My first reserve ride occurred on August 8, 1997, on jump number 57. It was my third jump of the day, and also my third jump on a new demo canopy - a Triathlon 175. It was also only my second attempt at PRO packing. I guess I need more lessons.

It was a gorgeous Friday. I had taken the day off from work, and appropriately wore a T-shirt that said "Even a Bad Day Skydiving is Better Than a Good Day at Work". That morning I made a joke at my rigger's expense. He said he'd remember it next time I needed something from him. I told him that he wouldn't remember by then. An hour later, I proved that statement to be wrong.

As my partner and I were climbing out the door of the Twin Otter at 13,500 feet, one of the jumpers behind us noticed that the spot was long, and yelled "DON'T JUMP! We're making another pass!" - - which we didn't hear, and out the door we went. Talk about your bad omens. The jump went fairly well; we turned a few points, and broke off at 4,000 feet, and I threw my pilot 'chute at 3K. The opening shock was harder than usual, and I was spinning and being jolted about. At first I thought I was just in turbulent air, but when I looked up, I saw the left side of the canopy being choked off by one of the steering lines that had gotten wrapped around it. Not good. After yelling a profanity that people on the ground could probably hear, I finally  got to execute what I had practiced so many times on the ground: LOOK at cutaway handle, REACH for it, LOOK at the reserve ripcord, PULL the cutaway handle, PULL the reserve ripcord.  And guess what? It worked! I remember thinking how flimsy the reserve canopy looked, but I was certainly happy to see it. After all, it was the last one I had.

But my troubles weren't over. I did a quick circle, and could not see the airport anywhere. I had no idea where I was. Then I realized I should probably be following the $1300 canopy I just cut away from, but it had already drifted quite a way from me, there were trees everywhere, and I was getting low. Time to find a safe place to land. Within a couple of minutes of touching down amidst some grazing cows, the Cessna belonging to the USPA regional director buzzes overhead. He sees me. My ride home should be arriving soon.

Fortunately for me, my partner also saw the malfunction, and followed my cutaway down. It landed about 50 feet high in a tree, just missing a big open field. Damn!

The cost of this malfunction:
 

I can now answer the many questions that I've always wondered about:

Q: How well will I react? Will I panic?
A: No! I had my reserve open by 2,000 feet. Piece of cake.

Q: Will I have the presence of mind to hold onto both emergency handles after I pull them?
A: I tossed the cutaway handle ($25), but kept the reserve rip cord ($30).

Q: Will I become stable before pulling the reserve?
A: I'm not sure, as I never took my eyes off my reserve rip cord. (I was also too afraid to look at the ground.) However, I believe I was fairly stable. My reserve opened with a 1/2 twist, which cleared itself pretty quickly. I was not wearing an R.S.L. at the time.

Q: Will I make a stand-up landing using the reserve?
A: No. Yet another grass stain on the seat of my jumpsuit!

Yahoo! I live to jump another day. Practice those emergency procedures, and don't date your rigger's wife.

Reserve Ride #2

July 30, 1998. Jump #115, 14K feet from the Queen Air visiting Pepperell. Turned 6 points on a 3-way, broke off at 4.5K, went to pull at 3K - - couldn't find the damn handle!! Still going terminal velocity, I pull the reserve. **WHACK**  I must have dipped one shoulder, because the whole left side of my body hurt, and I couldn't move my arm for about a minute, I thought it was dislocated. My arm got it's sensation back in time to flare for landing. The BOC handle turned out to be in it's usual place, I don't know why I couldn't find it. I must be getting stooopid or something. It's the next morning now, my neck and shoulder are still sore, but will be OK. The opening shock also left huge bruises under my legs. Damn, those reserves open FAST! It wasn't this bad last time, because I had already slowed down quite a bit from my malfunctioning main. This time I was going 120mph. Ouch, to say the least.

This jump was caught on video by 2 different freefall videographers, but neither one recorded my mishap. Good video, nonetheless. Ask me to show it to you sometime.

By the way - two reserve rides in only 115 jumps is not at all typical. The average malfunction rate is more like 1 in every 1,000 jumps. My goal now is to someday be bringing UP the average, instead of down!