pull altitude atitudes

[petetheladd 0]

Just a kind of Jarring experience I had Sunday. While waiting at the loading area, people were figuring out exit order and a 4 way RW group(from abroad I think) were asked their pull altitude - 2500 ft they answered (same as myself).

They were immediately leapt upon by people complaining about why they were pulling so low? could they not pull at the 'Correct altitude of 3500'?

Now I have been noticing a trend of pull altitudes floating upwards where jumpers pulling at 4000ft + dont believe they are pulling high and will jump in the middle of the run, without announceing or caring about it.

So whats a high puller these days - I used to think pulling over 3000, get to the back of the line but moved that to 3500 with the current trends but 4000 ft - gimmie a break.

I do argue with any group in front of me pulling at 4,000+ to either get behind me or preferably pull at 3500ft

Now I know horizontal separation is king but helping with vertical separation is common practice i.e. high pullers get out last.

So how high is a high puller / get thee behind me satan jumper ?

No, Not without incident

[quade 4]

USPA SIM Section 2-1 G outlines the minimum altitudes for various jumpers.

USPA SIM Section 6-1 C gives recommendations for breakoff altitudes for group freefall.

Although I believe it's common and recommended practice for people pulling higher than 3,500 AGL to announce their intentions to the DZ, pilot and other jumpers on their load, I can't seem to find any "official" source for this recommendation.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[PhillyKev 0]

I always make a point to ask the guy in rental gear doing a solo RW jump getting out right before the freeflyers where he's pulling. It's usually someone newly off student status and the answer is often 4500'.

[councilman24 37]

I don't know whether it's more AFF grads, more freeflyers, or the 700-1000 foot openings that many canopies are designed with today. I think some of all but among experienced jumpers mainly the long canopy openings. If my canopy took 700 ft instead of 200 ft to open, I'd be pulling at 3500 too. Which is the main reason I didn't buy a Spectre when they first came out. Of course I've always thought the minimum's were a little low. But what the heck, they were written in the days of low pull contests.

I'm old for my age.
Terry Urban
D-8631
FAA DPRE

[tbrown 26]

At Perris we've always been told that opening above 3000, which I interpret as flying an open canopy, has to be cleared beforehand. So I suppose tossing it out at 3500 is more or less OK, but anythhing higher without prior notice is a hazard.

Is it our ability to get more altitude with turbos, the slower - and so much nicer - canopy openings, or a generation of AFF grads that have created so much naked paranoia about opening below 3500 ft ? Or have the Health Nazis finally infiltrated our sport after banning smoking in taverns ? I throw it out just below 3000 and sit in above 2000. I've got plenty of room to one-two punch my handles. Sometimes I think we should bring back the static line (and Depends) for some of these people.

Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

[PhreeZone 20]

Its also some of us enjoy the canopy flight portion as much as we enjoy the freefall. If I'm going to do a HP landing I need to be completly set up at about 600 feet, that includes flying back to the DZ, flying the pattern and getting my self into the lane. Really hard to do if I'm only open at 2000 to start with after dealing with the slider and stuff.

Try getting out as the 4th or 5th group out of an Otter on one pass and throwing at 2500 feet and see how many times you start landing off. Thats another reason right there...

I have and enjoy getting out of the 206 at 2200 feet or lower, I just like to control the spot a little better then green light means go.

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

[tbrown 26]

Quote

Its also some of us enjoy the canopy flight portion as much as we enjoy the freefall. If I'm going to do a HP landing I need to be completly set up at about 600 feet, that includes flying back to the DZ, flying the pattern and getting my self into the lane. Really hard to do if I'm only open at 2000 to start with after dealing with the slider and stuff.

I can relate completely to that and I would never want to deny you the altitude you need to set up a good swoop or just to enjoy the ride. I'm not sure how long your canopy takes to open, but as long as you're not hanging out above 3 grand, there shouldn't be a problem. If you need to be under an open canopy higher than 3 grand, and I don't know whether you do or not, then you should just tell somebody and that's all I'm saying, because you are in fact a body with mass under canopy in a freefall zone.

I'm just thinking of the original post in this thread, with the 4 way guys from Europe who said they'd be opening at 2500 and everybody jumped on their shit like they were committing Jonestown suicide or something. People who gots to pull because the site of the ground at 4 grand makes their buttholes twitchy make me nervous. After returning to the sport from a looooong layoff (try 22 years), I'm frankly relieved to see breakoff and pull altitudes are higher. Breaking off from an 8 way at 4500 is nice and relaxed. But too much of a good thing is, well, too much. Hey, enjoy your canopy flying, I'm not up to that level of canopy flight, but maybe in a few years I might want to check it out myself. Blue skies bro.

Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

[quade 4]

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I'm just thinking of the original post in this thread, with the 4 way guys from Europe who said they'd be opening at 2500 and everybody jumped on their shit like they were committing Jonestown suicide or something.

I must have just glossed over reading that bit in your original post. Wow. Really? People thought that a 4-way team needed to open higher than 2,500?

Hope they never have to do a big-way!

Seriously. If my 4-way team opens ABOVE 2,500 I'll give them shit about it and there's absolutely no reason for anybody doing team 4-way (other than the camera flyer) to ever open above 3,000.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[pilotdave 0]

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Seriously. If my 4-way team opens ABOVE 2,500 I'll give them shit about it and there's absolutely no reason for anybody doing team 4-way (other than the camera flyer) to ever open above 3,000.

Is that sarcasm or did I miss something? It seems to me that opening altitudes vary a whole lot between DZs. I open at 3500... or occasionally as low as 3000, never below. I was doing a 5 way on sunday (which very quickly became a 1 way with a front row seat to a 4 way). While we were dirt diving someone suggested breakoff at 3500. I said how about 4500 and got a dirty look. I said I open at 3500 and the one guy (who's been in the sport for 49 years) asked if I could open lower. Everyone else agreed on breakoff at 4500.

A couple years ago I jumped at another DZ where 2000 foot openings were common. Where I learned to jump, 3500 was pretty much the standard for the low timers and 3000 was common for the experienced people.

If I was jumping from a 172 that could only get up to 9,000 feet, I might really appreciate an extra few seconds of freefall. But I already get about 70 seconds. I'd rather have a longer canopy ride.

Dave

[quade 4]

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Is that sarcasm or did I miss something?

No sarcasm, but maybe you did miss the 4-way TEAM reference.

It is pretty much standard procedure for a 4-way team to break off at 4,000 with deployments at 2,500. This is for everyone's safety but mostly the camera flyer. They track off and the camera flyer deploys in the middle. Deployments above 3,000 put the jumper and camera flyer at risk of canopy collision due to inadequate horizontal separation if the tracking jumper has a 180 degree off heading opening.

I have personally been involved with some VERY near misses by people that have not tracked low enough and had 180 degree off heading openings.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[crutch 0]

Somewhere I think we are losing the point of this thread, why was a 4-way team chatised for a planned opening of 2500'. Last time I read the SIM this is still 500' above the minimum for D-licensed skydivers. When was the altitude changed?
The other thing is when did a seven-hundred foot opening become "slow". Back when my team was doing 4-way is was very common to dump in a track to make your canopy open in a shorter period of time.
In my years in the sport I am seeing more and more people so scared of little things and their ability to deal with them, this is becoming even more frightening. The equipement technology has gotten to the point that Darwin isn't allowed to weed out the ones who should be bowling instead!
If you are going to open above 3500', I don't care, but tell the load organizer, and don't get on to people who enjoy freefall and are confident in there abilities to deal with mals at 2000'.
In closing, if your scared just say your scared, don't try and convince other people that they are unsafe because they have more confidence in their ability than you.

blue skies,

art

[mikkey 0]

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I'm just thinking of the original post in this thread, with the 4 way guys from Europe who said they'd be opening at 2500 and everybody jumped on their shit like they were committing Jonestown suicide or something. People who gots to pull because the site of the ground at 4 grand makes their buttholes twitchy make me nervous. After returning to the sport from a looooong layoff (try 22 years), I'm frankly relieved to see breakoff and pull altitudes are higher. Breaking off from an 8 way at 4500 is nice and relaxed. But too much of a good thing is, well, too much.

I agree with Thomas (maybe because I also just came back after a looong layoff - 11 years only though). Pull altitudes were around 2000 feet when I first jumped - one reason being that it took so long to get to altitude with the small Cessna's that you did not want to "waste" altitude. We did 3/4 ways from 6500 feet (2000 meter) as a standard. I think the opening altitudes were quite low especially in my early days jumping with Capewells etc. A mal would take longer to deal with.
Most new type of canopies definitely take longer to open - so I have put my own "standard" opening altitude to 3000 feet. This way I am under fully deployed main between 2 and 2.5 K. I find this to be a decent compromise.
The funny thing is that some of the "high openers" are sometimes 300 jump wonders with pocket rockets who are concerned about spinning mals that loose a lot of altitude fast. Therefore they open higher. Funny - first they are conservative in opening high and then they are trying to kill themselves on landing (sorry - being naughty now)

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When people look like ants - pull. When ants look like people - pray.

