My Parachute Malfunctioned after filming a Tandem skydive forcing me to cut away.

[Qballfph]

I had 5 reserve rides in 1065 jumps, mostly because my first main was a falcon which are known for hard openings. blew up its centercell twice, & streamered it twice from my packing it to open slow. the other chop was a spinner on opening. retired it to hanging on the living room wall. there were other mals that I was able to clear, even had a bag lock that cleared if you can believe that. around 50 jumps into skydiving all I saw was the pilot chute, as I went for the chop, it opened. odd.

[Qballfph]

hahahahaha bastard. sounded like a refined englishman. I would have been screaming at the chute, fuck you piece of shit canopy.

[siwilk0]

@Qballfph Maybe, but it wasn't the canopy's fault. This wasn't my pack job. If it was it would have worked. :-) Bastard packer came to mind!! Hahahaha!

[Charlie1821]

As someone who just did his first tandem and is seriously thinking about getting into skydiving, this video helped confirm my decision. You were calm, cool and collected. And your statistic of only 2 malfunctions in 1500 jumps is awesome.

p.s. I love your clapping.

[tandemskydivingUK]

@Charlie1821 Cheers Charlie and Blue Skies! As they say in skydive world :-)

[Charlie1821]

@tandemskydivingUK

Many thanks!

[icpplc]

nice work smooth cut and at least u didnt have a line over and start cutting lines on your reserve!!

[proudmullet]

What a calm reaction! :D Thanks for posting this video. Very useful for a newbie like me. : )

[MissSmudge78]

Talk about calm dude, well done

[rosahlyn]

A job well done calmly and safely and a lesson learned regarding packing your own gear then your life is in your hands...., phew!

Well done!!

[siwilk0]

@rosahlyn

Cheers Ros :-)

[cmlegend]

Always keep your calm... good job !

[MgpMontville]

Horn you must be joking!!!

I have always packed my own gear apart from Tandems and it was never about my body position etc.........maybe if the camera flyer was ultra inexperienced or worse....even my stiletto 120 didn't like not much slack between lines loose and the D bag on the main. The closer I got (re less slack line) between the riser and the D bag the worse line twists and openings. Its all about knowing your canopy, not being a lazy assed fark getting someone else to pack for you!

[neomuttley]

Ironically, fighting the G-forces of a spin like that, involves straining as if you were trying to poop. Being in that situation usually makes you poop. YeeHaw ;-)...

[ohlookabunny]

FUCK I bet that was a relief.

[ajducina]

u wouldn't have to cut away if u had a bigger canopy....

but no speed no fun :D

[tandemskydivingUK]

maybe and cheers :-)

[mchamp3802]

umm only 25sec of freefall for the tandem? Altitude was somewhere at 9.5k?

Nice save btw

[tandemskydivingUK]

Or did the TI dump high?? :-)

[PCBlueSky]

Love that comment at the end - beautiful understatement. The packer or the canopy ??? lol

[bettyboop392]

can an experienced jumper tell me approximately how fast you are going when your lines twist, and could you survive if you tried to land like that?

[keeponwishin]

I am not very experienced, but I do know that it's not so much how fast your going when lines twist, but more of the fact that you will not be able to control your descent, which can become almost as dangerous. As for the surviving part, you probably could, but you'll be risking serious injury or death, and as long as I had a reserve, I'd rather just cut away, deploy the reserve, and land safely.

[symons3569]

'bastard'

lol

[keeponwishin]

I agree. I'd probably be saying a few more select words than that after that happened!

[fastfall123]

I like the little comment right at the end....................... haha.

So apt well at least you held onto the handles as well so you just had to fork out for the repack

[Catapultandclingfilm]

you manage to find your main and freebag?

[siwilk0]

I landed next to my freebag :-)

The main was in the same field. Which is nice :-)

[joshbanford]

Kick out Kick out!

[MyGrandadParachutes]

goodness me simon what happened, im going to have 2 kill the person who packed your chute.

[hornpaul]

Don't blame it on the packer. Line twists on a highly loaded elliptical main are far more likely to be caused by poor body position at deployment time. This video guy probably dropped his shoulder when he dumped.

[siwilk0]

Break had fired I think. Twist were instant. But who knows. I make it a habbit of not looking up directly after deployment.

[pulsejet1]

Brakes are set on both sides (look at the trailing edge). But the bag may have spun right out of the container. Sometimes caused by too short of a distance between the links and the last line stow.

What kind of canopy was this? I doesn't really look 'too' elliptical. What was the wing loading?

[PCBlueSky]

Me too - hurt my neck too much doing that. Nice cut away...

[jdunk2145]

He's pretty happy that he was not the one that packed the reserve.

[siwilk0]

my "friend packed the mal. I have 2 kits and a packer. ;-) never mind hey.

[garystorey]

you sure he was your friend ? you havent been knocking off his Mrs have you ?

[MissyHolland]

I like how siwilk filmed himself applauding! lol

And Shropshire looks so beautiful, so Englandy.

[katyu16]

MissyHolland: I just LOVE your comment! "And Shropshire loos so beautiful, so Englandy" too cute :-) I completely agree. What a lovely place to skydive!

Blue Skyz from California

[Robberen]

haha love what he says in the end to his parashute "Bastard" ^_^

[prelan]

suppose it was gone... chop!

[JHeaddown]

I have a similar deal man, I load up my 135 approx 1.8 to 1, and if I have any sort of line twist, it wraps itself up. I've got great vid of me chopping. Good save, bud.

[ItsallaboutwatIthink]

Gustaf69. Very true. That guy is lucky the reserve didn't twisted.

