Why skydiving?!?!?!

[base615]

Guys,

I don't want to criticise the validity of what's going on in Malaysia etc but I have a bit of an issue with everybody calling it "Extreme Skydiving". It's not skydiving it's BASE or fixed object jumping or landmark parachuting or whatever name you want but not skydiving.

In the UK the British Parachute Association used to ban people for bringing skydiving into disrepute if caught BASE jumping. Their reasoning was that the general public couldn't tell the difference and therefore complained to the BPA (load of bollocks of course). These days they don't mind at all what we do because they believe there is a recognised difference but if people continue to call it skydiving then these problems will re-materialize for the jumpers here who still want to skydive.

It's not just because I'm British that I'm saying this, it's because I don't believe that the two sports are related close enough to warrant any sort of similarity in the name.

I honestly think the KL events have been good so far, politics aside, 400 building jumps without incident etc, but BASE being called skydiving really pisses me off. If you look at the news articles all they talk about is "skydivers" jumping off a building in Malaysia. To me that sounds like a bunch of people who jump out of planes all the time and then one day decided to do it off a building for a laugh. It sounds like no real specific experience or training has gone into it and that's not what we do!

Flame away, I can take it and I'm sure plenty of people agree with me!

Craig

[guest]

Craig:

I don't think anyone should flame you for your somments. They are thoughtful and speak to a key issue.

The bottom line is: People who jump from any high place with parachutes are parachutists and skydivers and that is how they are perceived by the general public. Too, SKYDIVING magazine refers to them as skydivers and parachutists too, because... that's what they are: People who dive through the sky using parachutes.

Extreme skydiving is just that: Extreme, meaning more risky or demanding that "regular" skydiving.

One reason, by the way, for moving from BASE jumping is the illegality generally associated with the term. Fair or not, that's the way it is, and from a marketing standpoint, it must be addressed.

Moreover, you gotta keep the old adage in mind: To cows, other cows look different.

I used this adage in a 1985 editorial I wrote in skydiving where I called on airplane skydivers to quit bad-mouthing fixed-object skydivers because it made us all look bad because whuffos can't tell the difference.

The bottom line is, most BASE jumpers are STILL airplane skydivers who also jump from objects. That does not, however, suggest that you can go from airplane to object without additional training or greater experience, any more than an accuracy jumper can move to a 79 square foot elliptical without similar additional training and experience.

So thank you again for your question. If you want to continue this dialogue, I'd be happy to bat this around with you on the Board.

Best regards,


Robin Heid

[guest]

Hi Robin,

I agree that we are all parachutists but "skydiving" as a word and as a sport has become synonymous with jumping from planes. The average whuffo thinks it's pretty silly to jump out of "perfectly servicable" aircraft in the first place and to add extreme to the name I feel just adds to the public perception that we have a "deathwish" (common term that I hear).

I also agree that BASE jumping is a name that conjures up ideas of illegality and in fact I don't believe it to be a very descriptive name now that we're jumping dams, smokestacks, fairground rides and other objects that don't fit neatly into any of the BASE catagories. Fixed object parachuting for instance I believe is a better description of what we do.

I'd like to see the sport become more legal oriented and high profile but what I don't want to see is people turning up to watch a spectacle of "extreme skydivers defying death before your very eyes".

Craig

[guest]

Good points, Craig, but also important to recognize that the current climate turns the moniker "extreme" into a positive for these kinds of events. It shows this sub-sport of parachuting to be just that - a sub-set of a larger sport that continues to gain acceptance every day as a legitimate sporting and recreational activity and NOT a death-defying daredevil pastime.

Two other things come into play also:

1) I've always supported the idea of competitive BASE events because they move public perception of the activity from "who will live?" to "Who will WIN?" It fundamentally changes the perception non-participants have of any risk activity when the nature of an event goes from simply living through it to performin more proficiently than your fellow practitioners.

2)Calling BASE jumping extreme skydiving moves airplane skydiving into the "mainstream," so to speaks, and makes imore accessible to the average person... now they can make a skydive but still not feel too "out there on the edge" because the extreme skydivers are so obviously way farther out there... it makes a regular airplane skydive seem much safer and less "daredevilish" than it might otherwise seem.

