I love puns and word play.

Puns are one of the few forms of humor that doesn’t have a target. No one is ever the butt of a pun and that is what I like about them.

"People say you forgive for yourself in order to move on. Personally it has never really clicked for me, how to forgive someone who hasn’t asked it or changed. "

This is a good point.

In this case the term “forgive” is almost, but not quite a misnomer. View it more as moving past the trauma and not letting it affect you in the future, irrespective of understanding the perpetrator’s behavior. This usually involves leaving them behind and ending all contact with them. Most people that behave in such a way to cause others trauma will never change. The only thing you can do is move past them and go on with your life.

I hope that makes sense.

DB Cooper has been the topic of Drop Zone conversations for years. The jump he made is perfectly doable by anyone trained in the practical application of aerodynamic decelerators. Albeit it was an extremely risky jump as I’ll detail below.

As a matter of fact I’ve gone out the air stairs of a 727. It was at the 1999 at the World Freefall Convention in Quincy, IL. It was fun, but a 727 on jump run is doing about 180kias when normal skydiving operations are around 90kias. It won’t injure you, but it feels like you’re getting hit by a ton of bricks. So not the funnest jump and I only did one, to say I did it. Going out the bomb bay of a B-17 (Nine-O-Nines RIP) was a lot more fun.

The general consensus in the skydiving community is that Cooper lived, but was probably injured. He jumped a round parachute, at night, in poor weather conditions. Even with modern gear that kind jump is extremely risky. Round parachutes go down where the wind blows them after exit. There is a little bit of control with a round, but nothing like a ram air chute.

He probably had a vehicle stashed close to the drop zone and was able to get to it with most of the money. If I recall correctly some of the money was discovered on a creek or riverbank some time later. He probably lived the rest of his life in secure obscurity… Or he might even still be alive.

Only he knows for sure.

Zestos and Polly’s Freeze and that’s about it.

I miss their malts, they were always the best.

AHEM!

AC/DC music is nothing more than 4 chords and a beat.

And you know, sometimes that’s all you need.

Awesome! Blue Skies!

Yeah, sports shoes, hiking SHOES (not boots) are appropriate. The swoopers would wear shoes with little tread so that they didn’t catch anything on the ground. I’ve seen a few broken ankles like that and a boot would not have helped.

I’m a former jumper now. My last jump was in 2006. Main reason is I got bored and took my life in another direction. I did some CRW and was actually in the 100 record attempt in Lake Wales many years ago, although I have to admit I’m not the best CReWdog and got cut. So I’m not officially a part of the record, but I was there. I was on the record setting team for big ways in Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky (65-ways). I think that was 1999 and not sure if those records still stand. It was all the same team, we just flew from our base at Skydive Greene County in Xenia OH over to Skydive Greensburg, IN and someplace in KY… Can’t remember what airport it was in Kentucky.

Also had a 4 and 8 way competition team. We traveled a bit to compete and went to nationals every year up until about 2003, until internal conflicts on the team broke it apart.

I took jumpers just off student status and trained them on canopy skills, hence my moniker. Never taught swooping, at least not with toggles. I consider toggle turns close to the ground too dangerous and have known people that were killed that way. I get it and I’ve never tried to argue people out of doing hook turns, but it’s not something I would ever teach or recommend. If you want to swoop use your front risers. Not as exciting, but you’ll have a much better chance at becoming an old skydiver. There are a couple of my former students who are professional skydivers today and you’ve seen them jump in movies. They have far out stripped this old dog, that is for sure and I’m quite proud of them.

Other than that, I did attain a USPA PRO license and did a lot of demo jumps. Stadiums, golf courses, a couple of NASCAR races and a few airshows. I hated doing airshows the most as it was typical for the director of the air show to know nothing about skydiving and I’d have to deal with weird restrictions. Just about got into a fist fight with one idiot telling me NO TURNS under 1500ft… Not even S turns. I told him to go fuck himself and I pulled my team out of the show. God damn whuffos.

My token is me under my PD Spectre 150 in 1997. I also had a Spectre 135 and a Sharp Chuter. Actually, I had several Sharp Chuters as jumping smoke destroyed them after a while. My container of choice was the Sunpath Javelin. I had a J-2 Javelin, which is what I was jumping in my token photo. My 135 was in one of the first Javelin Odysseys off the production line. I want to say it was a TNJ, but don’t remember and I sold it when I retired. I did demo jumps using a Dolphin. Back in those days you could buy one of those for $500 so if it got torn up due to smoke or some other demo jump thing it was not big deal. I think I did replace it once.

All in all I’m somewhere in the 4500’s for jump numbers. My log books have fallen to multiple moves over the last 20 years, so I don’t know the exact number. I know people with tens of thousands of jumps. The DZO of Skydive Greene County, Jim West, passed away last week and he was north of 20,000 jumps 25 years ago and I’m sure he added a lot more. He had more time in free fall that a lot of people have riding in planes.

Also, don’t take skydiving advice off the internet if it’s anything other than… “ASK YOUR JUMP MASTER or S&TA”.

BSBD

Yikes!

Hope you’re in a better place now.

This item sounds like it might be for a hobby.

An inviolate rule for gifts is you NEVER give a gift for someone’s hobby, unless they have specifically mentioned it. Then you buy EXACTLY what they tell you.

