Kudos to all the drop zones that have donated their planes, time and efforts to Haiti relief work, and to USPA for initiating the effort.

From PR Newswire:

Skydiving centers across the country have found an unusual way to contribute to the Haiti relief effort – by using skydiving aircraft to transport food and medical supplies to the island.

“Jump aircraft are especially well-suited for these missions,” said Ed Scott, executive director of the U.S. Parachute Association (USPA). “Most have large cargo doors and are easily converted to carry cargo. Most can also take off and land on short and sometimes rough landing strips.”

Shortly after the earthquake, USPA e-mailed its affiliated skydiving centers that relief organizations and the U.S. government needed aircraft to bring supplies and personnel from around the U.S. to Florida for staging, as well as directly to Haiti.

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Yesterday was the Winter Solstice, the official start of the countdown to summer. So what better time to report on the Endless Summer Boogie, held at Skydive San Diego November 21-22. It’s not possibly because this story has been sitting in my inbox for that long. No, that wouldn’t make any sense at all.

Endless Summer Boogie

by Chad

Nearly 44 years have passed since Director Bruce Brown and his ragtag crew tailed budding young pros Mike Hynson and Robert August across the globe with the ambitions of “following summer around the world”. The Endless Summer has since given birth to a way of life, a vibe, a longing to find what makes you happy and to simply go for it. Southern California’s crystal blue skies and wave-battered beaches no doubt evoke the very spirit that spawned the influential documentary. It’s this very same search for freedom, fun and family that lures skydivers all across the Golden State and beyond to Skydive San Diego’s Endless Summer Boogie. With world class load organizing, food, raffles, music, schwag, bungee-runs and beautiful weather, the Endless Summer Boogie has once again delivered and lived up to its lofty title.

Flyers at the Endless Summer Boogie are much like the diverse crowds of long and short boarders you’ll find scattered along the San Diego shoreline: a hodgepodge of young and old, new and well-weathered. Those that made their way to sunny Skydive San Diego were treated to load organizing from a broad array of talent and disciplines. Boogie-fevered freeflyers of all skill sets were rounded up by organizers Moo, David Gershfeld, Matt Lewis and Chad Ross. From three-way horny-gorillas to the Taft crew throwing down eight-way sequentials, anybody and everybody had an opportunity to get a little vertical. Not to be outdone, Gary McDonald, Julie Richter, and Padu Merloti led the horizontal front. Newbies and groms had a unique opportunity to partake in quality three-ways while the more seasoned boogie-goers were treated to multipoint big-way relative work. The end result: two full, safe and dynamic days of nonstop prop-turning fun.

Photos by Matt Lewis & Nick Boyd

And what would a boogie be without nightlife? As a heavy marine layer sleepily rolled in over head, the mood shifted from dirt diving and packing to rehashing the day’s shenanigans. During dinner, boogie organizer Matt Lewis raffled off Performance Design and Apex swag along with apparel from Gravity Gear, not to mention the handful of lucky ticket holders scoring killer deals from Cookie Composites, Velocity Sports Equipment, Precision Aerodynamics, UPT and Liquid Sky. As an added bonus, a bungee-run competition was held for anyone up for the challenge. Winners from both a men’s and women’s heat collected a handful of free jump tickets. A margarita slushy machine not only illuminated the course but aided in “rehydrating” the whiplashed racers.

Under a crisp San Diego night sky, DJ Moo set the vibe for the remainder of the evening with an imaginative compilation of music spanning generational genres. If one was lucky enough to catch it, even Terry (the drop zone’s veteran pilot) was doing a little twist and shout. In retrospect, the boogie-goers were doing what they do best: boogieing. Aided by an early southwest sunset, the party waltzed its way through the night in truly Endless Summer fashion.

The same year Brown was in the midst of filming his now epic documentary, a kite builder by the name of Domina Jalbert was in the process of designing what would later become the first of the ram-air canopies. The wonder and excitement of those days has fueled a growth in both sports. Brown’s was the sea, and ours is the sky. One thing will never change, however. And that is the spirit and passion to find and capture what makes you happy. Skydive San Diego’s Endless Summer Boogie is just that; a tide pool of people looking to find what makes them happy and, in turn, happily finding what makes this particular boogie so unique.

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If you have our November issue, you know there are many compelling reasons to visit sunny Florida for all your jumping needs this winter (Cali, you’re next on our “Traveler’s Guide” list.) If you do not have our November issue, you can subscribe right here, super easy!

