banditgrrr

Chubba, If you read my post again, that was in response to a tadem. Let's see. If I'm jumping with Simon Wade, who has over 16,000 jumps, who do I trust more? Him, or me with 2 tandem progression jumps? On an AFF, I totally agree with you. On a tandem, I'm putting my money on the guy with 15,998 more jumps than I have to get me down safely.

I did a tandem on Saturday and my instructor put it in terms that were very easy to understand.... "I have over 16,000 jumps and you need to be able to trust my ability to get you down safely." I'm not someone who would put my life in someone elses hands, especially after only knowing them for 20 minutes. But, for some strange reason what he told me made sense and I felt a little more comfortable knowing that I was in the hands of a professional. He took his time walking me through every step of the jump which helped quite a bit. Now I'm trying to find out if he'll be my AFF instructor. The risk is not going to be any different if you jump on the 31st, 2nd, 15th, etc. If you decide you want to do it, I say go for it and trust your instructor.

If you're interested in owning the DZ, just wait for the foreclosure. Then you can negotiate with the bank for the business and pay 10 cents on the dollar for the plane.

So I go back to Mesquite on May 3rd with my wife, and I chicken out. We went back this past Saturday and I was determined to give it another chance. I'm glad I took everyones advice. This was a much better experience than my 1st one last year. The biggest concern I had is the first 10-20 seconds after opening the chute. I had a shortness of breath and I don't know if that's common or not for new jumpers. I kept focused on the horizon but I didn't feel comfortable enough to try steering the chute down. I guess I'll take small steps and hopefully be able to overcome 1 issue at at time. I do have to give credit where credit is due. My instructor, Simon, was the biggest reason it went well. He took the little bit of extra time to make sure I was relaxed with the jump before we boarded and this made all the difference in the world. 182's suck! Simon - if you happen to read this, I'll buy you a beer ANY day!

Thanks for all the comments.... I think I will eventually get over the fear of the plane ride up. Even though I've seen horrendous videos on landings, I'm ok with that. The two parts that concern me most is freezing up at the door and how I would react if/when my main parachute failed. I realize I can't do this for someone else, or because they want me to. I just don't know if it's something I'd actually get excited about doing every couple weeks. We're going out to Mesquite on Saturday. Maybe I can sit in on my wifes class and see if I get any reassurance from it.

My wife and I did our first tandem jump in Hawaii last year, as a last minute decision. I'm extremely afraid of heights but I thought I would try to conquer my fears. Everything went well until we reached about 10,000 ft. My nuckles became white and I could feel a rock in the pit of my stomach. Our exit was made with me sitting in the door of the plane with the tandem master behind me. It felt like I was actually outside the plane only being held by him until he released us. It didn't help that I looked down just before we went. The freefall was not that bad but I had extreme anxiety once the parachute opened because I felt like I could not take a deep breath. This is the only time in my life I felt like I was going to literally pass out. We landed and I kissed the ground thinking it was a one time shot. My wife loved it. Now that you have my short jumping history...on to why I'm posting...... We ended up getting gift certificates for my 4 brother in laws. We're scheduled to do another tandem jump on May 24th at Lake Elsinore. My wife wants to go through the AFF course. Since we live in Las Vegas, we're going out to Skydive Mesquite this Saturday so she can get more information. She'd like me to go through the course with her but I don't know if I have the courage to go through with it. I'm even having second thoughts about doing the tandem again in May. I'm assuming that there are several first time jumpers that get the jitters. My fear is that if I were to try a solo jump, even with instructors at my side, I would freeze up due to my fear of heights. I've been consumed with watching skydiving video's on You Tube and that probably was not the smartest idea. I spent 4 hours last night watching people have to cut their main parachute and other mishaps. My questions are these.... 1. If I have this much fear and anxiety about jumping, is it better that I just hang it up and not pursue it? 2. I know this is an extremely vague question but is there any frequency of how many main parachutes have to be cut away? 1 in 10, 1 in 1000? 3. Is it mandatory that all students have the automatic device that triggers the reserve if it's not pulled by a certain altitude? The AFF course she's going to sign up lists jumps 1 and 2 as tandem jumps and 3-8 as instructor guided jumps. I'm just trying to get my gonads out of my stomach to see if I should join her. I don't want to have the same fear every time I have to jump. Thanks