Tag: skydive

Posted on by — 2 Comments

Jumping in SA is cheaper than here =(

Well, as far as I’ve been able to read, as it stand, Lance has got it way better than I do in Canada…

A jump ticket here is 35$ Canadian (34$ us give or take)
Packing is only 6$ though. So if you have your own rig, it’s 41$ if you have your rig packed. Add another 30$ if you rent a rig.
It’s July, I’ve done 2 jumps this month so far, (Not kidding)
I’ve done 48 overall this year, 10 of which were my AFF, 10 were my RW course, 2 were with camera men to film my “flip” attempts and the rest fun jumps and have easily spent 6000$ so far… This doesn’t include buying a jumpsuit or helmet.

As it stands, my money can go much farther in Lodi California than it can here or in South Africa, but it’ll cost me a fortune to go there in the 1st place. (In Lodi it’s about 9$ a jump+ packing) But given the choice, I’d rather jump in South Africa… Lodi isn’t exactly the nicest looking part of the world.

As for wing loading, the DZs here don’t limit you with anything, they just want to make sure you’re comfortable jumping with whatever loading you choose.
Right now, I’m jumping a 1.16 loading and am looking at downsizing to 1.32 by the time I buy my rig next april (We can’t jump in the winter, so it’ll be the equivalent of downsizing in October).

So I stick to my grounds on saying that SA’s got it somewhat better 😛

Then again, I’m not really sure of the average income/cost of living there though but judging from all the “sponsor a child in Africa” commercials, I guess I can see why it’s not affordable for most people.

Fill me in Lance!
– Adam

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Skydiving in South Africa

Right – I guess I should start off with describing how EXPENSIVE skydiving is here in relation to the general income (I’ll try make this as easy to understand as possible).

Skydiving in South Africa has unfortunately reached a point where it is reserved for professionals. I am sure not why this is, but it a major factor behind skydiving here not being as accessible as it is in the rest of the world.

To put it in context – A jump ticket cost me R200 (roughly $26.50), gear hire and packing – $9.90 each jump. Considering I normally take home around $2000 per month after TAX (Which in Rands is a fairly decent salary).

So – By the time I pay for my car, rent, food, cell phone  etc, I am usually left with around $260 to jump with 🙁

I can’t really compare the cost side of things to the US as I don’t know how much it costs relative to the average salary, however – In South Africa, jumping is out of reach for the general public 🙁

Other than the costs involved, Jumping in South Africa is pretty much the same as anywhere else in the world, just on a smaller scale. We only have about 6 Drop Zones in the whole country, but I plan to jump at all of them 🙂

As for BEER FINES, yes – we have them 🙂 but on a smaller scale. For passing my AFF progression, I was rewarded with having to buy a case of beer, and while everyone sits around drinking my beer, they laugh at all my AFF videos. I then had to tell a story that begins with “Oh SHIT, there I was – I thought I was going to die…(insert story here :-))”  Then had to down a beer within 5 seconds, and if you don’t finish it – pour it on your head. Haha – Good Times!

For our “Firsts”, we have to do down-downs, not buy cases of beer – This suits me just fine because two cases of beer is equivalent to one jump ticket, and I’m sure everyone knows – when you first get into the sport, there are A LOT of firsts!

Things are looking very promising for the skydiving future of South Africa as; recently a very wealthy business man decided to invest in uplifting the sport. So far he has built and upgraded various drop zones around the country, bought 6 ex South African Air force planes (Previously known as Atlas Kudu’s) and is currently in the process of having them all converted to turbine engines. The first three have been rolled out (My DZ currently has one). These are now called Atlas Angels and have a wicked paint job :-). The idea is that once all 6 have been converted, 5 drop zones will each have one and there will be a spare for when one goes in for a service! I love these planes – it takes just 12 minutes from take-off to 12 000ft, and about the same time back to the end of the run way.

Although the Angels only hold 9 skydivers, they are normally on their way back up with load 2 by the time the tandems from load 1 are landing 🙂

See below pic’s of my favourite jump ship 🙂

One thing I love (Especially now being winter here), from about 7 000ft and up the view is amazing! To the right of the plane, we can see the Drakensburg Mountains, covered with snow, and to the left, we see the entire Durban coast line and even the arch of our new stadium!

Those are the main differences that I know of – the only other minor difference is: Here, the maximum wing loading for a “Beginner / intermediate” skydiver is 1.0 as opposed to the 1.1 in the US, not a huge difference, but for me – it’s the difference between being able to fly a 170 vs. a 150. Meaning that now (Because I’m in the process of buying my FIRST rig) I have to buy a 150 canopy, and look at it in the cupboard while I jump a 170 till I get my B-License 🙁 as the 150 is going for a great price and don’t want to lose out!

