The Boogie

Between Friday at 1:00pm and 11:00 this morning I left the dropzone for a grand total of 30 minutes to get food.

Friday was cloudy and miserable. A few of the people coming in from out of state arrived late in the evening, but most didn't get there until early Saturday morning.

Jump #18

I was on the one load that went up in the evening, and we only made it to 4,000ft because of the cloud cover. I managed to hit the step with either my chest or my arms (I thought I felt my chest hit, but Katie said it looked like I hit my forearms from where she was) as I exited. I didn't end up bruising from it, so I'm no worse for wear. I've never had to think about avoiding the step before, but you can bet it will be on my mind for many climb-outs to come. Hitting the step knocked me vertical, and it took about 10 seconds to get back on my belly and stable. It was pretty windy, and after I landed the wind pulled me over and then dragged me about 5 feet before I got my steering line pulled in far enough to collapse the canopy.

Saturday was even more miserable. The winds were between 20 and 30 miles an hour for the majority of the day. A total of two loads braved the weather. After watching their landings, it seemed pretty obvious to me that they probably shouldn't have jumped at all. A couple of people got dragged all the way across the landing area and only stopped because spectators ran out to help collapse their canopies.

Saturday night was interesting, to say the least. For dinner we had a whole pig, with an apple in its mouth and all. Watching the guy who was carving it pull the skin off like a peel on an orange made me almost sick to my stomach. Seeing the cooked blood that had dripped down from its ears wasn't exactly appetizing either. I got up the guts to go ahead and eat some, and of course it was delicious, but I could definitely go without having such a vivid reminder of where my food comes from ever again. We had a huge bonfire, and the fire department showed up after either a neighbor or a passerby called to report a structural fire. Our only guess is that, from a distance, they saw the frames of the old worn out couches we were burning and mistook them for a house. In all the time I spent standing around the fire and listening to the cover band play inside, I had a chance to talk to a huge number of new people, many of whom had come from Washington and Montana for the weekend. I love listening to the old timers talk about the crazy stuff they did in their younger years, even though some of the stories they shared seemed so outlandish that they couldn't possibly be true.

Late in the evening we had a toast to Michelle who was among the 10 people that died in last October's plane crash over the Cascade Mountains. Even though I never even met her, I got teary eyed several times as I listened to Michelle's friends and family share fond memories and express how much they miss her.

Sunday the weather was decent. There was still some wind, but it was at least jumpable. Midway through the day was the 8-way ash dive for Michelle. It was a very somber moment to see the puff of white as they released her ashes into the sky. Kevin was one of the 8 jumpers. He had pretty severe line twists on opening, and because he had opened so low and the canopy he jumps is highly loaded and descends really quickly, there was no time to try to get out of the twists. He ended up cutting away and going to his reserve around at 1500ft. That was the first time I've seen someone cut away.

After the ash dive, there was going to be a record attempt for a women's 9-way jump, but several of the women who had planned to participate got caught up elsewhere. Thus the record attempt had to be rescheduled.

Jump #19

As the afternoon turned to evening, I finally got back up in the air for a coach jump with Ben. After diving out on his count I was supposed to dock with him, but I couldn't seem to get my body position correct to move forward. Instead I literally flew in circles around him. I was extremely relieved to have a nice soft opening with no malfunctions on this jump. Why? Because after my hop and pop on Friday, I packed it by myself. Granted, Rick watched me pack a lot of it, but I did everything myself.

Jump #20

As soon as I got down from the jump with Ben, I went to manifest to see if there was time for me to make one more. John, one of the very experienced jumpers who usually jumps over at the Caldwell DZ, asked if I would do a two-way jump with him. I kept trying to explain to him that I don't even have my A license yet and that considering the fact that I couldn't even successfully dock on my previous jump there was absolutely no way I would be able to pull off any relative work, but he was insistent that I'd do fine. He got the approval of the DZO to jump with me (since he's not actually a coach or an instructor and I'm not licensed yet we had to get permission), and then proceeded to brief me on what we would be doing on the jump. I continued to remind him that I was very new to skydiving and that the jump would be a mess. He continued to tell me it would all work out. Since the jump would at very least count towards the 25 needed for my A license, I went ahead with it. I quickly packed my parachute, this time unsupervised. Fortunately for me, someone walked by and noticed a stupid mistake I made in my line stows, possibly preventing what could have been my first malfunction. We exited the plane, John docked with me, we turned a couple of quick points, but then fall rate discrepancies between the two of us made the rest of the jump a total mess, just as I had predicted. I spent the final 20 seconds trying to flatten myself out to slow down, while John spent it trying to arch harder and speed up to catch me. At 4500ft we both gave up, turned, and tracked. I pulled just below 4000ft. Once again, I breathed a huge sigh of relief to see a good canopy above my head.

Even though not much jumping went on for most of the weekend, it was still a fun-filled few days. My plan to complete all of my A license requirements is pushed back again, but I'm not too bothered by it. I have to successfully complete two dive and docks somewhere in my next 5 jumps in order to get my A right at the 25 jump mark. Tomorrow there is supposed to be a pilot at the DZ in the evening. I'll plan on going out after class again.