[Canuck 0]

I'm not sure about this. If the team breaks off at 4000, that means the camera flyer can pull at 4000. If the team tracks and pulls at 3000, they should be no where near the camera flyer, vertically or horizontaly.

I think pulling much below 3000 is flirting with disaster under todays high performance canopies (and I'm not even talk about the cross braced sub 100's). When 2200 was set as the minimum activation altitude, everyone was jumping Cuislites and Furys. Openings took up way less altitude, they hardly ever spun up, and when they did mal, you had minutes before you hit the ground, not seconds (OK not always, but you get the point).

My Crossfire takes 1000 feet to open from the time I toss. Nay-sayers argue as you will - I have proven it several times with video. So, if I pull at 2200, it's entirely possible that I'm going through a grand by the time I even realize I'm under a mal. Can you say Cypres fire?

I realize that it's my choice to jump a slow opening canopy, but it's common sense when jumping that canopy to pull by or above 3000.

Canuck

[nathaniel 0]

USPA SIM section 5-6 weighs in on the subject
a. The pilot and all jumpers on board the aircraft should be informed in advance whenever an opening is planned to be above the normal opening altitude (generally 5,000 feet and lower).

Doesn't say don't advise for lower, but...

nathaniel

My advice is to do what your parents did; get a job, sir. The bums will always lose. Do you hear me, Lebowski?

[andy2 0]

[QUOTE]Can you say Cypres fire?
[/QUOTE]

not if you dont jump a cypres

---------------------------------------------
let my inspiration flow,
in token rhyme suggesting rhythm...

[quade 4]

Thanks for finding that.

5,000 huh? Sounds really high as the point at which you'd start pointing it out to folks.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[JamesNahikian 0]

That's what we do at my dropzone. We also mention any atypical planned deployment altitude to the others on our load, i.e., > 3.5 k, when 2.5k to 3.5k represents the norm. Since my custom is to make my sunset deployment at 14 - 16 k and enjoy the godseye view and canopy ride, I'm pretty familiar to our pilots on this matter.

D. James Nahikian
CHICAGO

[tbrown 26]

My Crossfire takes 1000 feet to open from the time I toss. Nay-sayers argue as you will - I have proven it several times with video. So, if I pull at 2200, it's entirely possible that I'm going through a grand by the time I even realize I'm under a mal. Can you say Cypres fire?
I realize that it's my choice to jump a slow opening canopy, but it's common sense when jumping that canopy to pull by or above 3000.
Canuck

[Tonto 1]

"solo RW jump"

You gotta explain that one to me...

t

D515

It's the year of the Pig.

[mikkey 0]

Quote

"solo RW jump"

You gotta explain that one to me...

t

D515

Solo RW is like making love solo

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When people look like ants - pull. When ants look like people - pray.

[Ron 10]

This is funny.

I used to pull at 1,400 feet on every jump. Now people get scared below 2 grand.

I am now in the saddle by 2,200 ish or so.

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334

[diverdriver 5]

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The funny thing is that some of the "high openers" are sometimes 300 jump wonders with pocket rockets who are concerned about spinning mals that loose a lot of altitude fast. Therefore they open higher. Funny - first they are conservative in opening high and then they are trying to kill themselves on landing (sorry - being naughty now)

Don't think I didn't notice that!

[kallend 2,028]

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Hope they never have to do a big-way!
.

Indeed. Last few big ways I was on my intructions were that I was NOT to be open above 2,200ft.

...

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

[kallend 2,028]

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Back when my team was doing 4-way is was very common to dump in a track to make your canopy open in a shorter period of time.

That is an admission that your track was not very good.

...

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

[Ron 10]

Quote

Back when my team was doing 4-way is was very common to dump in a track to make your canopy
open in a shorter period of time.



That is an admission that your track was not very good.
------------------

How in the hell do you reach that conclusion?

I see it as he opened in track to open his canopy faster.
And in fact he said just that...Where do you get that his track was bad? He never said that he opened in a track to continue to get away from everyone.

You just went to apples when he said oranges.

Ron

FWIW...The guy has 7,000 jumps...I bet he tracks just fine

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334