I skydived a few days ago!

[TheKorbinjer]

For those of you who have never gone, and are just absolutely insane, I highly recommend this extreme sport. (I WENT TANDEM)

PICTURES AT THE BOTTOM.

First of all, let me explain how it happens.

When you arrive at the skydive place, you will probably see people skydiving already, which will make you pumped to think "Wow, i'm crazy enough to jump from a plane at 12000 feet"

Once you enter the place, you will probably have to notify the people that you are there, and you will be put through a very simple, easy training session.

 After that is done, you will be asked to (literally) sign you life away with waivers stating that if injured, or possibly killed, that neither you, or family/friends will sue them.

 

Once that's completed, you will be suited up, and meet your tandem instructor, have a quick chat, he will explain how stuff works, and will calm your nerves if you're scared.

You and the instructor will walk to the plane (I took a C-172) individually, and you will taxi the plane out to the runway, where you will take the nail-biting climb up to altitude, mine was 10,900 feet AGL (11,700 MSL).

When you are done climbing, the tandem guy will scoot up to you and connect himself to you from 4 points, 2 on the shoulder, and 2 on the hips, they can each hold 5000 pounds. The pilot will inform the instructor that he is ready to let you guys off, at that point the door will open, and the pilot will reduce the power to the plane's engine. The door opening is as worse as it gets, you look down, see the ground looming miles below you. You think to yourself "This is more than i signed up for, can i reschedule, no no no no no." The tandem instructor, who will more than likely have hundreds, if not thousands of jumps of experience, he does this every day, seeing this does not phase him. You are told to put your feet out on the gripped pad that sits over the landing gear, and are instructed to cross your arms.

After that, he will yell

 

"LETS...

 

 

GO...

 

 

SKYDIVE!!!!"

 

And you begin to fall out of the plane, but you don't feel the stomach drop feeling because you're already moving through the air. (Momentum is conserved because you are moving forward with the plane before drag eliminates your horizontal velocity)

 

You are immediately blasted into sensory overload, you have no idea what is going on, or you are freaking out, thinking you just jumped to your death, but once you get used to the feeling of it, you start to realize, "hey, this isn't so bad, i like this."

A minute feels like 5 minutes or 5 seconds.    (Felt like 5 seconds to me)

Then you feel something pulling you straight back, lasting about 4-5 seconds, the parachute deploys, letting you know that it's alright, you're not gonna die.

The feeling of excitement fills your brain, you just survived falling 7,000 feet, and you now have a cool story to tell your family and friends on the ground.

5 minutes of serenity, and getting to fly the chute later, the instructor takes control, and you both brace to land.

"When i tell you too, i want you to lift your legs up as high as you can get them."

"Ready?.......... do it now"

You lift your legs up, the parachute slows WAAAAY down as the instructor pulls on the toggles together to brake the chute, and you land on your butt (or feet) on the ground at probably 5-10 mph, nothing too painful.

The parachute falls beside you, and the instructor detaches himself from you, and you jump up, feeling like you can do just about anything. 

 

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

This is just my version of my experience, im sure everyone's experiences will be different. I felt like sharing this, that away you can know somewhat of what your Kerbals feel when you throw the unsuspecting victim out the hatch in KLO.

One hour (about 15 minutes) of ground school,

$210 dollars (USD) was my price.

My skydive:

https://imgur.com/a/qL0nIYl

Edited November 27, 2018 by TheKorbinjer
Grammar checks. (again)2

[tater]

You jumped out of a perfectly good airplane? Are you nuts?

[Tonka Crash]

I did a few static line jumps. One of the coolest aspects was when you stepped out into the breeze you grabbed the wing strut and worked your way up to the wing. You feel like Superman flying through the air before you let go. 

The place I went encouraged learning.  After 2 jumps they started training how to pack chutes. Getting ready for jump 3 an instructor walked me through packing. Before jump 4, I packed the chute with an instructor observing. He missed that I had the chute wrapped around the riser. I got a full canopy, but the lines were tangled around the riser so I had very little control. They had trained us a full canopy was better than gambling on the reserve, so I rode it out.

As I got near the ground the wind blew me way into a cornfield next to the landing zone. Landing was hard as I couldn't really flare with the tangled lines. I landed butt first and moving fast to slide about 20 feet through corn stalks. As I I was laying there trying to figure out if anything was broken I saw the guy out of the plane behind me riding down on his reserve chute.

I was able to walk it off and drag the chute back to the hangar. I left, went to a bar and drank the pain away. By the next morning it looked like I had an eggplant growing out of the back of my leg from my knee to my ass.

[cubinator]

Very cool! I might like to try skydiving someday. Probably just once, though...

[YNM]

46 minutes ago, tater said:

You jumped out of a perfectly good airplane?

Are you sure it's that way ? XD

[qzgy]

Cool.

Kinda wanna try myself. I am quite nervous about heights though. And falling. It seems like one of those ideas that sounds fine on the ground but terrible 3 seconds before you jump.

