Sunday, no 4 way for us today.

We were going to do 4-way today, but Jean phoned last night that he had to work today. Pity, we are probably not the best 4-way team in the country, but it is always great fun. We (= the other three of us) manifest, and just ask the others on the load who wants to join. We end up doing a nice seven way. On opening I have a rather nasty twist, Luckily I fly a conservative canopy and I manage to get out of it, so I keep my count at two reserve rides in about 3000 jumps (not a bad average, huh).

The girl from yesterday comes up to me and asks if, since apparently I am not doing 4-way, I want to jump with her, and how could I say no to that. So up we go for her level 5. Some clouds are forming, and the wind has picked up a bit, but nothing too bad I think. On exit, there are no clouds underneath us, we have a clear view, but just before us, upwind of our exit point is a gigantic tumulus, it goes up to at least 15k I think. The freefall goes great, but as soon as I am under canopy, i feel that the wind is much stronger now, too strong for a very light student under a big canopy anyway. But all the briefing and the explanations about patterns and windchecks do prove useful. She heads her canopy into the wind at 4000 feet, and just comes straight down, staying in place or, for the bottom few 100 feet, even going backwards a little bit. The timing of her flare is perfect, and she even remembers not to flare too deep in a situation like this. I congratulate her on a job very well done, and apologise for putting her in that situation: I know the winds can get heavy just before such a big cloud, I saw the cloud, and yet the penny didn't drop and I gave the go for the exit...

The next plane still goes up, although the weather is now quickly worsening.
This is what it looked like when they were landing. That's it for today. Beer-time

Photos by John Beton