Skydiving!!

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white&yellow999

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So I went skydiving yesterday. It was awesome. The adreniline rush is like nothing I have ever expireniced, and it lasted all day. Thanks to the guys and gals at http://skydivedelmarva.com/ for the safe jump. Anyone else here ever gone skydiving?
 
Airborne, all the way here. 5 years as a paratrooper. No freefall, just static line stuff for me. However the sky dives are coming soon. Congrats on getting out the door-AKA putting your knees in the breeze!
 
My wife did it once before we ever met. I have no desire to jump out of a plane.


 
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Thats odd- most guys with a wife want to jump-
 
That ultimate base jumper guy is sick. Reminds me of this guy except he just climbs with no parachute.

 
I've never jumped. I remember the old man saying why would I jump out of a perfectly good airplane?
 
I've "jumped out of perfectly good airplanes" myself, wing walked, and taken part in other air-show antics. What a bunch of (fun) crazy people. Highly recommended for the fairly young (the parties alone would kill you otherwise - it's a wild bunch). It's a useful skill - not every perfectly good airplane stays that way. They tended to put too large a chute on me, so I had to learn to "drive" well or I'd land way the heck off the desired spot, coming down too slow. Fat guys have the opposite problem.

What amazed me is that my fear of heights went away over about 1-2k feet. It seems so surreal you think you could learn to fly in how long it'd take to hit. Higher, more so. Down close (my roof), I'm paralysed, almost. Funny old world.

Of course, at takeoff, we'd put our hands over the pilot's eyes so he couldn't see if he was going to clear the trees at runway end. Now, that's crazy (and dangerous).

You can get almost the same adrenaline from attending a machine gun shoot - on the correct end of the guns - it's amazing, and grins almost have to be surgically removed.

Now I'm an old fart, no way I do any of that again, but I'm glad to have done it before. Memories (from the parties that didn't make me lose them all, that is).
 
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we used to sneak onto the landing strip at night and lie down and let the jets fly over us. (Austin, Texas). Now THAT was stupid. I'm not against jumping, just never did it. Remember when my next door neighbors chute opened improperly because he packed it wrong. You only make the same mistake once. Can't remember how it ended (I was 14) but I think he lived. Reserve?
 
Respect, my man!

I wouldn't do that myself, unless my life, or life of my beloved ones depend on that

One curious thing about being afraid of heights (I personally am, ATM), is that you can get familiar with that, and train yourself, to NOT be afraid. Back in the time when daring mattered to me (young adult), I did go to some lengths, to overcome my fear of heights - and it worked. I mean, I was always uncomfortable with it to a some/slight degree, but it was OK, and even quite fun at times - to go climbing, do zip-line and stuff like that.

But crap like being brave and daring doesn't affect me anymore (oh, the joys of being in my late 30s ), so all that trained "comfort", has evaporated a long ago . It is not that I am being paralyzed, when up on the roof or the edge of a cliff, but I just don't like the feeling and don't feel the need to pretend otherwise, anymore
 
When we were working on the first phase of putting the panels up on my roof, both of us suffered from agoraphobia - even with the help of a bucket lift. Being proud rednecks, we did the work anyway.

But after a week we were so adrenaline-burned we had to quit before the job was finished. You can force yourself up to a point, but not much past it - we were just truly exhausted, and not from the work itself - just performing despite fear. I'm hoping to finish that job soon, weather, help, etc, willing. But I won't enjoy it much, just the results. Where I am, getting a panel just 10 feet higher gives me almost 2 more full power hours a day. Getting it 40 feet higher almost 3. It's a big deal in winter especially, but should also help cool the roof in summer; it does under those dual-triple rack guys already, and also seems to help keep heat in in winter. I've been testing with an IR thermometer. While the system could use some tweaking, it's a nifty side benefit.

Funny, when I was a kid, show me a tree and I'm out at the end of the topmost skinniest branch, for fun, and was a climber of other things. I just don't bounce like I used to and know it (the hard way).
 
Had a roofing co. for five years, also used to walk the top plate framing blah blah blah. Now I'm a cowardly homebody that doesn't even want to go anywhere ever. What a difference thirty years makes.
 
Jumping out of a perfectly good airplane is always fine.....so long as you have a perfectly good parachute.
 
All of us here did things during our younger years of "invincibility" that we wouldn't even consider doing now. I did several tandem dives in Homestead Florida back in the mid eighties and had a qualified blast doing so. Now, I figure I have already used up all of my "chances" so I wouldn't risk it, but for the younger of us I highly recommend doing it at least once. There is nothing quite as exhilarating as jumping out of a plane while nearly two miles in the air and free-falling for a bit.

All of that said, I still scuba dive, if infrequently, when I borrow a friends house in the 'Keys from time to time, which is probably statistically more dangerous than skydiving, but easier for more people to do since it does not involve stepping out of a plane at 145 mph in mid-air.
 

did a stint for a while when I was 27ish working for hospice in nursing homes. One of the things I most often heard was "oh I wish I was young again. I worked all my life to save to do the things I wanted to, and when I had the money my health was too poor..."
 
One of the fun things I loved to do with a Piper Warrior was to get way up around 5000 feet or so, and hold the plane so that you went weightless. You would be amazed at how long that free-fall-just-like the space station could last.

It did not accelerate, d'ysee. So if you were a mile up, you traveled a whole lotsa more than a mile in ground distance going down.
 
I'd rather be down here wishing I was up there, than being up there wishing I was down here.....
 
Goldhedge said:
I'd rather be down here wishing I was up there, than being up there wishing I was down here.....
Click to expand...
Well, alla youse Refugees know I am the oldest (prolly here, too) so GH just triggered an ole flying memory:

It was a washer-biter** -- There I was, over Schweinfurt in my B-17 with three engines burning and one of them turning... and the autopilot had just bailed out with the last parachute.

Left me with a silkworm and a needle. I was one busy summon a bench!

**A mission where your ass bites washers out of the seat.
 
I would like to go skydiving. I would have to pay someone to push me out the first time, though.
 
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