Macaw

I'd like to go for Arizona Airspeed basic tunnel camp in November and then maybe get some extra time in the tunnel for another 1-2 days. My main goal is to familiarize myself with the tunnel and work on my body position and body flight. Next week I'll be starting basic RW course at my home DZ and my question is do you think it's reasonable to do the tunnel trip on my own after basic RW course or it would make more sense either to go to the tunnel first? ________________________________________ Life is a series of wonderful opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.

I don't like statistics and statements like "like skydiving is safer than..." do not make much sense to me, you can always play with statistics and interpret numbers. I generally tell people that skydiving is a risky sport but ultimately it's a risk management activity where risk can be mitigated by both mental and physical training, staying current and constant practice. ________________________________________ Life is a series of wonderful opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.

Hello! Privet! Welcome to the Forums! It's a great place on the skydiving web! ________________________________________ Life is a series of wonderful opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.

Congrats on being cool and handling the situation so well! Thank you very much for the story! A good lesson for all of us. Be safe and blue skies! ________________________________________ Life is a series of wonderful opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.

Although I've been out of AFF just recently, skydiving has already made me take the responsibility for my own life. By finding out and understanding all nuances of the risks you can take that responsibility. There's always a danger element in every sport (I'm also into downhill freeride skiing - that is a less risky sport!) and I'm not really into statistics because even if someone tells you that AFF incidents records has been very good it doesn't mean in any way that you can assume nothing will happen to you and ignore practicing your EPs. Although I feel so excited about my jumps over the week-end I try to speak a lot to my instructor, more experienced jumpers and I every Monday I start with reading safety articles and incidents/fatalities reports on the web - some stories made me literally cry but all that cools my head and reminds of the risk and ways to mitigate it. Unfortunately, not everything is so ideal. One thing that scares the hell out of me is the thought that even if I die skydiving or freeriding (i.e. something I loved doing), it will still be very difficult for my family to accept it. The thought that I may make somebody suffer this pain drives me crazy. ________________________________________ Life is a series of wonderful opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.

Don't worry and take your time. In the end it doesn't matter how long it takes you to learn, although I do agree that it may be embarassing sometimes. Last Saturday I was doing my AFF 5 four times! I just couldn't gain control over spinning and over my emotions. I've got an awesome instructor but by the end of the day I felt like he was ready to kill me for not doing "simple" things. We talked a lot and practiced on the ground. Honestly, I was a bit discouraged and decided to take a break till the next day. And guess what? On Sunday everything worked just fine. Trust yourself, take your time, believe your instructor, do mental practice of your jump over and over again and it will work. You will definetely get there, that's for sure! Blue skies and good luck!

My brother has been skydiving for several years and I've been out at the DZ many times amazed by the beauty, speed of the sport and attitude of the skydivers to what they do. I signed up for an AFF course because I wanted to know if I have the mental ability to cope with the fear of height and speed. But being in the middle of AFF I realized that there's a lot more to skydiving than just coping with your mental blocks - it's fun, it's good opportunity to learn about yourself, it's people around you at the DZ, it's an incredibly blue sky around you and a distant horizont that becomes so close. Getting back to your question, I can't tell what exactly made me want to pursue skydiving - it's everything up above and at the same time none of the above - it just happened.

Thanks a lot for your advice and support!!! Looks like I've got no choice which is - keep jumping!

My greatest fear was and still is stepping at the door, looking down, ahead-back-out-arch. When I'm in the plane I'm cool and when I'm falling I enjoy it but several seconds in between.....ahhhh. Flying under open canopy in strong wind is also pretty scary. Blue skies! ________________________________________ Life is a series of wonderful opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.

I know I know that this has been discussed before here but I really-really need your advice. I've been doing AFF for the last three week-ends in a row enjoying every second of it although I didn't always get everything right the first time. Because I spend on the DZ either saturday and sunday or just sunday I find it very difficult to go back to work on Monday. I just can't concentrate on anything, keep recalling the episodes of the day before , anticipating the ones to come next week-end, reading lots of skidiving related stuff on the web and etc. At times I just feel soooooo uncomfortable with all those emotions and feelings. Any ideas how to deal with this? ________________________________________ Life is a series of wonderful opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.

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I have experienced something very similar when I did my first tandem and it took me 4 years to go for another tandem jump and understand that this something I would like to try to do on my own. I signed up for AFF course two week-ends ago, completed AFF4 yesterday and two things I can tell for sure now: 1) I'm hooked and 2) it turned out that skydiving has nothing to do with fear. Excitement, relaxation, good judgement, cool mind -yes, but not fear. Myself being scared of many things around me I can't explain why it is so, maybe because freefall is an illussion - the air holds you all the way if you let it hold you, maybe because you get so concentrated on various stuff that you don't even have a second to let the fear inside. I think that if you decide to go through training there will tons of new things and feelings that you'll discover. Good luck!

Thanks to everyone for the warm welcome! ________________________________________ Life is a series of wonderful opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.

Thank you! My first tandem jump was on Dec. 30 2001 and it was soooooo cold (you can imagine what Russian winters are like) but the view up above the clouds with the sun going down was just breathtaking and that was something that I will never forget, now it seems like that those 50 freefall seconds were the best feeling I've ever experienced. My ears hurt so bad that when the canopy opened and suddenly everything became so silent that I thought that something must be completely wrong with my ears and I probably will never hear again. At this moment the instuctor tapped on my shoulder "are you ok?" my first throught was "good, now that I will never be able to hear again ever, I must be going crazy cause I clearly hear someone talking to me"

Hi I'm new here and new to skidiving. Did my first tandem jump 4 years ago and the second one two weeks ago. That was quite an experience! And I'm seriously considering doing AFF! ________________________________________ Life is a series of wonderful opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.