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I’m not as good of a writer as DexterBase so deal with it!

I’m not quite sure if this should be here in the BASE section or not. I used a BASE specific canopy and it was within what you might call BASE altitudes. I just had quite a bit of fun doing this and thought I’d share. Tom if you feel this post doesn’t belong feel free to move it!

I generally do quite a bit of paragliding during the year. I’m trying to do more BASE jumping but at this point I’m stuck to legal bridges and water landings and the only really good one is a tad cold for me this time of year. So the only excitement I get is from my paragliding. **mental note – find another fun winter sport**
The last month or two, here in Southern California, haven’t been that great for paragliding. First there was the rain, and lots of it, then because of the rain the roads to launch were closed and then when the roads finally open the Santa Ana winds were blowing. Santa Ana’s are the winds from the desert. Usually strong warm wind out of the north, 180 degrees the wrong direction for paragliding around here. So, today was the first day in a long time that it was actually flyable. I showed up at the LZ along with about 50 other pilots. The conditions really weren’t that great. The wind was out of the south (that’s good) but only at about 1mph. That makes launches a little tricky. You really have to run, quite a ways. Yes there is a BASE aspect to this story eventually. You could tell there wasn’t much lift either, all the hawks flying around were flapping to stay aloft not soaring or thermalling gracefully like usual. Seeing as how I knew it wasn’t going to be a very long flight (we call a flight with little to no lift a sled ride) I decided rather than grabbing my paragliding wing I’d grab my Fox 225. I had it already packed in a specially made setup which allows me to do d-bag jumps from my friends tandem paraglider. As I was grabbing my d-bag I yelled to my friend to grab his tandem instead of his solo wing. He knew exactly what I was thinking. He looked at me, then at the hawks flapping away and said, “Good idea!” We threw the gear into the car and off we went. The whole way up I was trying to figure out what I was going to do. Would I release from the tandem as high as I could and practice a few canopy skills or did I want to try release from a low altitude just to see what it’s like. The lowest I had done so far was a little under 400 feet. I have a rule in life…you should try to scare the shit out of yourself at least once a month. It had been a good few months since I had done anything scary so…low altitude it was! We got to launch, set everything up and off we went. My friend flew the tandem out towards the LZ. On the way out he asked what altitude I was going to release at. I told him 250-300 feet. He leaned forward and said, “You crazy, no 500 feet!” (he’s French, his English isn’t that great) I said 300, he said 500 and we continued to bicker for a good few minutes. Finally he gave in. Truthfully he didn’t have much of a choice. I’m the one with the cut-away cables in my hand so…We finally got to about 700 feet, I looked down and thought oh that’s not too bad. Then came 500 feet, everything seemed much bigger. I was getting kind of nervous at this point. I thought, ok I’ve done this altitude several times at the good old potato bridge, no biggy. Then we got to 400 feet. Now I’m a little more scared. “Ok, I did this altitude last time.” I told my friend flying the tandem to do one more “S” turn and that should be good. After he finished the turn I looked at my altimeter, it read 253 feet. I looked down at a paraglider that was just landing. His wing looked awfully big. I’m pretty scared at this point but as I reach up for the cut-away cables my fear leaves and a huge smile gets plastered on my face. I say “cya!” to my friend and I release. The canopy opens nicely and on heading (no slider, d-bag…opens fast). I love that sound, the sound of the canopy opening. I’m pretty quick on the toggles, I release the brakes, make a 90 degree right, fly a few seconds, then a 45 left, fly a few more seconds and flare! The landing was fine and everything turned out great. I was quite surprised how little time I had under canopy. I’ve read all these stories aobut people freefalling sub 200 feet so I figured if I was d-bagging 250 I’d have a bit of time under canopy. I swear I only had about a 10 second canopy ride. I wasn’t timing it so I don’t really know but that’s what it sure felt like.

Any input from people as how much time they have for different delays from different heights?

It sure was fun to d-bag from that height, definitely an experience. I had several people come up to me afterwards saying something to the fact that they thought I was going to land and never release because I was so low.

Anyway, I thought some of you might enjoy a story. I’ve attached some pictures someone took of the jump. The second picture is funny to me to see one guy all by himself flying around on this HUGE tandem wing.

Enjoy!

 
>>To cool Russel, too cool.





>>Russel my friend, that's a nugget and a half!

Neat stuff.


I've been interested in Paragliding for a little while..... where do you play usually?

Great pictures! Great story! My favorite line...


nice work, man. that is too cool!

We were jumping all day today. But it's still a bit cold. I think today ranged from about 35-50.

Maybe we can talk to the county about installing some big heaters down in the canyon.

10 seconds from 250 feet sounds like a lot of canopy time. Sub 200' freefalls usually have canopy rides under 5 seconds. I believe the current low freefall record is held by BASE 587 (something around 140 feet?), and I seem to recall him having a non-canopy ride (he never got the toggles off, and just PLF'd the landing).

Nice Story!! If I return to India in April, I will take up paragliding. That is the cheap way to stay in the air and find some Exit points to return to in the future.

Kris.

Are you referring to the TARD in Washington?

No. Someone told me today that he had done an actual freefall deployment with a packed rig in that range. I haven't asked him about it personally.

Oh. That sounds about right. Would you classify a TARD as a freefall?

Better yet, can we just have them heat the water below to a nice 80 degress or so?

