PD’s new product: landing airbag
This past weekend we attended the UF Falling Gators Collegiate Boogie, hosted by Skydive Palatka, FL. Performance Designs sent their tour reps Alex and Matt with a bunch of demos and the fancy inflatable X-gloo PD tent. We set up right next to PD and enjoyed a great weekend of good weather, fun jumps and all the other good stuff that comes with going to a boogie.
Scott Roberts from Slipstream offered a free 2-jump introductory canopy piloting course to the college kids on Saturday, as a little pay-it-forward kind of deal.
On Sunday the winds were a little wonky and hefty cross winds prevailed in the main landing area. Things got interesting to say the least, and under our tents we had front row seating to the carnage. Jumpers forgetting/misunderstanding landing directions, forgetting to pull their strings to flare, opposite landing directions and all sorts of good stuff. Thankfully nobody was hurt, probably largely due to the fact that college kids are made out of rubber.
Melissa Marie, a local Palatka jumpers and the Vice President of the UF Falling Gators Skydiving Club made her BEER video jump this weekend, and captured an absolutely priceless video. If a picture is worth a thousand words, this video has to be worth a million – starting with “oh shit”. God bless the GoPro – this little camera has made sure that time you fuck up, there is someone there to catch it… and share it with the world. Enjoy.
But, all is well that ends well, and PD rep Matt was no worse for the wear.
We have a feeling that Scott will have a lot more jumpers attend the next canopy course, to be held in Palatka Saturday March 12th…..
My Favorite View Around
Rockstar/Skydive New England vidiot Sean Rogan (featured in our November 2009 issue) has another awesome video for the song he wrote about his Sabre 170, “Canopy Song.” We won’t delay your grinning time any longer, so here it is:
To download this song and more, check out www.seanprogan.com.
PS – We are loving “No Jumping in Lebanon Today”
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and “Ready, Set, Go!” too!
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Happy D.B. Cooper Day!
D.B. Cooper
On November 24, 1971, a hijacker who called himself “Dan Cooper”, sat down in seat 18C on Northwest Orient’s Flight 305 out of Portland, Oregon, bound for Seattle, Washington. After takeoff, D.B. did the damn thing and ended up hopping out of the Boeing 727 with $1,051,940 (adjusted for inflation in 2008 dollars-originally $200,000).
He’s never been caught, and the case remains the only unsolved hijacking in the world.
That Guy is: Dominik Loyen
Today’s That Guy is the guy who buzzed the European ski lodge in a wingsuit, prompting the local mayor to attempt to ban BASE jumping, wingsuit BASE jumping, wingsuit BASE jumping within 3 meters of a recreational skiier and really, just anything that comes close to what that guy did. The video and resulting press coverage was all over the whuffo world, and we want to know: Who is that guy?
That guy is Dominik Loyen, German ex-engineer turned drop zone owner turned blue skies free spirit, whose penchant for all thing Spongebob leaves everything just a little uncomfortable. He currently splits his time between teaching first jump BASE courses at 3-2-1 BASE in Spain and AFF/camera/coaching in Norway.
Stay tuned for an in-depth, heart-wrenching, tell-all interview with Dom . . .
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