I haven’t been able to jump anywhere other than in South Africa, so I’m just going on what I’ve read. Please feel free to add a comment if there is anything specific that you would like to know about.

Blue skies everyone and happy days!

Posted on by — 6 Comments

A Little Intro

Hi everyone,

I thought it best to introduce myself…

Hi, my name is Lance, and I’m a skydiving addict! It’s been exactly 2 days and 19 hours since my last fix and I’m getting serious withdrawal’s – I like to call this “Altitude Sickness” 🙂

I live and jump in Durban, South Africa and needless to say, skydiving here is not quite what it is in the US and the rest of the world. Yes – It IS as awesome and as addictive as it is everywhere else in the world, but it is not as “Big” here as it is everywhere else…but hey – that just means I can get on more loads! 🙂

I’ve currently only got 39 jumps under my belt and am about to start (this weekend) my free fly training for my CAT II & III (Super excited).

I guess you could say that skydiving is in my blood – My parents actually met skydiving in Ohio, although my mom decided it wasn’t for her after landing in a tree, my dad went on to do 600 odd jumps and get his D-License.

I am very grateful to my dad for marrying a US Citizen, because it means that I am also a US citizen which would allow me to travel and jump in the USA without having to worry about visa’s 🙂 THANKS DAD!

I love skydiving life! Skydiving has completely taken over my world and only skydivers ACTUALLY understand how addictive it is, and why it’s pretty much the only thing I talk about!

Anyway, I am very excited about being able to write for Skydive Addiction and give my insight into the skydiving life in my part of the world.

Blue Skies everyone and happy days!

Posted on by — 5 Comments

The bug has bitten

“How do you describe your first jump?” I was asked.

“A perfect blend of sheer terror combined with complete peace.” Was the only response I could find that fit what had just occurred.

I was fortunate enough that the winds had subsided last Friday, and I was able to make the first static line jump of my progression. And like I said, it was the perfect blend of both terror and beauty. For those of you unaccustomed to the wonderful world of skydiving, it’s hard to put into words exactly what a canopy ride is like. At first, it’s completely blissful – the loud sounds of freefall wind and aircraft engine have long since faded out, and all you can hear is your parachute gently fluttering in the air, as it floats down towards the earth.  I laughed, giggled as you may say, as I discovered how easily I could point myself where I wanted to go. I could see everything; a three mile wide lake was like a puddle from here. Cars were toys that seemed to move so slow on roads stretched so thin. Then the roads got bigger, the lakes wider, and I realized I was quickly coming back to the world I only recently left. Then it was terrifying.

“What’s my heading? Where should I start my landing pattern? Which way is the wind coming from again, north-northwest? Where’s that? Wait the runway points which direction?”

Then I realized that Corra, my jumpmaster, was still with me via radio, and talked me down the entire rest of the journey. Like I said, pure bliss, and completely terrifying – and I can’t wait to do it again.

So far I’m in love with the Static Line Progression. I may not have gotten to freefall yet, but learning to freefall correctly should come easier, because I’ll already have some canopy flying experience – compared to an AFF program, where I would be free-falling and piloting my parachute on the same jump.

Tomorrow, I get to jump again. If the weather holds out as long as it is supposed to, I’ll be able to begin freefall. After a few solo free-fall jumps, I’ll be able to better compare the two programs. One thing I see that attracts people to AFF is that you do get free-fall right away. I realize that I’m sort of the static line exception – paying for all of my jumps at once allows me to basically jump as much as I can, where someone paying for each jump individually would want the most experience for the money up front. So the way I see it, if you saved the money and are ready to begin your skydiving license, go with the static line program if it’s available. It’s cheaper, and if you’re dedicated you can be freefalling a few days after you start the program. If you’re paying by jump, AFF gets you the biggest bang for your buck, right away.

What do you guys think? AFF or S/L? Either way, don’t just do one jump and quit, get you license! Blue skies.

Posted on by — 12 Comments

High altitude jump woo hoo!

Only 6 more sleeps until I get to do a high altitude 4 way jump with some friends.

For those of you who don’t know what that means… Normally, when you do a skydive, you jump out of the plane at 13500 feet. Or in some cases 10500 feet (if in a smaller plane).

If the plane is between 10000 and 13000 feet for more than 30 minutes, then they have to have oxygen available for the skydivers with a minimum of 1 mask for every 10 jumpers.