It may have been less than 10, I'm not sure. It seemed like 5 to me but I didn't want to say that and sound like a fool.

I knew it was going to be short but I guess I didn't realize how short. Someone mentioned to me beforehand that my canopy time would be less than 10 seconds but it never really dawned on me how short that was until I got to the ground.

Those of you that freefall those heights officially have MUCH more respect from me!

Nice choice. Those pictures look like so much fun! I know you told me the weather has been sucking lately, nice to hear it cleared for you.

Oh, and your story definitely belongs here. Very fun read.

Wow.. 5 seconds after direct bagging from 250? That seems awfully short. How much do you, your landing gear and your canopy weigh together?

If it was as little as 5, I wonder if you pulled the cutaway handle lower than 250.

One day at a not so local 240 bridge, I noticed that some of the jumpers being PCAed had very little canopy time while others were much much longer. I freefell the same bridge and had around 10 or 11.

Lots has to do with the canopy selection and wingload. I suspect the BlackJack 240 and the Black Jack 260 I've used from 250 have a much lower descent rate than your 225 Fox.

Freefalling a 270 B with an Ace 220, resulted in an 8 second canopy ride where as the Black Jack 240 from 250 was 11 seconds. The 11 second ride included a 90 degree flat turn .

By the way, screw DexterBASE, he sucks, your story rocks.

<ps, I read his story about 10 times it was rather good wasn't it>

It was more than 5 seconds but it didn't feel like it. I think it was around 10 or so. This gives me an excuse to try it again with someone filming.


Me and my landing gear produce a wing loading of about 0.8 on that canopy.

Yes, it was.

nice storry mate
10 secs d bag off 250 sounds like not so long time in my ears..

my lowest jump (off a 143ft S /SL jump) i had about 4 secs under canopy(its on the video i shipped to you..)
I cant rember how long time under canopy we had off that Day pylon in the vid but exit point is 230ft whith 1-1,5 sec delays(be aware that only i jumps the vented canopy,so results may warry))

whats your wing load under the 225?guess it must be high right...

i also think that dexter sucks yeah really

NO edit:Dexter,just kidding,trying to make more freinds

Not going to help you. We will now be taking you to the finest and most treacherous BASE objects Washington has to offer.

Be afraid..... be very afraid.... (((sinister evil chuckle)))

Cool jump.

A word of caution though for anyone considering a similar jump:

You said your alti read 253'. I'm guessing you were using a paragliding altimeter, and I'm also guessing that they are more precise than a typical skydiving alti.

However, skydiving altimeters aren't too precise, some have margins of error as high as a 100'.
This could be bad juju on a jump that's low to begin with!
-Josh

Great story Russel! I love the photos! You're friggin' amazing, my friend!
xo
K

he he cool one pm me some details

Your achievements and can-do attitude amaze me, keep up the good work man. You are an inspiration.

I have to agree with everyone. You are amazing. Those short ones are fun aren't they.

I was curious about your goal to get the rest of the objects. Do you think it would be possible to somehow roll your cart off of some over hanging platform and PCA off them? Enough speed will give you object seperation and the PCA would hopefully eleminate snag potential. The only problem I could is if the front tires left significantly sooner than the back tires you would start rotating head down.

Pat

I think it would be possible the way you mentioned. Although I'd like to try to stick with actual BASE gear if possible. That way I think I'd feel like I really earned my BASE number. I'd like to do it the same way everyone else does, as close as possible at least. I don't know. Is it considered a BASE jump if you don't use BASE gear? Hmm.

Edit to add: It would solve my ground landing dilemma I have right now.

I think a fox 225 is pretty BASE specific

Pat

You could always have 2 close friends just toss you off of something ...like a b with an elevator and a grass landing to slide in,or an old mattress,practice those accuracy landings
~J

The canopy is but the harness wouldn't be.

I've thought of stuff like that. How about me getting on someone's back with my canopy out over the edge (my risers going over their shoulders) and doing a rollover. After my canopy opens the other person would fall away and delpoy theirs. Would that be possible?

whatcha weigh?

No rig, about 120-125 lbs.
I'm light!

light yes... to bad I didnt have the experiance and a bridge near me

Might as well just go packed and dump after a second or two while the other person takes a healthy delay. Similar to what they do on the radix video. In Norway you could probably even land in water.
Pat

I'm saving that one for Bridge Day '05.

Mate how much can you turn in your torso? im thinking if a slightly bigger canopy(even as your light),you might be abel to plf?
sorry if my lack of info does this imposible...

I know theres a risk.. but theres also a pleassure

How hard would it be to stay on someone's shoulders like that? Could you support yourself with, say, hands on shoulders? Or would we need some kind of seat apparatus?

If hands on shoulders would work (with the person below holding your legs, of course), it ought to be easy enough to practice.

For the rollover I was thinking about just getting a piggy back on the other person. I wasn't thinking about sitting on their shoulders. The problem with going piggy back is that I'd be laying on their rig.
For Bridge Day '05 someone has offered to do a rodeo type jump. Again this would be piggy back I suppose.

Pretty much none.

I'll be jumping something bigger anyway.

Ooh, I don't think that would be a good idea. My bones break really easily and without a PLF I'd end up with my face in the ground. Granted that'd be funny to see but that is part of me I CAN feel.

he he(just got the visual)
yeah oki,just trying to figure out a way,whith out knowing shit