BOth of these factors can contribute positively to the growth of skydiving as a general sport - a spot with many facets and "sub-routines," from object jumping to pond s3wooping to CRW and RW and freefly. The more the merrier, and the more dimensions there are to the sport, the stronger and healtier it becomes.

Robin

[guest]

I see where you're coming from and I think the difference in opinions stems from the argument of whether BASE is a facet of skydiving or a totally separate sport in its own right. I think we'll have to agree to disagree on that point.

I agree with you that competition can help change public perception for the better. However if one of these events has a fatality it's possible that this improved public perception could be harmed on a far greater scale, the El Cap demo is a perfect case in point.

I think it also needs recognising that a large percentage of BASE jumpers don't have any aspirations to compete but prefer to just jump among friends whether it's a 1000 ft legal cliff at midday or a 200 ft building downtown at midnight. There is therefore a pretty big contingent of jumpers who may not support the way the sport is going although I personally believe that route to be inevitable and beneficial.

I think it's going to be difficult or impossible to have a truly accepted sport of "Extreme Skydiving" when there will allways be illegal jumps and there will allways be busts, after all you'll never go to jail for running the 100m in a national park!

Craig

[guest]

A thought I just had (while watching you guys discussing this).

The name skydiving implies that someone who is an "expert" skydiver (i.e. holds a license from USPA, BPA or some other agency which has the word "expert" on it) is necessarily going to be competent at the activity in question.

So, by calling our sport extreme skydiving, we would appear to run the risk of giving non-jumpers the impression that any expert skydiver is a proficient BASE jumper, as well as a good source of information about the sport (witness the news crews that showed up at my home DZ-which is the closest one to Yosemite-in the wake of Jan Davis' death, expecting that all the skydivers there would know all about it).

Another, and in my mind, worse consequence of using the name "skydiving" to describe our sport is that it will convince young skydivers that since they are now "experts" at skydiving, they are competent to attempt BASE jumps with no further training. This may sound absurd, but I can personally think of three cases in which this has happened (in one a serious injury resulted, and in another a fatality).

With these consequences in mind, I have to agree with Craig that some verbal differentiation of BASE and skydiving would be a positive thing.

--Tom Aiello
tbaiello@ucdavis.edu

[guest]

Actually, you WILL go to jail for running the 100 meters in a national park if it is a competition and you.... don't have a permit. :)

As for the competitive thing, I am myself one of those people who has no interest in competition. I jump from objects because I like jumping, not competiting. My involvement with the World Championships of Extreme Skydiving is somewhat serendipitous and not the result of any interest I have in competition -- other than to promote and advance the sport becasue the farther the competition goes, the wider open the rest of the arena becomes for "recreational" jumpers, of which I am one!

The real bottom line is: The more often it shows up on television and otherwise in the public consciousness, the more accepted it becomes -- and I totally disagree with Tom contention below that somebody dying during one of these events is a bad thing. As the noted humor write PJ O'Rourke once wrote: "The only polite thing for race car drivers and skydivers to do is die. That's what everyone is waiting around for anyway."

People EXPECT race car drivers and skydivers to die, and when they do, it doesn't shed a bad light on the sport, especially if it happens in a competition. Events like Jan's death fall into a different category: When you put on a political show, you're supposed to get it right, and it was that fact -- along with the piss-poor handling of the media by that jump's "organizer" that led to such bad press. Had a professional media person been on-site and handled the "spin" properly, the negative effects of that event would have significantly mitigated.

But what the heck. People are gonna think and say what they want to anyway and so we're mostly just having a parlor debate for the fun of it anyway.

But it's been fun and polite and not anonymous that makes it worth doing.

Love,

Robin

[guest]

It's not skydiving, it's BASE jumping. It couldn't be skydiving, otherwise Gowaylow wouldnt be anywhere near it.

