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Skydiving -Skydive |
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SkydivingSkydiving
is truly the most exhilarating sport around.
Skydiving charges you with such energy, spirit, and vitality. The mundane world snaps back with invigorating speed. Skydiving inspires freedom like nothing else, and attracts people from all walks of life! Also known as recreational parachuting. The history of Skydiving isn't clear. It's known that Andre-Jacques Garnerin made successful parachute jumps from a hot-air balloon in 1797. The military developed Skydiving technology first as a way to save aircrews from emergencies aboard balloons and aircraft in flight, later as a way of delivering soldiers to the battlefield. Early competitions date back to the 1930s, and it became an international Skydiving sport in 1951. Today skydiving performed as a recreational activity and a competitive sport, as well as for the deployment of military personnel and occasionally forest firefighters. Skydiving trips typically start at airports, also referred to as drop zones. A fixed base operator at that airport usually operates one or more light aircraft, and takes skydiving groups up for a fee. In the earlier days of the sport, it was common for an individual jumper to go up in a Beech 18 or Douglas DC-3 aircraft for reasons of economy. Skydiving Beech 18 was once a mainstay at drop zones A typical jump involves individuals jumping out of aircraft usually an airplane, but sometimes a helicopter or even the gondola of a balloon, traveling at approximately 13,000 feet altitude, and free-falling for a period of time before activating a parachute to slow the landing down to safe speeds. Once the skydiving parachute is opened, the skydiver can control his or her direction and speed with cords called "steering lines," with hand grips called "toggles" that are attached to the parachute, enabling skydiving control for landing. Most modern skydiving parachutes are self-inflating "ram-air" wings that provide control of speed and direction similar to the related paragliders. Purists in either sport would note that paragliders have much greater lift and range, but that parachutes are designed to absorb the stresses of deployment at terminal velocity. In skydiving you generally do not experience a "falling" sensation due to the fact that you reach terminal velocity around 120 mph for belly to earth orientations, 150-200 mph for head down orientations and are no longer accelerating towards the ground. In skydiving this lack of "falling" sensation does not exist when you leave the plane, as your momentum from the plane causes the acceleration forces to be slow as their direction of travel changes from the direction of the airplane's flight to the direction pulled by the force of gravity. Skydivers call this transition period "the hill", and the amount of distance they fly with the plane due to the momentum is called "forward throw". Acceleration is what causes the "stomach in your throat" feeling on a roller-coaster or other amusement park rides. Most making their first skydiving jump with an experienced and trained instructor ( tandem skydiving ). During the tandem jump the jumpmaster is responsible for the stable exit, maintaining a proper stable freefall position, and activating and controlling the parachute. With training and experience, the fear of the first few skydiving jumps is supplanted by the tact of controlling fear so that one may come to experience the satisfaction of mastering aerial skills and performing increasingly complicated maneuvers in the sky with friends. Other skydiving training methods include static line, IAD (Instructor Assisted Deployment), and AFF (Accelerated Free-Fall) aka Progressive Free-Fall (PFF) in Canada. At larger skydiving drop zones, mostly in the Sun Belt region of the United States, training in the sport is often conducted by full-time instructors and coaches at commercial establishments. Commercial skydiving centers often provide year-round availability, larger aircraft, and staff who are current in both their sport and their instructional skills. In the other latitudes, where winter gets in the way of year-round operation, commercial skydiving centers are less prevalent and much of the parachuting activity is carried on by clubs. These clubs tend to support smaller aircraft. Training may be offered by skydiving instructors who are tested and certified in exactly the same way as their commercial counterparts in occasional classes or as demand warrants. These clubs tend to be weekend only operations as the majority of the staff have full-time jobs during the week. Club members will often visit larger centers for holidays, events, and for some concentrated exposure to the latest skydiving techniques. |
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