Case in point… I’m a former skydiver. It’s a sport full of extremely counterintuitive aspects. One of my brothers was in the army and did airborne training under round parachutes. He gifted me a set of paratrooper boots to use while skydiving…

It was a nice thought, but most of the time I’m running out a landing, not doing a PLF (Parachute Landing Fall). The boots were extremely tight around the ankles for support on landing under a round parachute. They were less than useless for jumping a ram air chute. They were in my closet for almost 20 years, before I decided it was time to make some space. Zero jumps and probably less than a few hours of wear, because they were just not comfortable, since they were designed to save your ankles landing under a T-10.

Yes, I informed my brother emphatically that I could not use that type of boot in sport skydiving, but typical of my family someone else knew better of what I was doing than I did.

Captain Steeeve is excellent.

Other Youtube aviation centered channels that are worth watching especially for accident information:

Blancolirio

Max Afterburner

Mentour Pilot

and his associated channel:

Mentour Now

Oh crap…

Dungeon Crawler Carl “The Inevitable Ruin” Book 7

“Fellowship of the Ring” Lord of the Rings Book 1

Frodo and Donut are fighting their way through Moria to throw Cascadia into Mt Doom… Oh and Frodo is wearing boxers with a heart print.

God Dammit Donut!

Vancouver

That what watching Stargate SG-1 multiple times has done to me.

30 year IT Professional here.

The thing about AI that most people do not understand is the sheer amount of processing power required and just how much that requirement impacts everything. Entire data centers dedicated to one thing that can require the output of a power plant and the associated cooling requirement. I believe Microsoft is in the process of reactivating Three Mile Island TMI-1 reactor. TMI-2 was destroyed in an accident in 1979.

For what? What is it actually doing that is truly worth investing those kind of resources?

That’s not even considering the financial investment. Which has resulted in tech companies taking a “throw everything against the wall and see what sticks” tactic to get it to start making money. Tactics like that usually result in a bubble where the technology is perceived to have more value that it really does. The problem with this is people won’t spend their money on something that does not return their investment. So it’s a matter of time that we have these huge data centers sitting all over the country abandoned.

I discovered SAS back in the late 80’s when I worked retail. I made a friend who worked at the shoe store that was in the same mall where I was working and she recommend them. They were the only shoe that allowed me to last 12 to 14 hours on the floor.

I would replace them every year, just because I wore them that much working 60+ hours a week.

Retail job… Never again. But SAS shoes are great.

It’s not the first time an engine has fallen off of a DC-10/MD-11.

1979 Chicago O’Hare American Airlines AA191

That particular instance was due to maintenance not following the correct procedure for mounting the engine. It caused cracks in the support pylon and it was just a matter of time. The crazy thing is the pilots did exactly what they should have done. The problem is the warning system for slat disagreement was only powered by the electrical bus supplied by the engine that just departed the aircraft. So the pilots had no idea that the slats on that side of the aircraft retracted due to damage to the hydraulic lines. So that wing complete stalled and 271 people died.

The difference with this crash is the plane was wings level until the tail hit the ground. Also in that video if you look closely the slats are out on the port wing.

I like to wear hiking shoes as my everyday shoes. My feet are EE width.

For the past several years I’ve liked Merrell Moab 2, although they have been discontinued for the Moab 3. They come in a GTX model as well.

To be perfectly honest, I have had some issues that had to be fixed with the shoe glue that comes in a red tube. After fixing the issue, which has been the sole separating from the upper, the shoe would last for some time. I get out and hike at least 4 times a week, for about 2 miles. Fortunately, I have a nice county park near my house. With that amount of wear the Moabs last me for about 3 years and then it’s just the tread that is worn smooth. My original pair, one’s I had to fix, I still use for yard work.

As far as sports shoes go, I like New Balance. I usually keep a pair of cross trainers around for those yearly times I try to take up running but utterly fail.

In the NTSB conference yesterday, the spokesman stated that UPS had NOT delayed the flight for maintenance.

At this point, it’s time to just wait until the preliminary report comes out.

About the only things that we have evidence for are:

1. #1 engine departed the air frame at or above V1. The reason why the engine departed is unknown at this point.

2. #2 engine experienced compressor stalls above V1. The plane had only one fully functional engine. Being fully loaded there was no way it could fly. There is video evidence of the compressor stalls in the video posted by OP. The reason for the compressor stalls are unknown, but there is ample evidence of the engine ingesting smoke and debris from departing #1 engine.

3. The plane was wings level or nearly so until the tail hit. After that Newton took control. Which is some damn fine piloting.

Anything outside of the above is speculation at this point.

Is this another AA191? There isn’t enough evidence yet. Video is too grainy to asses the condition of the flight surfaces, or at least the videos I have seen. The reason for the #1 engine departing is unknown. AA191 was due to an unapproved maintenance procedure, but those lessons were learned long ago… At least I hope so.

We are at the “wait and see” stage. Time to let the NTSB do their jobs.

My mother-in-law went absolutely insane when I told her that was a rule in Latin and not in English.

She was rather sheepish when she did her own research and discovered… I was right.

A preposition is a terrible thing to end a sentence with!

The NTSB actually showed that same photo in their briefing this afternoon… Also watching the close up videos of the crash does show the port engine missing on the wing. So I think it’s a real photo.

The plane was also wings level until the tail hits, which I find interesting.