So...you carry a hook knife...

[Kirils 1]

The latest poll shows most of you carry hook knives. What I'd like to know is it just for pure esthetics & fashion OR has it saved your life? If you have a story about a hook knife related save, let's hear it!
Skydiving is not a static excercise with discrete predictability...

[SkydiveMonkey 0]

I jump with mine mainly cos the BPA says I have to.
Let's go play chicken with a planet !!

[wlie 0]

I carry one because it doubles as bottle cap opener.

[Shark 0]

because a ka-bar is not pratical...

[hobbes4star 0]

i own one but i have yet to attach it to my rig.
why jump when you can fly

[Snowflake 0]

I have a hook knife so I'll never have to use it
"....and then the canopy opens and you float down to the ground like a multicolored snowflake"
JG
Rat# 27

[billvon 2,998]

>What I'd like to know is it just for pure esthetics & fashion OR has it saved
> your life?
Aesthetics? Fashion? Huh? They are ugly little things, but I have one because a) I used to do static line and the habit continued, b) I have a camera mount that could conceivably catch lines and c) it's an easy addition.
-bill von

[Grumpy 9]

I have a hook knife and I've never used it to save my life.
I can say the same thing about my Cypres.
A lot of jumpers could say the same for their reserves.
Better to have and not need - than to need and not have I reckon.

[drenaline 0]

It looks cool in the tonysuit, bought the pit special with it.
"Life is full of danger, so why be afraid?"
drenaline

[AndyMan 7]

I bought one a few monthes ago. As far as I know, the blade has never touched anything since it left the factory. It won't, until I need it.
I bought it because it's dirt cheap, and plumeting to my death under a wrap is the wrong time to think that maybe I should have one.
_Am
ICQ: 5578907
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[riggerrob 643]

Like bill von, I used to drop static-line students and couldn't drop the habit of wearing a knife.
Now I mostly do tandem, with a bit of PFF. When we get really short-handed, I drop the occaissional IAD student.

[Snowwhite 0]

ok, just for shits and giggles, anybody know where this habit STARTED? I DO!

[tlshealy 0]

Well, I started jumping them in the days of old in case of a line over on a round reserve, or for CRW ( dock on me , and I'll cut you free), but I would imagine the instances when they are actually used are kind of rare.
BSBD
Tad

[rhino 0]

I carry it in case I have a lineover on my reserve.. I can cut the lineover and possibly save my own life..
That was Billy's reason anyways
Blue Skies .....

[skybytch 273]

I carry one due to an incident in Perris a few years ago. A jumper had the reserve deploy severely damaged while she was in the door of the plane. She managed to survive the landing but was hurt pretty bad. She said later that if she'd had a hook knife she might have been able to get rid of the reserve and get her main out.
Sales of hook knives skyrocketed at Perris after that.
pull & flare,
lisa
"Try not. Do or do not. There is no try." - Yoda sez

[dove 0]

I wear one cause if I ever need it it won't do me any good sitting in my gear bag. I'd hate to be in a situation where I needed one and not have one.

[PhreeZone 20]

BTW.... check your hook knife once before you go and depend on it. I grabed mine last weeke to cut some 550 cord on the ground and the blade was so dull that it could'nt cut the cord cleanly. I'm getting a new one soon as a replacement.
If once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will....

[Spy38W 0]

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I grabed mine last weeke to cut some 550 cord on the ground and the blade was so dull

This is something I don't understand, people carrying hook knives as a safety device and using them to cut off gear check tags, etc. So if/when the time comes that it might be needed it's pretty close to useless.
--
Give them a sip of the darkside, and they just thirst for more.

[rainman 0]

I dunno if this is what you mean, but a rigger told me that the plastic hook knife thingies are actually made for cleaning/gutting fish. His description of how this works put me off fish for a couple of weeks...Anyways, my personal opinion is that the plastic hook knives will surely break at the least convenient time.
The same guy told me that should you ever want to use a hook knife to get rid of your reserve, your best bet is to cut the risers, since the lines are made of almost the same material as the cut-proof gloves used by butchers etc. Apparently risers under tension cut rather easily.
Blue skies,
Ramon

• Quote

[Darkzone 0]

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I carry it in case I have a lineover on my reserve.. I can cut the lineover and possibly save my own life..

In the case of a lineover I have always been taught to cutaway and deploy the reserve but would it not be sensible (given enough altitude) to attempt to cut free the line over first and checking controllability before resorting to a full cutaway.
Far away is close at hand in images of elsewhere.

[dove 0]

Quote

I carry it in case I have a lineover on my reserve.. I can cut the lineover and possibly save my own life..

Note he said lineover on his RESERVE. If you don't carry a hook knife you'd be wishing you did...

[skybytch 273]

I think what he meant was why not try cutting the line if you have a lineover on a main, instead of automatically cutting it away.
With today's main canopies, the resulting spin from a lineover would likely leave using a hook knife out of your emergency plans for that situation - as the g's build, it becomes more important to get away from the spinning canopy and the fastest way to do that is to cut it away.
Under a lineover on a reserve you have no chances left - you have to make what you've got work. Landing under a spinning canopy leaves little chance of survival, landing under a canopy with a cut line or two is doable.
If you have a hook knife, you have plenty of time (altitude) and the resulting spin is not too severe it might be an option on the main, but definitely give up and chop if a) things start to get worse or b) you reach your hard deck (decision altitude).
pull & flare,
lisa
"Try not. Do or do not. There is no try." - Yoda sez

[Dumpster 0]

I concur- Like you said, better to have and not need than need and not have- Cypres, Reserve and Hook knife- (and a few folks might even throw RSL in there, too-)
--Lenny

[JDBoston 0]

I carry a knife because there's no reason not to, and it was only $25.
Joe

[Trent 0]

I once had an instructor overhear a conversation about hook knives... the comment came up about a line-over on a reserve. A few people thought that it would be a good idea to try to cut that offending line with their knives. She then took them to the practice cutaway harness, tied a piece of twine where the brake line would be, put a knife whereever they liked to stow it, shook the shit out of them and then asked them to cut the line (during the shit-shaking). Not one person cut the brake line. In fact, the old POS risers ended up with a few nicks in them. Definitely made me think twice about how to clear a reserve line-over. Especially a nice spinning one.
Her opinion was that hook-knives are for freak incedents, like premature and damaged reserves, wraps, and the like.