Back to the topic at hand, Chris from right here in DeLand, brings us news of some low-key big-way action:

There is an informal group meeting Saturdays at Skydive Deland for introductory big-ways. Martin Sutton is organizing group skydives for people who want to learn and get experience on larger formation skydives. He has the blessing of the DZ and folks like Carl Daughtery who participates occasionally. Here is a link to my YouTube site to see my 399th and 400th skydives on the big-ways. It’s been a lot of fun and everyone is learning a lot. Anyone is welcome to attend no matter your skill level. Everyone is considered in the dive plan so there is the best chance of everyone being in and gaining confidence.

YouTube Link: MrSkyslut's #399 & #400

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I think this is the reason my Catholic elementary school wouldn’t let us celebrate Halloween.

All photos were taken by: Joe Neal, Marcelo Garcia and “Super Dave” Johnson at past Skydive San Marcos’ Halloween Carnival. Don’t miss this year’s Carnival, October 30-November 1.

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Lincoln Sport Parachute Club (LSPC) turned 50-years-old this year! To celebrate, the volunteer organization threw Nebraska’s best boogie, the annual Redemption Boogie, July 16-19. Over 200 people were registered to jump from Skydive Arizona’s Otter, fill up on specialty beers and chow down on the best smoked pork, courtesy of club member Duane Hansen, named #1 at Syracuse Ribfest 2009.

LSPC annually donates a portion of the boogie proceeds to the American Cancer Society. This year would be no different until a week prior to the boogie, a friend of the club had a hard landing, putting himself in the hospital all busted up. Immediately, plans were in motion to include benefits from the boogie for the club’s fallen friend. The cashier had a bucket for jump tickets and cash as well as sold plates for $2. Saturday at sunset the plates were placed in the landing area for the Big Money Elmo Drop (Elmo just happens to be LSPC’s mascot). The full-size mannequin has his own gear and was static-lined from one of the club’s Cessna-182s. He landed on the opposite side of the runway so some measuring had to be done to determine the winner. The lucky plate belonged to Lee Baney; he did not keep the winnings, rather donated it all to the cause.

Cool stuff happened in the air—state records, Skyhook demos and the introduction of the Bradicole. What happens when you let the reps from Sky Venture Colorado talk you into a hybrid where two of the hangers are on their head? You get The Bradicole (Brad Cole + radical). SkyVenture Colorado sent three reps to skydive in every discipline. If there was a dive someone had always wanted to do, they got it done. SkyVenture also donated an hour of coached tunnel time to be awarded to the highest bidder, with all proceeds given to LSPC. SkyVenture also with raffled off 30-min and 15-min blocks for folks on the early risers load. Aerodyne, Liquid Sky, FireFly, PD, UPT-Vector and Vertical Suits were on site; check out redemptionboogie.com for a complete list of vendors that contributed.

After alleviating some stress, the ladies set a Nebraska Women 8-way State record. When a couple 10-ways don’t work out, focus on getting everyone in their freefly suits for a sit-round. It helps when seven of the eight women are wearing Fire Fly Suits and the owner of Fire Fly, Sherry Jasnos, is also on the dive. All they did was look hot and voila, record! Happily sharing the spotlight, the women stepped aside to applaud organizer Jerry Eddens for getting people riled up to set a POPS State Record. With the help of Mark Farrell, POPS completed a 12-way on their first try!!!!

This boogie continues to grow while keeping its home-town feel. Turbine aircraft, camping, showers, food, beer, a strongly supported boogiemeister, committee and a whole lot of volunteer hours keep people coming back and LSPC couldn’t be happier!

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by Albert Berchtold

When I had about 1,200 jumps, I bought my first used Velocity 111 from a friend of mine. From that point on I’ve devoted most of my time to the disipline of canopy piloting and doing my best to educate myself and those around me in the joys of canopy flight. I’ve been competing since 2005. I call Deland Florida my home, though I find myself jumping all over Florida, around the U.S., and ocassionally abroad. Swooping is my game! I enjoy it so much that when Chris Hayes retired from the sport about two years ago, I had the honor to take on his duties as organizer of the FLCPA). This was a real treat for me, as I have been able to help be a part of the growth of competitive swooping in my area. The downturn is that I find myself swimming around in the pond setting up courses, rather than enjoying competitions.

As an American there seems to be some reluctance on the part of my countrymen to just pick up and take off to a foreign land without a plan. Where will I stay? What will I eat? I don’t speak the language! How will I get from one town to the next? This summer I decided to take on the style of our European counterparts and “wing it” for my time out of the office. Three weeks swooping in Europe! There were three meets this August that were one weekend after the next. There was about 7,000 Euros in prize money between the three of them, and I had some vacation time built up so off I went. After the flight into Prague I picked up my rental car. For the low price of about $500 I was off and running around Europe for three weeks.