[siwilk0]

i gave a good enough delay for there not to be any.

[HC3]

Dude that was sweet! You opened at a safe height and had more than enough time to deploy your reserve safely. Ive noticed that this type of malfunction is the most common. Would you agree? Were you at all stressed when thishappened?

[Gustaf69]

The worst thing you can do is cutaway with plenty of altitude to spare if its a line twist. Try amd see if you can fix it, but it doesn't always happen. Also, don't be too quick when pulling your reserve to avoid a new set of line twists.

[katyu16]

What do you think about RSL? I'm a student and our reserves are connected to the main canopy as the main is chopped it pulls out the reserve. I'm nervous about this as if you're spinning the reserve is deployed too soon possibly creating a new problem. Your opinion? Thanks.

Blue Skyz

[EagerBeaver71]

Shit - I'm a student at the moment at Tilstock and I was always told to stay with twists!

I guess sometimes, you better not, huh! :o)

[siwilk0]

High performance conopy with a high wing loading. No problem! See you at the weekend :-)

[EagerBeaver71]

Hi

Does that mean that a student should always stay with his low performance canopy twists? :o)

[EagerBeaver71]

BTW, I thought the way you composed yourself after the malfunction to clap your hands for the student was pretty amazing :o)

[jingham06]

so the camera guy had a malf.. i wanted to see a student in shock! :P

[rich2468]

Im a student at the moment and a malfunction would be pants filling for me haha, do the happen often?

[siwilk0]

my first was after 996. A friend had 3 in less than 100,but really, the average is every 700 800 or more nowadays. Just stay cool. Pack well and enjoy. Always practice your drills :-)

[vinnyware1]

love the 'Bastard' bit at the end, im jsut a stuent at the min, but i gues he cut away because he started going into a spin right??

[siwilk0]

You've got it.

I was suppose to film the landing as well as the freefall. ;-)

[vinnyware1]

u in tilstock now??

[siwilk0]

yes i am. It is raining :-(

[vinnyware1]

lol, thanks for forcast was debating if i should go or not. next satday it is then

thanks

[dave3663]

I know you all will, Claire is doing her jump for BRAKE on the first anniversary of her Husband Ryan's death. She has booked for the video, and we hope to embed it on her charity page on my nephew's memorial website

[dave3663]

My Friend is doing a charity Tandem Jump at Whitchurch on 25th may this year! I better not show her this!!! LOL - good recovery though

[siwilk0]

We'll look after her/him.

Maybe they want it videod ;-) lol

[siwilk0]

dont be a dick! you look up. oooh fuck the cameras pointing that way. I always applause a good skydive. :-) (i didnt die?)

[NCnutmeg]

Bravo to the jumper for having the clear head to attempt to get the lines untangled and then to release the main and deploy the reserve!

[siwilk0]

they are sods to get out on ellipticals. :-(

[wigglyglowworm]

Once I finish uni i might see about going to america and doing an AFF there, good because you get to jump like every day - my dropzone only operated on weekends.

[wigglyglowworm]

No unfortunately - never managed to get past 10 sec delays coz i lived too far from airfield and couldnt get jumping regularly. I do have tickets to go to Bodyflight Bedford which i won in the bpa mag - maybe i'll be able to sort out my body position there, hopefully.

[siwilk0]

have faith. I took 70+ jumps to get my cat8. I was was a shit student. My body postion out of the door was too rigid. More like a plank. It just clicks. After 15s, i think, it was sussed. When you have time to relax in the air. :-)

[wigglyglowworm]

only 2 mals in 1500? i've had 2 mals in 22 jumps. 1 in 11 - that aint a good ratio. I did 1 more jump after 2nd mal just to make sure i didnt end on a bad jump and then stopped coz my money had run out. Gonna take it up again in a couple of years. Blue skies! :)

[siwilk0]

Unlucky Wigglyglowworm.

Shit happens :-) Did you clear cat8?

[siwilk0]

I took my RSL off. I like to think I can deal with the situation rather than relying on the RSL. took itoff after 500 jumps got over 1700 now :-)

[ddrshimonu]

hehe, yeah, that was a cutaway situation. You tried to get out, the parachute started to dive so you lose altitude and didn't seem to be able to get out of it.

btw, you don't have RSL? Or is it mostly students that use RSL? Or is it that you disabled it?

Nice job.

[siwilk0]

only another 4 years mate :-) then you can have a go if its ok with mum and dad.

[stuart556]

im only 12 but i wana do a skydive

[Elonwy21]

Where´re you from? Somewhere you can tandem skydive since 12 and alone with perents perrmitions cince 15..

[stuart556]

well that comment was 2 years ago, lol im 15 now but im from UK and u have 2 be 16

[WellConditioned]

Actually that situation looked hopeless. "When in doubt cutaway and reach for silver," is what I was taught (I'm still a student). Altitude is a terrible thing to waste. Nice job!

[siwilk0]

ha ha

Not much of a riggers friend with 2 Mals in 1500.

And in the UK we repack reserves every 6 months

not like you girls in the US ever 4 months (or is it 3). ;-)

[kitepilot]

That wasn't a tandem malfunction. It was a camera man too lazy to kick out of a wimpy line twist. You are a riggers best friend!!

[siwilk0]

I have a slow mo of the mal. Not quite sure if the quality will show thru... We'll see :-)

[krosfyah]

2 jumps for the price of one, and kept both handles, nice one :)

Hope you got your main back!

[siwilk0]

Thanks I did. Not too far from the freebag ;-)

[siwilk0]

slow motion uploaded. watch this space :)