If above 13000 feet, everyone needs oxygen for the duration of the flight. (Exceptions are made for the first 500 feet at most DZs)

Above 20000 feet, each skydiver needs oxygen for the descent as well. (An oxygen bottle to jump with)

Now, because of all these regulations, Drop Zones reserve high altitude jumps for special occasions, plan it out months in advance (to be sure to have oxygen available) and take reservations as well.
I’ve been waiting 2 months for this coming Sunday.
Why?
Because this Sunday is gonna be my 1st experience with it.
What’s so special about it?
Well, when you jump at 13500 feet, it takes about 1500-2000 feet to stabilize, and an extra 500-1000 feet if you’re in a group to start doing formations. Leaving you about 11000 feet to play with right?

Wrong!
You separate at about 4500 feet and release your canopy at about 3000-3500…

So that leaves only 6500 feet of freefall to “play” in…. Falling at 174 feet per second, that’s only 37 seconds…

When falling from 20000 feet, you still need the 2500 or so feet to stabilize and start formations, plus separation at about 4500 feet, but that still leaves you 13000 feet to have fun with… OR 74 seconds of freefall with which to do your formation… You’re effectively doubling your play time…
Now that’s a LOT of falling =)

It’s costing 85$ plus canopy rental (Unless I can convince a buddy to lend me his :P)
And it’s gonna be 85$ well spent!

I’ll share my experience with you when I get home afterward!

Blue Skies!

-Adam

Posted on by — 2 Comments

Never thought that giving something would be so hard….

This week is one of the Héma-Québec blood drives, they’ve been putting ads all over the place with the whole “Give blood, give life” thing.
I figured to myself that I’ve done quite a bit of living, might as well share the wealth.

I’ve never actually done this before, so I wasn’t familiar with the procedures, so I decided Well, since I have a half hour lunch, been eating all day, that should be PLENTY of time.”

WROOOOONG!!!!

Turns out that the 2 minute procedure of drawing a liter of blood is actually followed by a 58 minute proceedure of filling out forms, answering questions and eating cookies….
I went to donate blood, and was sent packing because I wasn’t able to give them an extra half hour of my time…
I even offered to come back at the end of my work day, which is 4 pm give or take 10 minutes (sometimes I’m stuck working on something for a bit, but USUALLY I’m done at 4)

The woman tells me that they stop taking patients at 4 pm and aren’t willing to wait 5 MINUTES for one more…

They have a counter going on, and it’s aimed at 75 donors… They’re at 40 and today’s the last day… They spend millions on ads to get more donors, yet they can’t wait 5 more minutes for one?
Hell, they planted themselves inside the biggest office building in Montreal… 44 floors of offices, easily with 5-10 thousand employees overall, but they set themselves up to work 9-4?!?!
They’d have more donors being open from 7 am-9 am then 4 pm to 6 pm….
4 hour work day but at efficient times… Work smart not hard was something that I had always been told…

Anyways, I’m done ranting haha.

On another note: I WANNA B.A.S.E. MY OFFICE! Heck, if I don’t survive, Héma-Québec can take the blood that splatters on the pavement 😉

-Adam

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Statistically speaking, the airplane ride is the most dangerous part of the skydive (AKA why I decided to get my license)

What a day. In the last twenty-four hours I’ve slammed two 16oz redbulls, wrote some code for a few Facebook pages, toured 5 apartment buildings, almost fell to tears when I saw how much tuition has gone up and – oh yeah, signed up for a crash course in skydiving. And it’s only Thursday.

My name is AJ Stuyvenberg. I decided after my freshman year at the University of Minnesota that I’d rather stay in town for the summer and try to find work, than to go back to my small hometown and live with my family. I got a job at a bar, and a print shop, and haven’t looked back yet.

Which brings me to my skydiving tale. I’ve been looking skywards since I was a little kid, throwing army men with parachutes, even putting on a Superman cape, running down the hallway and diving head-first onto my couch asking my dad “Am I getting higher daddy? Am I flying?”

Naturally the day I turned 18, my friends and I took a break from a weekend of camping and drinking to hurl ourselves out of a plane 13,500 feet in the air. Needless to say, I was hooked.

Here’s the video – Warning, it’s uncensored:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zH4aKlQIV3s[/youtube]

Like everybody who was smart enough to make the decision to skydive, I felt the unceasing desire to gaze skyward and wish for that feeling back. It’s impossible to describe to anybody who hasn’t jumped before, but I literally could think and speak about nothing but skydiving for days.