First stop was the Pink Skyvan Open in Klatovy, Czech Republic. This was also the Czech and Austrian Nationals. I turned up a few days before the meet to find a skydiver’s haven of a drop zone. All the facilities you could ask for and a clean bed for 5-10 Euro per night. After about three days in Klatovy, the hard drive on my laptop decided it didn’t like the European air and discontinued its life. So three weeks ahead, and I’m now unplugged. I think it may have been a blessing in disguise. I needed a little time away from work, and that is one of the few ways to get me to stop checking emails regularly and working when I should be relaxing. So I continued my trip “unplugged”. After the days of competition were over, I had finished sixth of 43 competitors from around the world. I decided to spend an extra day after the meet flocking with a dozen of the competitors. Then I piled my skydiving gear, my clothes, and myself into my mini car and headed across Germany.

Since I had a few days to spare before the next competition began, I decided to take a detour to a small town in Germany called Bad Wuennennberg. This small town in the valley is the home of Airtec GmbH) Not many people go to visit them, probably because they’re not on a great skydiving drop zone, but this was definitely a worthwhile stop on my trip. After another day of sightseeing around Germany I headed into Belgium for the Black Mountain Swoop Competition and Belgian Nationals. The trip got a bit interesting at this point when I realized that my TomTom (mobile GPS device) didn’t have maps for Belgium or Holland loaded into it. Uh oh. After a short delay to “attain” them, I was up and running again.

From what they tell me, “Zwartberg” is Flemish for Black Mountain. This name comes from the huge mounds that are around the city from excavating when this was a coal mining town. For the low price of about 16 Euro per night, I checked into a hostel with three Australians and two Danish guys who were also making a “swoop tour” of their own. We all quickly learned that there were multiple snorers among us. After the first night of taking turns waking each other up, we found that the ear plugs at the dz weren’t only good for avoiding the noise of loud aircraft. As the meet in Klatovy was, this swoop meet was also blessed to have two days of sunshine and manageable winds. This meet drew thirty competitors and again the competition for the top places came down to the last rounds.

From there, I again had a few days to rest my bones from another challenging meet. I decided to take in the sights in Amsterdam for a few days before heading to Teuge, Netherlands for the Lake Bussloo Beach Swoop Competition. For the low cost of ten Euro per night I checked in with my newly-found Australian friends for another canopy piloting comp. Lake Bussloo is known to be a challenging meet. I had heard stories about strong winds, turbulence from the trees and challenging non-traditional courses set up by the famous Henny Wiggers. This year I got to see it all first-hand for some of the most challenging swoops ever. Though we only finished two competition rounds, those who were able to negotiate good scores certainly earned their placings.

I’d urge those who are considering taking a skydiving/sightseeing vacation to GO FOR IT. For those swoopers interested, let me know, because if my boss will let me, I’d love to do it again next year and would be happy to share the enjoyment with others. Find a traveling companion and have a blast, you only live once—don’t spend it on your couch…

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By Amy Gralewski

In August of 2008, as the first Wisconsin CRW Boogie drew to a close, the most commonly heard phrase was, “I can’t wait ’til next year!” Planning for the 2008 Boogie had only begun in May, and no one expected it to grow to the size that it did. Surprised at the success, some wondered how it could get any better.

Any such questions were put to rest at the 2nd Annual Wisconsin CRW Boogie, held August 13-16, 2009 at Skydive Milwaukee / Sky Knights Sport Parachute Club in East Troy, Wisconsin.

Last year’s state CRW record stood at 14, and with the drop zone flying a PAC 750XL and a C-182, there wasn’t a lot of room to break that record. The event organizers and dropzone staff tossed around the idea of trying to do the new record with the two current planes, but ultimately decided it was time to bring in more lift capacity. The dropzone’s neighbor to the South in Hinckley, IL, agreed to lease the dropzone their brand new PAC. This brought the total number of brand new PACs to two, as the PAC that currently flies at Skydive Milwaukee arrived at the beginning of the season with less than ten hours on the engine.

25-Way CRW Record. Photo by Eric Bernetzke.

Although the CRW dogs and pups were jumping at the chance to not only break, but annihilate, the current record, the organizers knew that the high-deployment CRW dogs and pups alone wouldn’t keep the pair of high-performance PACs turning loads. No one wants to see two beautiful aircraft sitting on the ground on a beautiful weekend, so the organizers began brainstorming other ways to keep the planes flying. “What about the old guys?” they asked…Enter the Parachutists Over Phorty Society. The last Wisconsin POPS record had been set in 2007 over East Troy; local POP Nick “Fish” Birdsall agreed it was time to try again, and began rallying the troops.

