big-ways, and people have to translate long distances (in some cases hundreds of meters) to get to their slot. That's starting to show some control in the horizontal plane, although they are still falling 10 feet for every foot they move. On breakoff they might get even better, falling only 2 feet for every foot they move. That's a lot closer to the conventional definition of flight as opposed to a pure fall. Trackers are actually beginning to use the aerodynamic forces available to them to move long distances, instead of just deflecting some air in the constant stall we fly in when we're in normal freefall.
Wingsuits are probably the next step closer to 'real' flight. I'm not sure if they can get past 3:1 but they can probably get close. And it's possible to come out of that stall with a wingsuit; you can feel the air stop separating from you as it passes by you. You can actually use the air to pull some G's in a turn.
From there, canopies are the next step. 3:1 is definitely doable, with many canopies approaching 4:1. Under some conditions (light tandem, hot and bumpy day) you can gain altitude, and use that altitude to help you get where you want to go. This is very far along that scale, much closer to flight than falling - although we're still relying primarily on gravity to give us drive.
I suppose it's all semantics, and it's relative as well. In a 4-way, from the jumper's point of view, he has complete control over motion in all 3 directions - so from his point of view it looks like flight, even if it is straight down overall.
I honestly beleive skydiving is pretty much flying. We can control our bodies and make them move to different parts of the sky when we want (well, the more experienced of you!). Granted, we cant go back up but going up is not the main characteristic of flying. We cant be compared to a falling rock as a rock has no control over where it goes. Similar to a person falling accidentally from a cliff / building etc. They have no control over where they are going so are therfore falling. I think since we can control our movement across the sky (even if it be only a little bit) we are not just falling.
EDIT: Heres a link to a cool vid, look at the instructor who has to catch up with the student... does that look like falling or flying?...
here
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"Ive given up on sigs cos I make a mess of them!"
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EDIT: Heres a link to a cool vid, look at the instructor who has to catch up with the student... does that look like falling or flying?...
here
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"Ive given up on sigs cos I make a mess of them!"
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Well, claiming that we fly in freefall is like claiming that Molly's cat flies. Sure, she jumps off stuff a lot, but that doesn't mean she flies in the normal sense of the word. Realistically, we can't do much in freefall. We can vary our fallrate a bit, we can translate a bit (barely 1:1, and that's a very good skydiver) but it's not really flying. I mean, look at how often we land out when the plane doesn't drop us in exactly the right spot - is that indicative of flying or falling?
I liked the Toy Story definition of skydiving - "that's not flying, that's falling with style!"
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