Flying at Night

[paddyFrenchman 0]

Hey,

Just got to do my first flight at night. All i can say is that it got my adrenaline pumping like it hasn't in a long time...

Next time it will have to be a flock ...

take it easy,
P.

[Trae 1]

Thanks for putting me right back there .
Can't wait to do a flock at night after a couple of solo's on pitch black nights.

A full moon flock would be unbelievable.

Pick me pick me

[TomAiello 26]

I've never done a full moon cliff flock, but I will say that full moon cliff flights have some of the best visuals I've ever experienced. I wonder if adding other birds would add or detract from the experience?

-- Tom Aiello

Tom@SnakeRiverBASE.com
SnakeRiverBASE.com

[Martini 0]

Did a two way flock last night with Jim M. It was awesome, can't wait to do more.

Sometimes you eat the bear..............

[Mr.g 0]

How do you stagger the break off of WS flocks on night jumps to avoid canopy collisions during landing?

Respect my authoritah!

[SkymonkeyONE 4]

I don't consider that at all. What we do is make sure we track far enough away from each other prior to opening and then we keep a keen eye out for each other during our canopy descent. Just like any other night jump, we are marked fore and aft with chemlights and we wear a strobe, generally on top of our helmet. Vertical separation is generally also taken care of by different wingloading. More critical on night wingsuit flights is insuring that you don't get out so far that you can't make it back to the lighted/marked landing area. It's much better to get out short and have to fly in a circle over the top, knowing that you are going to have a 100% chance of landing where you want than to land in the middle of a barely-lit street criss-crossed with powerlines a half mile from the DZ.........Right, Blair???? Right, Kevin????

Chuck

[Trae 1]

Not having done any flocking at night this is only conjecture....But I'll have a go. For base flocking ..some-one else would know better.

For skydiving ..well...

I have done multiple night demo's where we staggered the opening heights from 6ooo' down to 2ooo'. this was freefall not wingsuiting.Something similar might be possible here. Where this comes unstuck is if some-one breaks the sequence so take care in who goes where.

Lights, lights and more lights.

Making sure you and others are visible under canopy can make night jumps much less stressful. I use a strong beam headlamp on top of my helmet (this will light up a landing area if I have to land off for some reason.) I also have a LED footlamp for the flying bit (not so bright) and a colour flasher for use under canopy. The flashers are good for showing up other canopies at a glance.

With the idea of not getting too big too fast perhaps a 2way would be good to start with after you've done a few by yourself ...as long as you have some other night jumping experience.
Then you could simply have one person dumping at break off with the other giving it another 1000'. This would give you some good separation.

With bigger night flocks some form of breakoff in stages could work well keeping the inner close so that some hold is kept on where the bods are. Perhaps the outers getting away first leaving the next in to leave 1000' later fanning out and cranking away...followed by the next ones leaving the leader to dump out last. Upping the heights a bit wouldn't hurt to start with.

Only suggestions here and fully recommend doing this only with people who have proved their discipline in the air with you.
If you can see the other canopies semi-normal rules apply re direction of circuit and holding in brakes etc.

Getting too big a flock too fast ..not a good idea.

This is gonna be a lot of fun if it's done safely.

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