Basejumper.com - archive

Hi, folks. I've posted over 250 Bridge Day jump photos, taken from next to the LZ. Here's the link:

http://ekhphoto.smugmug.com/.../3694923/1/211964821

Portraits, face-plants, and ballet-like landings -- lots of close-ups as well as distance shots. Enjoy!

Eric Hatch Photography[

http://ekhphoto.smugmug.com/photos/211964821-S.jpg

Looks bad for this guy!

http://ekhphoto.smugmug.com/...4821#211976231-XL-LB

Nice shots... want to trade some?

You saw the follow up shots right?

http://ekhphoto.smugmug.com/...4821#211976375-XL-LB
http://ekhphoto.smugmug.com/...4821#211976532-XL-LB
http://ekhphoto.smugmug.com/...4821#211976689-XL-LB
http://ekhphoto.smugmug.com/...4821#211976806-XL-LB
http://ekhphoto.smugmug.com/...4821#211977116-XL-LB

Way to hook yourself into the ground...

Yeah, I was leaning against that curved
tree shooting landings when he hit it and
was damn glad when he fell it was not
on me

On the upside, I got the shot & know it
will make it into the final BD 07 video.

BTW, Hope the guy is recovering nicely

It sure seems like a lot of people in those pics have their toggles buried while there still quite a ways off the ground...

What bugs ME is the amount of the hard landings that you see - and most from people wearing sneakers/low tops. Do people ever learn ?

I had three very nice soft stand up landings.

On my first, I swooped the canopy a bit with a 90 hook turn, the next were more traditional straight in approaches.

When I landed the quasi-swoop, people in the landing area yelled "nice" and clapped.

This was my first jump, but maybe the 300th jump that day. I wondered why a "typical" landing was so impressive. Then I turned around and saw 10 people in a row burn it in, PLF (or try to), hit the deck, etc.

It is for this reason I think Bridge Day MIGHT hurt our fight more than help our fight, to get NPS open year around. All it takes is the photos and video of the landing area to prove we need medical personnel on site for every jump. What, 8 ambulance rides for 876 jumps? That is 1%?

It was actually 7 ambulance rides, but you are correct that it's too many. Everyone at BD had more than 100 skydives, but the average was well over 1200. The average number of BASE jumps was near 70 for all jumpers. So why are people still pounding in?

-Tight landing area
-Should have landed in the water
-Bad canopy skills
-Some minor turbulence at 150' AGL due to Friday's storm.
-Wind directions shifting 180 degrees every few minutes

Normally, there are 3-4 ambulance rides each year. So even after we raised the requirements, more people got hurt. Personally, I tip-toed into the LZ and I often wonder what the big deal is. There are MANY worse LZ's in BASE jumping.

7 ambulance rides does not look good and it's the first thing you'll hear from NPS and other organizations in Fayetteville when asked about expanded jumping. Of course, when we eventually control our own landing area, it'll be 100% sand or pea-gravel with no tall trees....

As I've heard it, you weren't tip-toeing when you hit that tree in Moab some years back. OOOWWIIEEEE!!!!!