Though the Boogie technically started on Friday, some of the nearby CRW dogs were so anxious to begin that they arrived on Thursday and were jumping by early afternoon. Local CRW pup Jef LeRette earned the distinction of CRW dog after an eventful jump with Jim “Razz” Rasmussen and Brian “B-Mart” Martin. Not only did Jef experience his first canopy wrap, he had a moment of clarity as he reached for silver, realizing that this would be his first save after earning his Rigger’s ticket. Mike Lewis, one of the best CRW dogs in the world, was on hand with about 10-15 other dogs to help get some of the newer pups up to speed so that they could participate in the record attempts.

Friday was a beautiful day for jumping, with even more CRW jumpers arriving to get in on the action. They broke last year’s record early when videographer April Schuldt decided to tag a 14-way diamond. (April wanted to write this article, but when asked, replied by saying, “I figured it wouldn’t be very modest to write about how awesome I am ‘cuz I broke the record on Fri. taggin’ on the 14-way breakin’ it to 15 while filming! Haha That was cool. Glory for about 12 hrs!!!” Since when has a skydiver ever been modest?!?) After a full day of jumping, the drop zone provided a spaghetti dinner and free beer for all boogie registrants, and jumpers made new friends and caught up with old ones throughout the evening.

Saturday brought another beautiful morning and even more guests, including a welcome addition to the fleet—the second PAC. About 35 CRW jumpers and 30 POPS jumpers circled up early under the drop zone’s famous “Ravin’s Nest”. Saturday was a frenzy of activity, with a ton of tandem students gearing up, a full AFF class in progress, videographers doing student interviews all over the grounds, office and manifest staff cranking out waivers and paperwork, and packers setting up a secondary packing area to keep up with the demand.

The CRW jumpers and organizers (Mike Lewis, Jim “Razz” Rasmussen, Roger McClelland, and Eduardo Guillen) were the first to set a new record out of both PACs with a beautiful 25-way diamond, with Razz taking the lead for his first time piloting a formation of that size. Videographers Eric Bernetzke and Jeff Klingbell were there to take some beautiful pictures of the formation. Inspired and confident in the ability of even the newest pups, they decided to do it again just so that jumpers who weren’t on the first record would get their chance. April Schuldt and Eric Bernetzke came along to do video for the record, allowing Jeff Klingbell to become a participant this time. This time April didn’t tag the formation, so another 25-way formation was built. As if that weren’t enough, those CRW jumpers who were also POPS members made their own record attempt, and completed a 14-way CRW POPS formation—the first ever noted in Wisconsin.

The POPS jumpers had also been planning and dirt diving all day, and the celebration from the CRW participants was infectious.

Not to be outdone, the POPS jumpers, led by organizer Terry Rago, went up for what they hoped to be their fourth and final attempt. They successfully built a 24-way formation, outdoing the standing 20-way record, but video debrief revealed an extra grip (by Nick “Fish” Birdsall, no less!) that put celebrations on hold. With daylight left, the POPS jumpers decided that they weren’t going home empty handed, and gathered up anyone who hadn’t taken off yet for another attempt. This time there was no hooting and hollering upon landing, only cautious optimism, as the proof would be in the video. When asked about the jump, videographer Greg Shields simply smiled, knowing that the formation had been completed as planned, and there would be a new 24-way record on the books.

POPS Participants. Photo by Greg Shields.

Saturday night’s festivities were enhanced by the smiles of numerous new record holders, and especially by the jumpers who earned the day’s trifecta: local jumpers John Bechtel and Tim Shue had been on all three record jumps! The drop zone provided a traditional BBQ dinner and more free beer, though many paid beer fines that evening as well. With Sunday’s forecast promising prohibitive wind and rain, jumpers were content to revel in their accomplishments and party into the early hours of the morning.

All in all, the 2009 CRW Boogie was a huge success, drawing jumpers from 13 states across the nation as well as from Canada! With the new CRW record at 25 and the POPS record at 24, this year’s most commonly heard phrase was “Guess you’ll need an Otter next time…”

The Sky Knights Sport Parachute Club thanks all of the boogie participants, and congratulates those who were on the record jumps. It’s been very exciting to be part of a resurgence of CRW interest in the Midwest—we thank Razz, April, and the other organizers for sharing their knowledge and infectious CRW-dog spirit with us and getting this ball rolling.

We would also like to extend a sincere thank you to our entire staff—pilots, packers, instructors, office/manifest staff, ground crew—for working together to make this boogie a success. We’ll be looking into making the next boogie even better—though no promises on that Otter, ok?

Record Participants

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