>Not that watching the safety video would have helped in this case, as the instructor was not properly trained and vetted in the first place.
The article is a little vague about the failure but I'm a skydiver and this might not be the instructor's fault. I know that sounds insane but hear me out.
The article says "main and reserve parachutes had tangled, preventing either from opening". This could mean a few things:
1. Neither chute was ever deployed - "total malfunction" on main and reserve where they're both stuck in the container (backpack thing holding the parachute).
An instructor following perfect protocol with a poorly packed reserve would have died here, and they likely did not pack the reserve themselves. Reserve chutes are packed by a master rigger who's required to apply a seal and update a little paper record on each rig indicating when it was packed and by whom. These are meant to be checked before you're allowed to get on a plane. Reserves are (thankfully) rarely opened until they're due to be repacked based on time. There's overlap between master riggers and instructors who handle tandem jumps, but the reserve was most likely not packed by that instructor.
2. Main deployed but has a "partial malfunction" (out but not fully open), reserve then deployed and tangles with the main.
This would be the instructors fault - in this case they should cut away the main before deploying the reserve.
3. Main has a "total malfunction" where it doesn't come out at all, instructor deploys reserve, then main deploys late and tangles with the reserve.
This one is inconclusive but probably not the instructor's fault. Protocol here is don't waste time cutting your main because you're falling fast with no drag from a partially deployed chute and the main is unlikely to ever open. The reason it could still be the instructors fault is if they had a chance to cut away the main after it came out and failed to do so before they tangled.
I did a tandem freefall jump that had a "partial malfunction".
The square canopy had one end closed off by lines looped over the top of the chute, perhaps 75% was still inflated. The instructor decided to keep the main chute.
There was still significant drag, but no steering on the closed side, so we just spiralled into the ground at relatively high speed. The wind calculation was correct, so we hit a soft ploughed field.
As I recall, free fall is about 120 mph, while a tangled chute can cut it to 60 mph. I know this from a newspaper article about a man who survived a tangled chute fall onto pavement.
These are not hard numbers. The velocity can vary quite a bit in free fall and depending on parachute state when tangled I'm sure that can greatly vary as well.
But yes, a partial deploy will slow you down somewhat.
And mildly related there's this website about free fall survival that I find fascinating:
Yup. If you get a partial "mal" and have a "bag of washing" over your head, as we call it in UK, your terminal velocity can drop to the point where you can survive, but you'll be all busted up at best. It happens.
> Main deployed but has a "partial malfunction" (out but not fully open), reserve then deployed and tangles with the main.
This would be the instructors fault - in this case they should cut away the main before deploying the reserve.
I’ve done a “solo” skydive where you jump out with 2 instructors and then they pull the line and you’re on your own. As a part of the training, we just had one motion (if I’m remembering right) to jettison the main and switch to reserve. Is that a potential configuration or do I have it wrong?
Yep you’re describing an RSL - it’s a line that should deploy the reserve as the main gets cut away (although good practice to pull the reserve handle anyway as a precaution).
In my hypothetical failure case you referenced it wouldn’t help because the instructor didn’t cut away the main - they went straight to their dedicated reserve handle.
Cutting away should automatically deploy the reserve, but deploying the reserve from the reserve handle doesn’t automatically cut away the main.
I believe they describe AFF Level 1 jump, where there are two instructors waiting for the student to pull the "line and you are on your own" which they describe a bridle of main pilot chute to main canopy. The idea of this jump is an altitude awareness and for students to pull their main canopy at the right altitude. When they don't - instructors do it for them. Which happens pretty often with students who never done tandems before.
Nobody tells students anything about the RSL at this stage, just teaches them basic Emergency Procedure - "Look at Red, Grab Red, Look at Silver, Pull-Punch Red, Pull Silver".
Lodi is a notoriously unsafe drop zone (I'm an experienced skydiver in the bay area). I don't know if it's a cold-hearted greed thing so much as it's an anti-rules, anti-establishment thing where they like to scoff at safety and protocol. I wouldn't jump there or even do a group dive with anybody who regularly jumps there.
Not sure when the people you know were jumping but I've heard a few older (non-military) guys at drop zones complain about shoulder, back and hip issues from harder openings with the rigs they used in the '90s and early '00s.
Parachutes are typically sized according to weight to manage rate of descent, so the extra weight shouldn't be an issue. Given the context I wonder if the military just calibrates around faster rate of descent because it's risky to stay in the air too long.
