| Date | Location | Category | Age | # Jumps | AAD?/RSL? | Dropzone.com Report | Dropzone.com Discussion | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10/01/1999 | Zephyrhills, FL | MAL | 53 | 1200 | Y/N | |||
| Description: The deceased left a Twin Otter at 13500’ filming a 4 Way team and practicing his video skills. The team conducted a normal 4 Way jump, he took the center of the sky for opening, but opened somewhat lower than perhaps he normally would, still easily above 2500’ or more. We extracted a great deal of information from his video camera, which was recording the whole time. His Triathlon 160 canopy opened normally other than an off-heading opening and he was seen in his own video, lifting his right arm for the toggles, but his movement was restricted by the swoop cords he was wearing. He was also wearing gloves on top of the swoop cords, since it was a very cold day and it was his first jump of this type with gloves on. He managed to reach the left toggle, probably by lifting his leg as he shifted in the harness to get comfortable, as big guys sometimes do. Once he released the left brake, the canopy began an immediate turn to the right, which accelerated rapidly over the course of the first couple turns. His video then shows him taking off his right hand glove to help reach the right toggle. The glove was seen in the video after he removed it. Then he tried to stop the turn by pulling his left riser, but only slightly, having no effect on the spiral. It is expected that he could not reach the left toggle again, due to a swoop cord under his glove on the left hand (and a wrist mounted altimeter on top of the glove). He then moves to the right hand again to remove the swoop cord, which he did, but he still did not reach the right toggle, either due to the force of the spin, other restriction on his arm. Also, the right glove, removed earlier, had inadvertently been let go and got its Velcro stuck to the toggle Velcro on the right toggle, which may have impeded his ability to get the right toggle. This may have been another ‘curve ball’ thrown at him when he was already getting critically low. Again he tries to stop the turn by pulling the left riser, with no effect. He actually made four attempts to do this, each time having little or no stopping power of the turn. There are a few seconds where not much seems to be happening on the video. We expect he is either confused, perhaps disoriented from the spins, perhaps looking for his cutaway/reserve handles, or perhaps just plain overloaded due to the size of the trees and ground below him. He pulled his cutaway handle at tree top height, almost instantly struck some power lines and then fell to the ground, dying instantly. His freefall after the cutaway was less than 1 second. His reserve handle was never pulled and the Cypres never fired since the rate of descent under the canopy was not sufficient to do so. He did not have an RSL, but that would not have made a difference at the altitude at which he cutaway. He did 11 spirals under the parachute with one brake stowed and his canopy ride was about 43 seconds long in total, most of that spinning. |
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| Lessons:1. He put new gloves over top of his swoop cords, effectively tying down his hands. Not a big problem, had he simply removed all that before releasing any brakes. Jack was new to video jumps, and perhaps just did not think of that. 2. He did not have a ‘malfunction’ in the true sense of the word, so his judgement of whether or not to cutaway may have been impaired. He may have thought this was a very simple problem, and perhaps he could fix it. 3. He also may not have thought about the velocity of his spin or the rate of descent, given that he jumped a Triathlon, considered to be relatively docile by today’s standards. 4. A Cypres is not a substitute for an RSL. Had he cutaway with at 300’ with an RSL, he would probably be alive today. His rig was bought used several years ago, and did not come with one. I do not think that he ‘deliberately’ jumped without one, just that he never got around to getting it done. 5. Give all of your problems 2 tries to fix them, and then get out of there. Earlier reaction and detection of a problem would surely have had a different outcome. 6. Any size of a parachute is capable of spinning fast enough to be out of control. His Triathlon was probably losing 200+ feet each revolution. Don’ t assume that any canopy is docile; the deceased was clearly horizontal to the ground for most of the descent | ||||||||
| Name | Jack Larrison | |||||||