221–230 of 252 posts
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Not parachute related, but the story is Juliane Koepcke, sole survivor of a plane crash, is worth a read as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juliane_Koepcke
Here's a documentary by Werner Herzog featuring Juliane and her story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlJVIcCPIl8 The book is worth a read too!
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He mentioned not preparing for the impact. How would one even prepare for an impact if one wanted to? Ground or water, I just can't think of a good way to land. Anyone have any insight?
I think about this sometimes. Ground, I have no answer, you seem like you will die. Perhaps landing legs first allows you to use those as a crumple zone. Water, though, isn't the pencil dive the clear winner? Everything else would decelerate you so much faster that it would be bound to cause injuries. The only downside (relative to all other methods of impact) I can imagine is how far underwater you might end up. I w…
I was once in a plane crash in which the wing of our small plane hit the mast of a sailboat that was motoring in front of the runway and we didnt see it. We impacted the seawall and flipped over onto land and slid upside down a few hundred feet. The author's description of both not feeling his injuries until he tried to move as well as his own recognition of not being dead were spot on. I would have described it exac…
It is amazing how little you feel immediately after an accident. Mine wasn't so death-defying, but I did shatter my shoulder in a bicycle accident, and called a friend to come get me and drive me and my bike home. I did not realize I was hurt until he got there, and could not stand up or move the left half of my body. Then we decided to go to the hospital instead of my home. But for about the first 10 minutes, I thou…
3 mins after, a ski medic was shuffling pieces of bone around in my shoulder and saying "i think its dislocated" all without any pain but feeling very badly winded. Adrenaline is impressive. Morphine is the best
The human body can sustain a surprising amount of damage and still carry on. Three different wingsuit pilots have survived unintentionally crashing into trees with no parachute out now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kp3YLdhraPw https://vimeo.com/50817449 (view at 6:35) http://www.basejumper.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=2994... And then you have Jeb Corliss crashing full speed into a mountain and surviving: htt…
Sadly these near miraculous cases are vastly outnumbered wingsuit accidents where the jumper was killed. Your chances of surviving a wingsuit, or any kind of BASE jumping accident are considerably worse than your chances of surviving a single round of Russian roulette with five rounds in the cylinder, even if you're the only player.
I had a friend in high school who's father survived a skydiving accident "breaking every bone in his body." What made the biggest impression on me was that not only did he have to recover physically, but he had to deal with inability to work and medical bills leading to bankruptcy and a failed business. It may have been the first time in my life I thought about this kind of consequences.
I did a tandem jump from 10,000 ft when I was a teenager. We exited the plane while flying through clouds (which is illegal IIRC) and tumbled out of control for the entire free fall period before the chute opened. The exit was my fault. To initiate a jump, the pilot would count down from three and then scream "GO". With the door open it was very difficult to hear. Clouds were forming and we had already aborted twice,…
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Might I ask why you go white water rafting? It baffles me as it seems like a really dangerous hobby. I actually understand skydiving, bungee jumping, or climbing Everest, because they are controlled risks, but white water rafting seems very chaotic.
Controlled risks, bah humbug! If you think Everest is a controlled risk, do not go there, you are severely underestimating the risks and you would die.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
He mentioned not preparing for the impact. How would one even prepare for an impact if one wanted to? Ground or water, I just can't think of a good way to land. Anyone have any insight?
I think about this sometimes. Ground, I have no answer, you seem like you will die. Perhaps landing legs first allows you to use those as a crumple zone. Water, though, isn't the pencil dive the clear winner? Everything else would decelerate you so much faster that it would be bound to cause injuries. The only downside (relative to all other methods of impact) I can imagine is how far underwater you might end up. I w…
Basically, cross your legs, point your toes, cup your testicles with one hand, and cover your nose with the other.
The force of hitting the water will crush your testicles and rip your nose off your face. So, you cover them. You cross your legs to keep them together. You point your toes so you don't shatter your feet, ankles, or legs.
When your feet hit the water, immediately bend at the waist. You're going fast enough that you're completely in the water. You fold at the waist to make your depth more shallow. You then flip and swim to the surface.
This works at greater heights but survivability goes down at about 90'. You can practice at lower heights, if you want to learn it. I'm sure there are videos and whatnot.
