I just had a thought about a jump a year or so ago, and wanted to see peoples opinions.
At the time I had about 70 jumps, jumping a navigator 230. wing loading (0.9).
On opening at about 3000ft, i noticed an immediate problem. My first thought was that i had twists, but before i even tried to clear them in the usual way I saw that this was not going to be possible.
The lines from my front and rear risers were twisted above the toggles but underneath the slider. spinning myself left or right would make no difference.
I wasn't entirely sure what was wrong, but i had a good canopy, so my instruction told me the next thing to do was a control check. I released the toggles and did a turn each direction and a couple of flairs, canopy was fully controllable. But had these twists.
At this point I was at about 2200ft. I knew I had to make a decision quickly, chop it or not? I decided to stick with it.
I flew a cautious pattern with no radical movement, just in case. Good stand up landing, no problem.
When I got pack to the packing area, i explained what had just happened and was told by a more experianced jumper that i should have chopped it. Their reasoning was that the twists in the lines could have trapped my sterring lines, thereby making the canopy uncontrollable. Good point i think, but I hadn't been taught that or thought about it under canopy.
My question is, is this the sort of malfunction that you can choose to land, or is it something you should always chop? At the time I think i did the right thing keeping it, but now with the knowledge about the steering line, possibly getting trapped i'm not so sure.
I think it is called a container rotation, the risers were not twisted but the lines from front and rear risers were twisted round each other (once) above the steering toggles so that they were twisted underneath the slider. I can't find any picture to describe it better than that. The cause of it was flipping the contrainer through the risers at some point after landing it on the previous jump.
Of course, i should have spotted this whilst i was packing. But, it isn't blatanty obvious when laid out on the mat as the twist in the lines is hidden as it passes through the grommet of the slider.
I realised that in my line check, i had been running my fingers through the lines to the slider, letting go and then starting from the other side of the grommet. So it is entirely possible to miss this rotation as it gets drawn up to the slider grommets, i have now changed my check so that i make sure the line i hold on one side passes through the grommet without twisting around another.
Just thought i'd pass on the lesson and see who else has had this, and what you would do if you had it again.
