"A new angle on life." By Nik Daniel of AXIS Flight School.
By Blue Skies Magazine  |  View on Facebook

by Nik Daniel <AXIS Flight School>

Our resident skydiving and life coach Melanie Curtis’ latest column has to do with the breakdown of skydiving confidence. As in, what happens when you have a weak link in your chain. In her case, her chain got fixed with a little help from a friend – world champion Natasha Montgomery, specifically. You’ll have to read Mel’s column in the March issue of Blue Skies Mag, but for dedicated readers, here is another view of that chain-fixing canopy in all its patriotic goodness!

Melanie's Chain Link Fixer

Kevin Burkart is on a mission to raise awareness and money for Parkinson’s Disease research. In 2008 he did 100 jumps in one day, then 200 in 2010, and this summer, he’ll attempt 300 skydives in one day.

The “200 Perfect Jumps” DVD is now available at www.perfectjumps.com. Check out the trailer:

Buy a DVD, send a donation, sponsor a jump at www.perfectjumps.com. Go on, it’s good karma.

Zach Sabel, Colorado TunnelGod, posted this video his dad made for him on Facebook and we just had to share. (Original post)

This is a video put together by my dad. He made it for me when I got hired as an instructor at SkyVenture Colorado. I have been fortunate enough to work there for the past three years. I can honestly say that I have loved everyday. Its nice to look back at my videos and my experiences just like this. At one point, I didn’t know how to fly, at some point nobody knew how to fly.

Just like many others out there, I have always dreamed of flying, I still dream of flying and I like to imagine myself flying at a much higher level then I do right now. whatever your dream is, make sure you take everyday to love the people you love, experience what there is to experience, and dare to Dream the life that you are living right now.

His dad’s original post was:

My daughter in law Laura sent this song to me with a note saying ” does this remind you of anybody? ” I only had to listen to the song once to know I had to make a video as a tribute to Zach who followed his childhood dreams.

Many thanks to a dear friend of mine Sharon Pace who spent many hours producing this video.

The story is self explanatory. As a child, when Zach was not wearing some kind of cape he was on his magic carpet. I called home from work one day and I could tell that Kathi had been crying. When I asked what was wrong she said ” oh….I’m just being a mom, Zach is on the porch again. He’s sitting on his magic carpet …..he thinks he can fly and I don’t know how to tell him that he can’t. We never told him that he couldn’t fly……and he did.

I told that story to Zach the night before he did his level six and seven jumps of his AFF certification and the rest is history.

Just a side note……..Zach’s brother Adam always played with blocks and leggos. Today he works for an architectural firm in Tucson. Parents…….pay attention to your children’s childhood dreams…..you may already be seeing what they will be when they grow up.

Follow your dreams guys…….follow your dreams

Sabels, are you accepting applications to join the family?

That’s the sound of the March issue flying through the U.S. Postal Service tubes to your mailbox. If you are a current subscriber, that is. If you are not a current subscriber, you can rectify that situation by clicky clicking here on the big SUBSCRIBE button: Subscribe

In this issue:

• Skydivers Unite Alert #2: Tim “Sage” Sagehorn
• Lots of Flight-1 Canopy Camps
• This guy
• RV Tips from the Hypoxic road show
• SoFPDaRF Terms and Conditions
• 2012 Arizona BASE Boogie by Cynthia Lynn Guzman
• Read more about BASE Boogie organizer Matt Frohlich over at Cynthia’s place: Someone You Should Know…15 Questions with BASE Jumper Matt Frohlich
• A Personal History of Skydiving As Told by the T-Shirts Which Can’t Be Thrown Away by Cheryl Michaels
• How many old skydiving T-shirts are in your collection?
• 100-Jump Wonder by Mary Flannery
• Who they really are, as told by one of them.
• Kate’s Last, My First by Melissa Keener Havemann
• Melissa’s first skydive was her friend Kate’s ash dive. Completing the circle.
• Centerfold: a very pretty picture by Bill Schmitz
• Surprise, Bill!
• Indoor Skydiving Championships 2012: A Photo Essay by Chad Wilcox
• Yes, you will be jealous.
• Freeze Your Buns Off by Wendy Faulkner
• Easy tiger, it’s about the CRW boogie at Lake Wales this February
• I Jumped It: The EEZYCUT Trilobite by Mike Gruwell of Chuting Star
• Another installment of our reader gear reviews
• Good Luck with This: Throwing Some Singles by Karl Meyer
• We’re pretty psyched about this one. Skydive Arizona’s new marketing manager will toss out some nearly impossible dives for you to try at home! Send pictures and video to shenanigans@blueskiesmag.com.
• Turning Points: Spring Time – Let’s Get 4-Way Married by Kurt Gaebel, National Skydiving League
• How do I love thee, teammate? Let me count the ways. This month’s column by Kurt should be required reading for anyone considering putting a team together.
• The Beginning of the End of My Flourishing Career: Safety Starts Here by Sydney Owen
• Community. It’s not just a show on NBC.
• Mid-Life Mania by the Fuckin’ Pilot
• Princess branches out into fiction. A story we all hope to avoid.
• Links in the Chain by Melanie Curtis
• How do you repair your chain once a link breaks?
• SkyGod’s Official Man Card Application
• Jump a Random Skydiver
• Shaggio Rodriguez, as interviewed by the lovely (and very much missed!) Faith. Nope, no idea what his real name is.

