Re: [piercewhat] Packing a Direct Bag
Since I've been working at Apex BASE almost six months now I can compare it to the early 90s when I worked here doing the same thing but we were called Basic Research.
Sure, I know we are drawing in new BASE jumpers much earlier in their skydiving careers. But, frankly, I’m pretty astounded at the lack of gear knowledge so many prospective BASE jumpers now display. It wasn’t that prevalent before.
There’s always been a certain amount of hand holding in this sport, but back in the day a customer would call me and tell me what they wanted; now they ask me what they should get. There is confusion in even the little things like the difference between 0-3 and ZP fabric. “Oh yeah I get now, 0-3 is that stuff reserves are built from.”
That's a real sea change in BASE jumping.
For instance this direct bag thing. Okay, yes, they are somewhat out of favor nowadays, but some of the “wisdom” this fellow with his new direct bag is getting is really out there. One guy wrote him privately to say, "That's not a direct bag, it's a POD." And up-board there’s someone saying direct bags make for slow deployments like it's a fact of life.
In this time when many jumpers are so gear/rigging handicapped we probably should embrace the simplicity of things like direct bags. While some here act like they wouldn’t touch one with a ten foot pole the fact is direct bag deployments are tried and proven. In fact the major argument against them became not about reliability but more about the increased “freefall” time one could get off a low object by using static line or even PCA.
There’s been just one direct bag fatality (the holder dropped the bag) and it amazes me that when static line came into favor (two things imported by the Brits, the Beatles and static line BASE, and they should have quit after the Beatles) direct bag fell from favor but look at how many static line failures have since occurred. Aside from the fact you need an assistant everyone is forgetting Mark’s idea for the direct bag was just a better and safer way of static lining very low stuff.
Then a funny thing happened. Almost every BASE jumper who started in the mid-80s started on direct bag. It became the “tool” for teaching new BASE jumpers. “You can blow your launch, you can flail like your at an ethic funeral, you can even cover your eyes and scream like a baby, but I’ve got your bag, man, and everything’s gonna be cool.”
In fact none of us thought twice about putting a first time BASE jumper off a tower with a direct bag simply because direct bag was so reliable it negated the other factors. We would never put someone off a solid object for the first time any other way.
I’ll caveat the above by also saying the average new BASE jumper in the mid-1980s was more experienced, gear-wise, air-wise, and canopy control-wise than today’s new BASE jumper. That fact alone means mentors need to be a step above where they were twenty years ago. I know most of the professional and established first BASE courses are doing a great job, but I do worry more about the part-timers who maybe shouldn’t be a mentors at all. But that’s the price we’ve always paid for our freedom.
There is one thing that hasn’t changed and it's still good advice for all beginners – it’s not the drop zone, so be careful who you hang with.
Oh, wait a minute there’s the phone . . .
“Apex BASE, this is Nick.”
“Hey man, I need some of that breakable shoelace stuff cause I found this building and I want to static line it. Where do I tie it to?”
Gee, it’s going to be a long day . . .
NickD
BASE 194
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