The only problem was that I was heading off to college, and carrying 13,000 dollars in debt with me. That really didn’t bother me, as I immediately began donating plasma and saving a little bit each month, all winter. I knew what I wanted, and I was going to do it. Now the time has finally come. It’s official, I’ve registered for my first class in the Static Line Progression tomorrow, and will be writing about it the whole way.

Currently, I’m planning on finishing the progression in 4-5 weeks. I plan on jumping every Wednesday and Friday, and hoping to jump 2 or 3 times per week. We’ll see whether or not that happens, but since I’ve saved enough to pay everything up front, the only factors involved in progression will be time and weather.

I’ve decided to write a blog about skydiving for many reasons. Part of my internship at the print shop I work at is to plan, design, code and implement their facebook and twitter page. Whilst doing such, I stumbled upon many interesting, and funny blogs written by regular people. I have found that the more I work with these social media outlets, the more I love them. So moving onto a blog was natural.

Secondly, I’ve found that an increasing number of DZ’s are moving to an AFF-only method of instructing students. I think the Static Line method of instruction is quickly falling out of favor because it takes longer to achieve freefall, and DZ’s charge less for it. Adam pointed out that nobody on staff at Skydive Addiction progressed using the S/L method, and thought I may have an interesting perspective. Hopefully I do!

I’m incredibly excited to begin tomorrow. I received a call from the DZ with both good news, and bad news. The good news is that nobody else will be at the course, so I’ll be there getting one on one attention from a jumpmaster. The bad news, is that the winds might be a little high for me to jump tomorrow, so it might have to wait til next Wednesday. I’ll be sure to post as much video, pictures, and blogs about them as I have time for.

I invite you all, jumpmasters, skydivers, students and enthusiasts a like leave a comment. I love hearing from new people, and I really want to see what you guys think. Did you start your skydiving addiction through AFF or S/L? Which do you think is better? Why?

Posted on by — 1 Comment

A quick welcome to…

The newest addition to the family!

When I spoke to AJ, he seemed very very very enthusiastic about his future addiction….
He’s starting his skydive lessons tomorrow.

So this is both a good luck, and a welcome to the family!

Blue Skies!
-Adam

Posted on by — Leave a comment

WEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Sorry for the long delays in between postings, I’ve just been so busy with my new job, with my summer plans, with getting Skydive Addiction on the map, with making excuses as to why I haven’t been posting, with procrastinating posting, and with a bunch of other stuff.

Seriously speaking though, getting Skydive Addiction on the map is my #1 priority…
Behind skydiving of course 😛

So anyways, this past weekend, I managed to convince 8 of my friends from a couple of DZs I jump at to join me on a bungee jumping road trip.
Needless to say, I heard at least 20 skydivers say:
“Are you crazy? How could you jump off a perfectly good bridge… WITHOUT a parachute?”

Yes, that’s right… Skydivers asked me the most God awful question in the world…
Why wouldn’t I? It’s quite a different rush from skydiving, and it’s a welcome change from the regular routine… Given, it’s not something you’d find me doing every day, but it’s fun once in a while.

So we headed to the Great Canadian Bungee which claims to be the highest bungee jump in North America. It’s 200 feet over a very very blue lake. Beautiful place actually.
I jumped there last year (as you can see on one of my 1st posts). And it was a lot of fun, so I decided to head back.

Turns out that when you’re 8 or 9 people, it’s actually cheaper to pay for 10 then it is to pay for 8 or 9… Group discount… So that’s exactly what we did.
And since I organized it, my friends were quick to put my name down as the person to do two jumps.
S-WEET!!
So the 1st person to jump is a girl named Stephanie, she’s done 5 tandem skydives, but doesn’t have her license yet. She’s never done a bungee jump however.
(They went by weight)
After 7 minutes of her standing at the edge not jumping and 7 minutes of myself and one of the other guys yelling at her to hurry up, she finally took the plunge… Ok, well she held hands with the instructor and he slowly lowered her backwards until she finally fell. HI HI =)

The others jumped right away, which was a welcome sight =D

My first jump was a normal forward dive with my ankles strapped in, didn’t give me the same adrenaline rush as the 1st time though (Which pretty much proved that once you face a fear, you never get that same rush again =( )

I even tested it… I started running back up the hill to get to the top… Half way up, I couldn’t breathe anymore… If I had an adrenaline pumping through my veins, I probably would’ve made it up without breaking a sweat.
So on the 2nd jump, I decided to strap myself in by the shoulders. The instructors at the top told me that since I was so comfortable with jumping off the bridge that I could do a flip this time.
We decided that I’d do a back flip. That back flip then turned into a double and if I had known how much more time I had, I probably would’ve been able to get a third in. Damn me and my dissatisfaction!!!!!