Don’t let the title fool you – this is quite the video. Something for everyone.

the palm from mike on Vimeo.

Guest post by Laura Morris

Since 2004 Skydive Midwest has been operating out of two trailers placed inside old, ratty airplane hangars. No running water was available and 13 glorious port-a-johns were the only restroom facilities. A little tandem puke required a trip to the local gas station to wash up, causing instructors to miss loads. After 190 tandems on a Saturday the bathrooms were very ripe and made Sunday a long, long day for all. The dedicated jumpers at SDMW loved the place for reasons other than the facilities, that’s for sure.

But alas, Skydive Midwest will be opening the doors to a brand new facility on March 31, 2012. The new hangar is 12,000 sq ft located on a private airport just north of Chicago in Sturtevant, WI. This new two-story facility is a skydiver’s heaven, complete with a padded packing floor, 1,500 sq ft elevated observation deck and a full café. Other features include a gear store, team room, AFF classroom, bathroom/showers, elevated manifest control tower and lockers for skydivers. Patrick Opiola, a SDMW building crew member and experienced jumper said, “I can’t believe it’s finally here. This is going to be our best season yet.”

Join SDMW for a pot luck dinner as they kick off the 2012 season the right way, Saturday, March 31 after sunset. Together, we can say, “Goodbye blue water!” as we say farewell to the port-a-johns and let loose at our new place together.

More pictures of the new facility and updates on the building can be found on their website, www.skydivemidwest.com.

Skydiving Book Service, the fabo folks who brought you Skydiving magazine, are having a great sale on books and videos. Some great steals in there, so break out your plastic and do a little shopping: www.skydivingmagazine.com/clearance.htm

A few of our choices:

Bedtime Stories for Skydivers

by Larry Schatz. A collection of humorous short stories, including “The Man Who Loved Cat Chasing” and “Downplane to Hell.” Professionally illustrated. As one critic put it: “Outrageous and disgusting drivel lacking in any redeeming social value whatsoever” and “Not for the squeamish or prudish.” You’ll love it. Comb bound, 142 pages, 8.5 x 5.5 inches. Regularly $14.95, on sale for $4.95.

 

Hookin’ It!

DVD by Sonic and Donna Bayrasli. Since 1996 the Ranch Parachute Club’s annual swoop meet has served as the Super Bowl of swooping competitions. This compilation includes the most dramatic and entertaining footage taken over five of the annual meets. 99 minutes. Regularly $34.95, on sale for $4.95.

 

Skydiving Magazine Back-Issue
Collection — All of Them

This collection consists of every issue of Skydiving magazine that are still available in our files. It runs from Issue #6 (published in 1979) through #330 (published in 2009) — about 220 copies in all. Hundreds of hours of informative and entertaining reading covering 30 years of our sport. Only $199 postpaid to US addresses.

You’ve probably heard that Felix Baumgartner and the Red Bull Stratos team are back at their goal of breaking records with his planned 120,000′ skydive. You probably also know that the project was halted because of a lawsuit.

You may not know that the project almost stopped even before the lawsuit—because of Felix himself.

“I couldn’t do it. my head was letting me down.”

Before ascending into the stratosphere and free falling back to Earth in spectacular, record-breaking fashion, the Austrian BASE-jumper, 42, had to face his demons. At the high point of his life thus far, he hit an all-time low.

The Red Bulletin: All went quiet on Red Bull Stratos for nine months. What was going on behind the scenes?
Felix Baumgartner: Let’s go back to the time before the project was stopped because of a lawsuit. In December 2010, we carried out the last major tests with the space suit and it was clear to me that I had a problem – one I never thought I’d have – with my psyche. I had trouble putting on the space suit and it got worse and worse. I could barely stand a couple of minutes in it.

Could you describe the symptoms?
The idea was that the suit should feel like a second skin, but it’ll never be like that. Your movements and your perceptions are restricted. As soon as the visor closes there’s this nightmarish silence and loneliness – the suit signifies imprisonment. We hadn’t originally conceived of a test that confined me in the suit for five hours – that’s how long the entire mission should take – with the visor closed. After all my past exploits, all the extreme things I’ve done in my career, no one would have ever guessed that simply wearing a space suit would threaten the mission, me included. In the end, the symptoms developed into panic attacks.

You’re exaggerating …
Not at all. When it came to the crucial pressure test at -60°C, under real conditions with pressure and altitude simulated, and surrounded by cameras, air force personnel and scientists, I realised I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t see a way around this problem. I’d easily mastered what seemed to be huge obstacles, like free fall in a pressure suit, but now my own head was letting me down. Instead of driving to Brooks [The Brooks Academy of Science and Engineering in San Antonio, Texas] to go testing, I drove to the airport and hightailed it out of America. I wept on the phone. It was the worst moment of my life. To that point I’d always known how to solve all my own problems. This time, in front of everyone, I’d found my limit.

Clearly, you’ve since pushed it higher.
We tried several things in training because from a medical standpoint a high basic fitness would also improve my stress resistance. But really, I mean… for 20 years I’ve done the most extreme BASE jumps, I’ve flown over the English Channel [in a wing suit], I’ve shown my stress resistance without hours of exercise bike sessions. The problem had to be solved another way.

Full interview online at Red Bulletin.

These guys have shot to the top of my favorite video-producers list. According to Lauri, “Polte means desire and passion with a little twist of fire.” Love it.