On the 6th March at 10:45am local time I jumped out of a helicopter from 2,800 feet. I opened my parachute after 1.5 seconds. We opened over the ocean and flew back to land on the beach where over 1000 Vietnamese locals looked on with interest. I jumped with Wendy Smith who happens to be the number one rated female skydiver in the world as well as flying the camera for me that day.

It was a day of firsts.

• First time I had been to Vietnam
• First time I had jumped out of a helicopter (or even being on one!)
• First time I had jumped from 2,800 feet (I usually jump from around 13,000 feet!)
• First time I had jumped onto a beach
• First time anyone in history has skydived on six continents in six days!
• First time many people had heard of 3 million orphans in South Africa!

Everything went well! We didn’t miss a flight. We didn’t have any really bad weather.

We made every pick up and every connection. It was a logistical nightmare organizing such a trip that took us to 6 continents, 9 countries, and 14 flights adding up to 92 hours in flying time in just 7 days!

We had an amazing experience and met some amazing people, really amazing.

…

Thanks everybody for your support!

God bless

Martin Downs

More info…

http://www.project0.org.za/content/view/15/24/

Videos…



 

Skydiving, Vietnam, boogie / event | No Comments »

LSD

Albert Hoffman died on Tuesday morning. RIP dude.

Article, Media, culture | No Comments »

A skydiving friend’s gear has gone missing. Please forward far and wide and keep a look out for any and all pieces.

Forwarded from Lauren:

My name is Lauren Demme and my gear bag that has all of my skydiving gear in it has disappeared. It is black with purple pinstripes from the Sunshine Factory, and it has Lauren embroidered on it in purple. My green helmet bag with a Deland Embroidery on it is attached. In it is my rig which was my high school graduation present, my liquid sky suit which was college graduation, my mom’s helmet, and many other items that have great sentimental value as well as crucial pieces to my sanity!!!

If you could take the 5 minutes to forward this e-mail onto your skydiving friends any riggers you may know I would greatly appreciate it.

Everyone in the skydiving community is trying to do the same thing, and most of us barely have money to do so…it could be just an accident and someone picked it up by mistake. I don’t care…I just want it back!!! It really won’t take that long… To everyone that passes this on and Riggers that keep an eye out I want to you to know how grateful I am for your help. Seriously, thank you.

Lauren

Please contact The Skydiver Network, or Extreme Sports Cafe, directly with any info.

Gear Details:

Vector 3 Micron
UPT V310 s/n: 37690 DOM: 05/01
It is teal yellow and silver and has GRAD 2001 embroidered on the left mudflap and Skyhook as well.

Cypres
s/n: 50E0E7675CC8 2200 DOM: 07/98

Sapphire 2 119
s/n: 94315181 DOM: 04/06
that is teal bottom skin, yellow ribs and silver top skin

PD 143 Reserve
PD 143R s/n: 25881 DOM: 09/01

Liquid Sky Freefly Suit
One of a kind freefly suit, designed with teal, yellow and grey with bubbles that begin at the feet and swirl around the body.

Silver Z1 Freefly Helmet with a White ProDytter
There is a Gold Skydive Venezuela sticker on the back of my helmet.

Silver Altimaster 3
Lauren is engraved on the side.

Goggles, Gloves, additional clothing are all in there as well.

Thanks for all your help.

General News, Skydiving | 2 Comments »

’nuff said… Learn to Skydive. Learn to Kitesurf. Or cheat and use your iPhone to stay online!

General News | No Comments »

Well this is just crazy! And the reasons given defy belief, particularly when you take into account the currently pending Chinese Olympics!

The world-famous Red Arrows have been banned from appearing at the 2012 London Olympics because they are deemed ‘too British’.

Organisers of the event say that the Arrows military background might be ‘offensive’ to other countries taking part in the Games. The display team have performed at more than 4000 events worldwide, but the Department of Culture, Media and Sport have deemed the display team ‘too militaristically British’. Red Arrows pilots were said to be ‘outraged’, as they had hoped to put on a truly world class display for the Games, something which had never been seen before. Being axed from a British-based event for being ‘too British’ is an insult - the Arrows are a symbol of Britain.

The Red Arrows have been excellent ambassadors for British overseas trade, as they display their British-built Hawk aircraft all over the world.

The Arrows performed a short flypast in 2005 when the winning bid was announced, but their flypast at the Games was to have been truly spectacular.

It is to be hoped that common sense prevails

If you disagree with this decision, sign the online petition. Please.

This is the current response from the PM’s office, where they deny the allegation. But remember it’s the Organizers who are trying to ban the Red Arrows. Not the PMs office. Apathy in these matters will often mean that these kind of stupid decisions go forward.. So please sign the petition.

PM’s Office response..

This allegation is not true. The Government has not banned the Red Arrows from the London 2012 Olympic Games. The organising committee of London 2012 will decide what to include in the Opening Ceremony and other celebrations - but with almost five years to go, decisions are yet to be made on what these will look like.

And of course the Red Arrows played a memorable role in the celebrations for 2012, when they flew over Trafalgar Square to mark London winning the Games.

Article, General News | No Comments »

Odds that you’ll die from Skydiving, or another extreme activity… Not listed! But some eye opening ones are..

General News, injuries | No Comments »

Chris K was a joy to have at the boogie, and helped out immensely when Stefan had his accident. Respect.
Hope to see you again soon Chris.

He also took some wonderful pictures of not just the boogie, but also local scenes..

Chris K’s Skydiver Network page.

General News | No Comments »

If you didn’t know already that Skydiver Network (setup by Omar - one of the Skydive Vietnam Load Organizers) was the place to be here’s another reason to go there..

Kevin Elvis King (one of our participants) has put a bunch of really cool photos from the Skydive Vietnam boogie (and those bad weather days) on his page of the Network.. Nice work! And thanks once again for coming.

Elvis is on Skydiver Network!

Article, General News, Skydiving, Vietnam | No Comments »

This is from a very interesting article published on ArsTechnica..

[Researchers also found that geckos in windtunnels (pictured above) were able to control their decent and steer towards a solid surface using their tails. When on their stomachs, gliding in a pose similar to Superman's, the position "allowed them to use their tails to turn or control yaw and pitch."]

That paragraph conjured up images for us of teams of experienced skydiving geckos going to work each day to a Wind Tunnel to assist man in his experiments… Hilarious!

Article, General News, Skydiving | No Comments »

Thank you once again to all the participants and organisers involved in the Skydive Vietnam Boogie.

We are just getting sorted again at HQ, and plan to finish the blogging (late I know) of the last few days of the boogie.. Including info on National Records set in Vietnam and the World Record we assisted in…

In the meantime there is a small post boogie report on the main Skydive Vietnam Website

General News, Skydiving, Vietnam, boogie / event | No Comments »