Phew... only broken ribs, a concussion, a misplaced shoe, a missing sock, and a missed competition. Saied went against everyone's advice and jumped in crappy conditions after a recent downsize, driven by the anxiousness to be ready for a competition in 3 days. So much for that. Glad we can all learn from his non-fatal crash. Fast is slow and slow is fast... or something like that. Now downsize faster and try harder next time, Saied (kidding, kidding :-).

Some of you may find this disturbing to watch, but this (older) video highlights the very real and potentially deadly effects of hypoxia on a high altitude jump. In this particular case, all of the skydivers on this plane had varying degrees of hypoxia by the time they climbed to 21,000 feet. Clearly there was miscommunication during the briefing, because the pilot wasn't aware there were two separate O2 valves; one for him and one for the jumpers. That said, the purpose of posting this video isn't to blame anyone, it's to learn about something that is very serious and can affect us without even knowing it. Remember, these jumpers were high as a kite and had no idea what was going on -- one of them even "woke up" mid-freefall without knowing how he got there. Scary stuff.

My boy John Berry thought he'd have some fun with an old Jumbo ParaCommander at Skydive Spaceland. Little did he know that he packed himself a line over and had to ride a reserve manufactured in 1955 (container was a B4 belly mount). First cutaway on a round? Yes way, Johh. Yes way!

Well this doesn't go quite as planned. I'm no doctor, but I think his broken leg takes priority over his bruised ego. Ok, now let's go eat some birthday cake kids!

Guru Khalsa is the victim of a freak accident. The excess brake line gets tangled with his slider stow ball, causing a fast spin and eventually a cutaway. Releasing the right toggle may have fixed the problem, but who knows. At least he's alive and he found out his reserve works. More importantly, he's really lucky that stow ball wasn't sewn onto his rig, otherwise that cutaway would've been a mess to deal with. I'm curious... do you stow your excess brake lines?

If you remember to fasten your seatbelt before take off, good for you. If you forget to take your seatbelt off before exiting the plane, then you might end up hanging from the plane with an embarrassed and frightening look on your face like this guy. Take notes people, this is important stuff.

At the bottom end of Geoff's Level 1 AFF jump, he deploys his main and has a bag lock. Watch the video to see how the situation gets handled by the instructor on his reserve side. According to Geoff, the fun wasn't over once the video ends. The reserve deployment released the bag lock, giving him a two-out. Once he cleared the line twists, the canopies formed a downplane. He safely cleared the main, then rocked a downwind landing under his reserve. I'm exhausted just thinking about it.

Having a low cutaway around 1,000 feet is never fun, neither is having 6 solid line twists on your reserve. Good thing he had a Skyhook and could clear those line twists by 500ft. Which would you prefer: get stable before deploying your reserve or line twists on an open/flying reserve?

Who needs to flare when the ground is there to stop you. Gravity: 1, Skydiver: 0.