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They were at Aerograg-Kolomna DZ (http://www.aerograd.ru/zabout.html). We always glag to see foreign guests, especially as interesting and funny as our danish friends . Benjamin and Jasper (sorry for names spelling if something wrong), who went home this monday, can tell you many interesting storyes about their long-long russian vocation

More pictures from that cool weekend! Good swoops!! http://www.skydive.ru/cgi/gallery.cgi?gallery=15

Well, first of all I'll explain details of that occurrence for everybody. That was 01/06/2003, 2nd lift on our DZ (1st for me). I was the LAST skydiver who left chopper, so after headdown training (I don't really stable in headdown and sometime horizontal zooming takes place in my individual jumps) and deploy at ~2500ft I was pretty far from landing area. So when I passed landing point and made 180 deg. turn the really altitude was less than 200ft. But a lot of VERY white snow and VERY bright sunshine played a very bad trick on me, so I understood my mistake only after completion of my 1st flat 180 degree turn under Crossfire. I cant even imagine, how many meters of altitude will eat Crossire after it. So in a split second I found myself digged under tons of beautiful soft snow. So main reason of that occurrence was: my lack of experience in low-altitude flat turns with Crossfire; my stupidity in case of unusual weather. After that terrible landing I have had long conversations with ALL instructors and many experienced jumpers from our DZ, most of them saw that fall themselves. I have completely became aware of my mistake and I think I will not be so stupid again. As my instructor (Roman Lednev) said, sometime everybody, even REALLY careful jumper, can made same mistake, and I'm very lucky, because I passed this test in right time - with a lot of snow. And, as he said, downsizing and canopy model are not reasons in this case. The reason is my brain. I could get hurt by low-altitude turn with my old Omega-149 @1.3, or one of many "right" (for my experience) canopies. So, as direction of DZ decide: I'm not restricted to jump my canopy for the time present; I must use not more than 90 degrees turns for speed it up, always pay attention to altitude. After that occurrence I've made 15 jumps for now. All my landings was controlled by instructors. Most of landings was straight line, sometimes it was 90 degrees. Every jump I've remembered that stupid landing. Every landing was perfect, so my instructor said he believes I'll not repeat that mistake and I'm really adequate enough to fly and improve my skills with my current canopy.

schumacher, Canuck, jdhill - Ok, I'm starting to understand the difference. Thanks for your explanations. ernokaikkonen, rhino - just Crossfire, not Crossfire 2. You're right, I know. I'm trying to be realy carefull. I still land it without agressive turns, only sometimes I'm trying soft carves, less then 90 degrees. All trainings only at safe altitude. I'll try to do it. P.S. ramon! Your russian is good too!

I've never test Stiletto, and just 30 jumps ago started using my new Crossfire119 (w/l=1.6, my previous canopy was Omega 149, w/l 1.3). This weekend one guy from my dz said Stiletto is more aggressive then same size Crossfire. I realy think this is not true. So what are you thinking: 1) Which one (same size Stiletto or Cross) is more aggressive and faster in toggle turns? 2) Same about front riser turns. 3) Which one is... ummm... swoopier? 4) And in general, what are you thinking about learning to swoop on Crossfire whith w/l=1.6? Is it realy possible?