I was once in a plane crash in which the wing of our small plane hit the mast of a sailboat that was motoring in front of the runway and we didnt see it. We impacted the seawall and flipped over onto land and slid upside down a few hundred feet. The author's description of both not feeling his injuries until he tried to move as well as his own recognition of not being dead were spot on. I would have described it exac…
It is amazing how little you feel immediately after an accident. Mine wasn't so death-defying, but I did shatter my shoulder in a bicycle accident, and called a friend to come get me and drive me and my bike home. I did not realize I was hurt until he got there, and could not stand up or move the left half of my body. Then we decided to go to the hospital instead of my home. But for about the first 10 minutes, I thou…
I was doing something real stupid - mid 30's, showing off to my wife, on a bike with Amerityres; I had just gotten those tires installed. They're great tires - solid tires, but feel like they are aired up. Well worth the price.
What I wasn't told was that you shouldn't do any kind of "jumps" with your bike...
So there I am showing off, and I decide to ramp off this one section of sidewalk (that actually made a good ramp). I landed, and that's when things went to hell.
Ya see, Amerityres don't deform like a regular tire does. Instead - they come off the rim. I went a$$-over-teakettle.
To this day I don't know all what or how I landed, but I do know my knee took the brunt for some reason. I came within inches of slamming my head into a concrete block retaining wall for the raised bed of the neighbor's lawn that was next to the sidewalk. The bike was totally mangled. My wife was horrified.
Now - I knew I had taken a good spill, but I thought "well, dust yerself off, laugh about it" - which I did. I told her I was fine, go home and grab my pickup so I can get home. As she biked off, I decided I would get up, and walk the bike home. I slung it up on my shoulder, and started to walk (note, this was a cheap walmart bike, and weighed a bit). Everything seemed ok. She eventually got to me, I put the bike in the back, then slumped in the passenger seat. We went home, then went inside.
We started to discuss what we were going to have for dinner (KFC, if I remember right), when I looked down at my knee...
...it was swollen to the size of softball! It didn't really feel that good, and I could barely walk on it.
We went to urgent care that night. They xray'd me and told me nothing was broken. Gave me a script for vicodin (yay), wrapped up my knee, and gave me a crutch. I hobbled around for a few weeks, and eventually all was better, with no problems in the leg since.
But in the immediate aftermath of the crash, I had no idea just how bad I was injured, nor the amount of pain I would feel. I was just walking along, carrying my bike on my shoulder, like no big deal.
I guess a lot of accidents are like that, if serious enough; probably some kind of survival holdover tactic to allow you to "get away" and to safety after an injury (or worse) a predator attack.
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I think about this sometimes. Ground, I have no answer, you seem like you will die. Perhaps landing legs first allows you to use those as a crumple zone. Water, though, isn't the pencil dive the clear winner? Everything else would decelerate you so much faster that it would be bound to cause injuries. The only downside (relative to all other methods of impact) I can imagine is how far underwater you might end up. I w…
We were taught the sailor dive, which is good to about 90', according to training. You use it to abandon ship. Err... I was in the Marines. Basically, cross your legs, point your toes, cup your testicles with one hand, and cover your nose with the other. The force of hitting the water will crush your testicles and rip your nose off your face. So, you cover them. You cross your legs to keep them together. You point yo…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
We were taught the sailor dive, which is good to about 90', according to training. You use it to abandon ship. Err... I was in the Marines. Basically, cross your legs, point your toes, cup your testicles with one hand, and cover your nose with the other. The force of hitting the water will crush your testicles and rip your nose off your face. So, you cover them. You cross your legs to keep them together. You point yo…
I believe I read that you want to clench your butthole as well (in addition to covering nose and mouth) to prevent the force of water rushing up your cavities from killing you. Certain pants fabrics help prevent this from happening as well.
When you do hit it, just relaxing will fold you up - by the way. You're going so fast that you won't relax before you're completely submerged and slowed. I forget the numbers but it means your dive is more shallow than if you'd stayed tensed. There's a ratio for it, but I've long since forgotten.
I suspect there's been a bit posted about this. My enlistment was a long time ago but I'm told they still teach it. There may be some modifications to it, or new data for survivability.