[cubinator]

34 minutes ago, qzgy said:

Kinda wanna try myself. I am quite nervous about heights though. And falling. It seems like one of those ideas that sounds fine on the ground but terrible 3 seconds before you jump.

Remember, falling and weightlessness are one and the same. Think of the astronauts bouncing and spinning and enjoying themselves in their respective reference frames. And of course it's going to seem like a terrible idea when you've got one foot out of a damn airplane.  That's just part of the experience.

Edited October 11, 2018 by cubinator

[razark]

2 hours ago, tater said:

You jumped out of a perfectly good airplane? Are you nuts?

I would like to report a forum bug: It is impossible to like a post repeatedly.

 

1 hour ago, qzgy said:

It seems like one of those ideas that sounds fine on the ground but terrible 3 seconds before you jump.

I am one of those that gets a bit queasy at heights.  I'm fine in a plane.  I just don't know if I could make myself get out of the plane, let alone let go of it.

 

1 hour ago, cubinator said:

Think of the astronauts bouncing and spinning and enjoying themselves in their respective reference frames.

Yeah, but those guys have walls around them.  They can't see the planet below them.  (At least, I'd like to think that makes a difference.)

[GearsNSuch]

Wouldn't it be skydove?

 

 

 

Sounds like it was an enjoyable experience. Always nice to hear about people having a good time; thanks for sharing!

Edited October 11, 2018 by GearsNSuch

[Reactordrone]

Letting go of the plane is one of the hardest parts. Your brain's kind of asking why you're standing outside an aeroplane at 14,000ft.

[p1t1o]

Not to #humblebrag, but I have almost done this too! Probably the most enjoyable hing I have almost done in my life.

 

 

[XB-70A]

13 hours ago, qzgy said:

Cool.

Kinda wanna try myself. I am quite nervous about heights though. And falling. It seems like one of those ideas that sounds fine on the ground but terrible 3 seconds before you jump.

It reminds me what an ex-paratrooper friend of mine was telling me: the first jump is always particular, and not so scary. You got boosted by adrenaline, and everything around is just incredible.  Then, the second jump is another story... we gave diapers to the guys just in case, because unlike the first jump, that's when most of them realized what they were doing! To be honest, we had a few full diapers.

[TheKorbinjer]

14 hours ago, tater said:

You jumped out of a perfectly good airplane? Are you nuts?

Honestly, I think so. Might just go get a check up with the doctor, just to see. xD

 

14 hours ago, cubinator said:

Very cool! I might like to try skydiving someday. Probably just once, though...

I am already planning to do it again.    ( Graduation gift )

(for being the first person in my family to graduate high school in over 5 generations.) 

[TheSaint]

37 minutes ago, XB-70A said:

It reminds me what an ex-paratrooper friend of mine was telling me: the first jump is always particular, and not so scary. You got boosted by adrenaline, and everything around is just incredible.  Then, the second jump is another story... we gave diapers to the guys just in case, because unlike the first jump, that's when most of them realized what they were doing! To be honest, we had a few full diapers.

My dad joined the Army in 1939, and for his second billet in 1941 he volunteered for the Airborne. He did his minimum three jumps to get his badge, then said, "To Hell with this!" and talked his way out of it and into the Armored, wound up as a tank driver.

[SpaceMouse]

Awesome! Not sure I'd be brave enough to jump out of a plane. I'd much prefer to just sit in front and be well-buckled.  I think it was probably something larger than a Cessna 172 you jumped from though. The 172 is only about the size of a compact car and only has two doors next to the pilot and co-pilot.

[cubinator]

14 hours ago, razark said:

Yeah, but those guys have walls around them.  They can't see the planet below them.  (At least, I'd like to think that makes a difference.)

I imagine when the engines cut out it's like being on an elevator when it starts to go down. When acceleration is constant your brain isn't panicking, but when you feel jerk (the derivative of acceleration) upwards you feel like you're falling. The astronauts on the Moon were fine because you get used to any constant acceleration. Once you're floating for a moment, you'd probably only be dizzy.

1 hour ago, TheKorbinjer said:

 

I am already planning to do it again.    ( Graduation gift )

Congrats! I have a vague feeling that while logically I just want to do it once, there is a part of me that will get up off the ground afterwards and say "again, again!" 

[TheKorbinjer]

1 hour ago, SpaceMouse said:

Awesome! Not sure I'd be brave enough to jump out of a plane. I'd much prefer to just sit in front and be well-buckled.  I think it was probably something larger than a Cessna 172 you jumped from though. The 172 is only about the size of a compact car and only has two doors next to the pilot and co-pilot.

 

1 door for the pilot, and a large clear door that opened from the bottom and hung out at the bottom of the wing.

It may have been a 182, I didn't check. When I return, i'll be sure to remember the N-number on the tail, so I can do an FAA N-number registry search to find out exactly what it is.

 

I neglected to add that at 12000 feet, do expect the air to be between cool and freezing cold. 3 degrees temperature drop per 1000 feet of altitude gain.