Skydive= high
BASE= low

Who really cares how the public views BASE. They will always think it's crazy, and they will always be right. Besides, if it's done properly, it's not viewed by the public anyhow. All this publicity and people are going to start staking out objects to catch a glimbse of BASE jumpers in their natural habitat.

[Donk]

O.K. so what do you call a jump from an airplane at 750’, like the ones several of us have experienced in the military? It is certainly not BASE-jumping but yet it is lower than many BASE-jumps. On the flip side, it is certainly not skydiving. E.g. I don't think altitude reference should have anything to do with it. Technically I would say we are all “sky” - “diving” in that we jump or dive from the sky. Regardless if the exit is from an object, a plane, a balloon, or some other. We all jump, fall, and descend under a parachute. Considering the fact that a BASE-jumping requirement is to have at least 100 skydives then I wouldn't take it personal when the uniformed use the term skydiving ubiquitously for BASE-jumping activities. I have yet to see a BASE-jumping event covered by the media where they do not make this reference to the 100 jump prerequisite.

Fun discussion but, in my humble opinion, the important point is that BASE jumping got some excellent press and the participants contributed to the validity and "sanity" of BASE jumping. Maybe this country will take the KL event as an example and realize that the BASE community and our nation highest attractions can live in harmony. I would also reference NRGB as a good example but to many non-BASE jumpers or extremely unskilled skydivers frap in only contributing to the ugly stigma BASE-jumping has gained (that should raise some response :-)). But every time there is news footage of the NRGB event they show somebody w/ skydiving gear and a 9-cell canopy getting dismantled by trees or rocks...Not so much the participants fault but the media always sensationalizes the bad instead of the good. Part of the success of KL event seems to be that most all of the participants where very skilled in their craft. Give credit when credit is due, the participants in the KL celebration did an outstanding job (a reported 450+ jumps and 0 incidents) and we should be thankful for their efforts and the continued efforts of other organizations like the CJAA to legalize the sport we all love.

Donk out.

[guest]

Amen, Donk. The bottom line on both Petronas and KL Tower is that a bunch of jumps were made in a very proficient manner from two demanding sites owned by major corporations just a month apart.

Kudos are deserved by EVERYBODY who helped make these events happen, and that includes a BIG bunch of whuffos who joined in both events -- and whose efforts were as important as any of those made by the jumpers.

It's been a great 30 days for BASE jumping in the world and that's the most important thing for all of us to take away from this.

Robin

[Donk]

Hi Robin,

Can you elaborate on the tower strike during the KL event mentioned below?

"But, the biggest gasp came when the Swede, Mikael Nordquist struck the tower about halfway down. "I had a slow 180-degree off heading opening with one line twist. By the time I unwound and went for the risers I hit the tower. After hitting the tower I popped the toggles, backed up and flew away." Nordquist said. When asked how he felt about it, Mikael just replied, "I was just mad at myself"." – The IBC Inc. web site

Was it a rushed pack job, bad equipment choice, or just an example of sh%# happens?

Thanks,

Donk

[guest]

he was not there.
you can ask mikael himself.
his e-mail address is on the page.

[gowaylow]

>It's not skydiving, it's BASE jumping.
>It couldn't be skydiving, otherwise
>Gowaylow wouldnt be anywhere near it.
>

thank you for the complement, Tree.
You are correct in that I too did not like the Term SKYD$%^&* (see I can't even type that word much less say it) associated with the petronas jump.

Have a Go Way Low day

[crwper]

Many skydivers would argue that mainstreaming skydiving is not necessarily a good thing. A "regular airplane skydive" is about as safe as a BASE jump, which is to say (IMHO) it's as safe as you make it.

Michael

[guest]

>Was it a rushed pack job, bad
>equipment choice, or just an example
>of sh%# happens?

Well Donk, maybe a little of both. On this jump I used an old BASE canopy that don't pressurize as well as it used to, giving unpredictable slider up openings. It was not a rushed pack job thou, I was one of the slowest packer that day. And yes, sh-t happens. This is part of the game, if you wanna play it this is what you might end up with. I made a mistake and had an "interesting" ride as a result.

/Micke