So after spending 2 and a half hours at the bungee jump place, we then decided to go grab breakfast at some random place in town… This place was on the 2nd floor of a supermarket… And I can say one thing… If we thought waiting for Stephanie to jump was a lifetime wait… Waiting for sunny side up eggs and toast to be prepared was an eternity.

Fast forward an hour and we arrive at Go Skydive. It’s one of those DZs that you wouldn’t be able to find if you didn’t know where to go… We didn’t know where to go.
We parked in the Gatineau airport’s parking lot, looked around for signs, but couldn’t find any.
We were given directions on how to walk there by a girl who had just completed her 1st tandem =).
So we get there, they check out our paperwork, the rigs we’re jumping, and so on.
Then they tell us that even though we’re regular jumpers who have jumped together before, they want us to jump with a coach ?!?!?!?!

My buddy Alex lent me his rig (Sabre I 170 in a Javelin J2 rig), he spent 15 minutes checking the gear making sure that everything was ok even after a rigger took a look at it and I had inspected it too… His reasoning was that he didn’t want my death on his conscience. I laughed, told him that I’d pull the reserve on purpose then went into the plane 😛

In the end, they decided to put 5 of us on a Cessna 182 (TINY plane!!!) instead of their Navaho (Still tiny, but bigger than the Cessna) but this time, we didn’t need a coach.
For those of you who don’t really know the difference, with a Cessna, you have to get out of the door, hang onto a strut below the wing, stand on a step and hang there before your jump.
On the Navaho, you jump out of the door. On the Twin Otter and the Caravans that my home DZs have, you not only jump out of the door, but you have a bench to sit on 😛

Anyways, the DZ’s landing area is bigger than the one at Parachute Montreal but the planes, much smaller.
The staff was nice, but the rigger who packed Alex’s rig after I jumped took ages… He also asked us different questions about the rig and forgot to collapse the pilot chute (a fairly dangerous mistake that can sometimes cause a malfunction). Anyways, all in all, I’d jump there again, but I’d also pack my own rig 😛

Blue Skies everyone!

-Adam

Posted on by — 2 Comments

My original plan for this year… My actual results

My original plan for this year: To have 40 jumps done by October (The end of the season here)

My actual results: It’s only the begining of July and I’m already at 47…

My original plan for this year: To spend no more than 1000$ on jumps after completing my solo course in florida…

My actual results: I’ve spent 3337$ (not counting the 1750$ for the solo course, the 350$ for the jump suit, or the 1200$ spent going to Florida to take that solo course)

My original plan for this year: To prepare myself for my A license and then possibly take the RW and packing courses at the begining of next season.

My actual results: I’ve not only completed my RW and packing course, I’ve already done the A license exam and sent it in, and am already somewhat started on getting my B…

My original plan for this year: Maybe buy a jump suit once I had some experience and start looking at gear for next year.

My actual results: I’ve had my jump suit since I took my solo course (before even completing my 1st jump, I had already bought a pit special with canvas grips and vented booties), I now have a black factory diver on the way (It’s still on back-order), I’m also waiting to demo an altimeter, and I have a packing tool already in the mail on it’s way to me… Yes, I have a packing tool on the way before even having a rig to pack 😛

My original plan for this year: To get comfortable with landing a student canopy and maybe try out a big sport canopy next season.

My actual results: I’m already bored with those slow student canopies, have been jumping sport 190s and am now looking at downsizing what I jump to a 170, to then possibly buy a 150 for myself… (For those of you who think 190, 170, 150 is all gipperish, it’s the size of the parachute, the bigger the parachute proportionally to one’s weight, the slower you descend, for example, a 190 is 190 sq ft, with a 1.0 load, it would be 190 lbs of weight, so the weight of the person + equipment would be 190 lbs. a load of 1.5 for the same weight person would be a 126 sq ft parachute (which would go down VERY fast). I’m right now looking at going to a 170, which would be a load of 1.088)

As you can see, and as I’ve noticed, I haven’t at all been in line with my original plans… I’ve surpassed all of them, which in some cases is a good thing… I.E. my level of experience, which is great. I still know NOTHING about the sport, but I know way more than I had originally hoped to :).
However, I’ve also spent more than triple my original budget for the year (For next year, I’m actually setting aside 4 times the money that I had set aside for this year, plus I’m putting 5k aside to buy a rig, so I’ll get double the jumps for the same money… I’m just hoping that I don’t overshoot THAT budget as well :-/)

– Adam out.

Hopefully your blue skies aren’t as smog filled as the ones I see outside my window right now =D