I'm an experienced skydiver - one death per year is an insanely low bar for any drop zone. Lodi is notorious for incidents and I would never jump there.
Skydiving seems insanely risky because it's scary but it's statistically not particularly risky [0], especially for conscientious skydivers at well-run drop zones. The calculation on "calculated risk" changes dramatically once you start blowing off safety protocol, which are what keep the sport relatively safe.
This. I used to jump at a DZ in the Midwest that has been in operation for like thirty years and had, I think, only one fatality. But we had great safety people in charge and were really careful with students.
My first jump there was a static line solo and they gave an hour long classroom session followed by time in a hanging harness practicing emergency procedures and malfunction recognition.
not sure if you're spectacularly missing the point, but if not: the point i'm making is, he wouldn't have to mention it, period. but will do so to reap the tax benefits.
yeah, i got it. and the point i’m making is i’m not getting outraged over it because it is a charitable contribution and he has an incentive to report it. does it feel a little gross and is this whole thing probably a PR stunt? sure. but i’ll settle for letting billionaires be charitable for the wrong reasons if it means they’re being charitable. i trust people to see this for what it is. i’m not sure why anybody feels obligated to leap into threads like this and strain to reframe neutral-to-positive events as profoundly negative. you don’t need to save us from possibly thinking a brief positive thought about a thing a billionaire did. we’re fine.
> i’m not sure why anybody feels obligated to leap into threads like this and strain to reframe neutral-to-positive events as profoundly negative.
Have you seen the insane money-making by the rich over the last, I dunno, 30-40 years? The kind of money-making that thoroughly fucks/fucked the rest of us?
was this really about whether or not Figma had a right to fire her if they’d decided to? afaict the intended point was that Sprinklr exposed themselves as insecure and vindictive over something relatively small and still haven’t been able to let it go.
this assumes placing no value on principles or pride, which is probably not true of most people and varies by individual. you can’t reasonably price this for a person you don’t know.
>but the loss of her job could potentially cost her everything
again, you can’t answer this for somebody you don’t know. she’s in a better position to estimate the probability of being fired and how much it would cost her.
clearly she thought a 100% probability of giving in was more downside than an x% chance of losing her job. the preference is individual even if we know all of the variables, which we don’t.
>they are usually short and lacking in citation, evidence, or persuasion
He’s not writing research papers. He’s just a thoughtful guy with a lot of experience sharing his ideas as concisely as possible. Part of the reason the posts are so interesting is because of the discussions they prompt - I wouldn’t mistake the level of interest on HN for everybody treating these as gospel.
>The figures come from a survey of members belonging to songwriters’ body The Ivors Academy and the Musicians’ Union
Combined membership of the two organizations is around 32,000 [0][1] dues-paying members in the UK. We can safely assume the survey response rate was not 100%.
I believe that most musicians make little to nothing from streaming. I would be shocked if this survey data was representative of professional musicians more broadly.
The article is a little vague about the failure but I'm a skydiver and this might not be the instructor's fault. I know that sounds insane but hear me out.
The article says "main and reserve parachutes had tangled, preventing either from opening". This could mean a few things:
1. Neither chute was ever deployed - "total malfunction" on main and reserve where they're both stuck in the container (backpack thing holding the parachute).
An instructor following perfect protocol with a poorly packed reserve would have died here, and they likely did not pack the reserve themselves. Reserve chutes are packed by a master rigger who's required to apply a seal and update a little paper record on each rig indicating when it was packed and by whom. These are meant to be checked before you're allowed to get on a plane. Reserves are (thankfully) rarely opened until they're due to be repacked based on time. There's overlap between master riggers and instructors who handle tandem jumps, but the reserve was most likely not packed by that instructor.
2. Main deployed but has a "partial malfunction" (out but not fully open), reserve then deployed and tangles with the main.
This would be the instructors fault - in this case they should cut away the main before deploying the reserve.
3. Main has a "total malfunction" where it doesn't come out at all, instructor deploys reserve, then main deploys late and tangles with the reserve.
This one is inconclusive but probably not the instructor's fault. Protocol here is don't waste time cutting your main because you're falling fast with no drag from a partially deployed chute and the main is unlikely to ever open. The reason it could still be the instructors fault is if they had a chance to cut away the main after it came out and failed to do so before they tangled.