For reference, it was 76 on the ground when I jumped.

10,900 feet just round it up: 11000 feet.

11* 3 = 33. 76-33 = 43 degrees fahrenheit at altitude.

Go ahead and slap wind chill on there, 120 mph wind speed

Boom, 25 degree wind chill. You better believe that the only reason why I didn't want to jump from a plane was because it was (literally) freezing cold.

I'm not kidding. Door flew open, and i was shook by that chilly air.

Edited October 11, 2018 by TheKorbinjer

[Delay]

How can you jump out of a 172? You have a big strut in the way, don't you?

[TheKorbinjer]

4 hours ago, Delay said:

How can you jump out of a 172? You have a big strut in the way, don't you?

You don't. The strut is in front of the landing gear, which you use as a step.

[Orc]

Congrats TheKorbinjer.

 

You are crazier than most, and have now lived more than most.

 

Do you still have Life Insurance?

 

In my country your Life Insurance is automatically Null and Void after you decide to make one jump. And no one will sell you a new policy after that.

 

Which seems a little strange now that I think about it. They don't Null and Void people's insurance for smoking, drinking or driving like an idiot (this is South Africa - everyone (except me) is driving like an idiot). They might penalize you but they don't terminate your cover. Given the safety record in the sky diving business its safer to take a plane and a parachute to work than it is to drive to the airport to catch your plane. 

 

Anyway, well done. Is this a once-off or are you going back for more? I know/knew a couple of people who did it once and couldn't kick the habit. I say 'knew' because I lost track of them, not because they ... er... didn't make it back in one piece.

 

Take care, have fun, be careful.

REgards

Orc

[TheKorbinjer]

7 hours ago, Orc said:

Congrats TheKorbinjer.

 

You are crazier than most, and have now lived more than most.

 

Do you still have Life Insurance?

 

In my country your Life Insurance is automatically Null and Void after you decide to make one jump. And no one will sell you a new policy after that.

 

Which seems a little strange now that I think about it. They don't Null and Void people's insurance for smoking, drinking or driving like an idiot (this is South Africa - everyone (except me) is driving like an idiot). They might penalize you but they don't terminate your cover. Given the safety record in the sky diving business its safer to take a plane and a parachute to work than it is to drive to the airport to catch your plane. 

 

Anyway, well done. Is this a once-off or are you going back for more? I know/knew a couple of people who did it once and couldn't kick the habit. I say 'knew' because I lost track of them, not because they ... er... didn't make it back in one piece.

 

Take care, have fun, be careful.

REgards

Orc

Hi, Orc

 

Well, there was a section in the waiver, the one where I signed my life away, where I had to put down whether or not I had life insurance, i of course checked the box that said "None" because I live life (over) the edge ;D

Edited October 12, 2018 by TheKorbinjer

[Dartguy]

I made 2 tandem jumps when I was young.  Absolutely awesome!

I found out not long ago that the trainer I jumped with died in a tandem jump.  He actually flipped himself under the tandem partner and absorbed the impact, saved that guy's life.

His name was Mike Costello, a real hero.

[TheKorbinjer]

On 10/12/2018 at 3:50 PM, Dartguy said:

I made 2 tandem jumps when I was young.  Absolutely awesome!

I found out not long ago that the trainer I jumped with died in a tandem jump.  He actually flipped himself under the tandem partner and absorbed the impact, saved that guy's life.

His name was Mike Costello, a real hero.

That's really sad. I couldn't imagine what his family went through.

_____________________________________________________________________

Not related:

Looks like im gonna skydive with a friend now, can't wait.

[CharmSado]

This is indeed a breath-taking journey. I am shivering here already. Thanks for sharing your experience with us.

[StrandedonEarth]

On 10/12/2018 at 1:50 PM, Dartguy said:

I made 2 tandem jumps when I was young.  Absolutely awesome!

I found out not long ago that the trainer I jumped with died in a tandem jump.  He actually flipped himself under the tandem partner and absorbed the impact, saved that guy's life.

His name was Mike Costello, a real hero.

I seem to recall hearing about that...

On 10/11/2018 at 11:06 PM, Orc said:

In my country your Life Insurance is automatically Null and Void after you decide to make one jump. And no one will sell you a new policy after that.

When I got life insurance, the agent said one jump wasn't a problem, as the odds of an accident are pretty low. But if you were a professional skydiver, expect a very expensive policy. But that may have been specific to Sun Life.

On 10/11/2018 at 5:06 PM, TheKorbinjer said:

You don't. The strut is in front of the landing gear, which you use as a step.

I did one static-line jump from 3,000 feet when I was about twenty (some 28 years ago now), so I'm familiar with that step, as you can see in this pic (yes, that's me, since I was the last out I got the best pic since the instructor held the camera). Step on the step, hold the strut and then just... let...go... I know I was supposed to count the seconds until my chute was supposed to open, but my mind went completely blank, aside from "Whooooaaaaa..."