How to book a skydive! (and be satisfied by the whole process)

Easy! turn on that shiny mac book and google skydiving or skydiving in london etc. etc. Maybe your looking to do a charity parachute jump for a current uk charity or a cause that is close to you personally. Many 1st time jumpers opt to make a tandem for charity to raise funds for the cause that may have affected a family member or close friend. Of course you may wish to purchase a gift or voucher for a friend or maybe even just feel the need to take to the skies for yourself.

Well as most of us have already realised the world wide web can be a tricky and frustrating place to navigate as everyone with access to a computer seems to have a website! The most difficult part is to know exactly what you want as generally it’s all going to be new information at this stage of the process. Does any of the following form part of your “I am looking for this to go skydiving” list:

• Professional and helpful voice on the phone who know what they are talking about because they really skydive not just sell skydives.
• Prompt and concise reply when you e-mail your questions and inevitable concerns (everybody is a little nervous when thinking about making a jump from a plane)
• A good feeling about the people you are booking with.
• A competitive rate for either yourself or your group
• A company that are looking to make that skydive a fantastic experience not just treat you like just another Tandem or AFF student once they have taken your credit card details.

We feel the same when we book services online so we do understand how it feels to be ignored and frustrated when you require information about something your looking to do for the first time that you want to be 100% right (no-one wants to do a 98% correct skydive

So where do you look? your favorite web search engine is most peoples first port of call! Enter your desired question and bam! a list of providers of the service your looking for.. Well, generally most people start on the top of page one and go to the sponsored links.. Why look any further right? after all these are the top on page one, they must be the best. Actually the sponsored links and most of the page one are the companies with the large marketing budget, not necessarily the best staff or experience, the more you pour money into ad-words the higher up the list you rise, it’s all about the money!

Scream louder...

Here are some tips to help you end up with a great Tandem or AFF experience and not end up sitting in a field with a styrofoam cup of weak coffee wondering what is going on whilst all the people in the colourful suits buzz around having a good time.

Rule number one above anything else is to find a parachute centre or skydiving centre that are the providers of the skydive you wish to make. Not an agency that take your credit card details and then sell the product to the centre taking a chunk of your money for the privilege, usually £50 or more. Yes they have fancy headed paper and nice envelopes but is that worth the extra money. We too have some pretty fancy headed paper as it happens.

Rule number two check whether there maybe any further charges for the day, if the Tandem skydive is only £150.00 whilst everyone else seems around the £220-£250 range it’s probably to good to be true and other charges may “suddenly occur” on the day.

Rule number three ask questions, we expect you to ask a lot of questions after all you are looking to put your life quite literally in our capable hands. If you don’t get the answers you are looking for, make a call elsewhere, customer service should be a main priority.

AFF Courses 2011 with Infinite skydiving Solutions Ltd

Do you want to learn to skydive?

Then AFF is one way to be trained to become a licensed skydiver in the UK, static line parachuting or the progression system as it is more professionally referred to is the other available method. In the opinion of Infinite Skydiving Instructor Andy Ford AFF is the only way to seriously train to become a skydiver. “I trained on static line back in the day and spent a lot of time sat on the ground because of unfavourable weather conditions, I became a static line parachute Instructor over 11 years ago and watched 1000′s of students try to progress from static line to freefall with dummy pulls being the hardest point to get past” (A dummy pull is a fake handle that the student has to reach for and pull a second after exiting and maintaining an arched position whilst the parachute opens automatically)

1000, 2000, 3000, 4000, check canopy

 

 

 

Andy goes on to say “The dummy pull was a toughest part of the progression,I have seen maybe 4 or 5 students carry out the three consecutive perfect jumps to progress without having to repeat the process multiple times, very frustrating to get the 2nd perfect jump done only to have to start again after messing up the dummy pull on the 3rd attempt”. In the worst case I watched a student on one dropzone spend a year and 70 dummy pulls getting onto freefall (good effort Graham!)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Arch position right of the sill of the plane

The static line progression system or R.A.P.S (Ram. Air. Progression. System.) is a very laborious way of getting to A license and i believe few make it without changing to AFF or giving up and missing out on the wonderful world of freefall.

So if you fancy having a fun and challenging day out then a R.A.P.S.  S/L course is a nice introduction to parachuting. At about £225 for a day’s training and one static line jump it is the cheapest solo way of doing a parachute jump.

A quick breakdown of the course cost:

Initial S/L course £225.00

Progression Jumps £30.00 – £40.00 (minimum jumps required 17 to reach category 8 )

Even though for a skydiving school the S/L course is a more lucrative way of introducing people into the sport at a ratio of 1 instructor to 12 students, Infinite Skydiving have decided not to train static line parachuting as we feel it is not an efficient use of our instructors. We want our students to be skydiving solo and enjoying the sport in a few weeks not a few months. All of our instructors have taught static line parachuting over many years. (Andy Ford and Andy Scott started on the traditional round parachute static line parachute courses in the late 80′s)

AFF or Accelerated Free Fall is without doubt a better system if you are serious about getting into skydiving. A day of ground school much the same as the R.A.P.S system but with some specific lessons about freefall/ in air signals/ Ac emergencies/ freefall emergencies as the aircraft will fly to 13,000ft and not 3,500ft and we are exiting into FREEFALL!! not just instant canopy ride.

Once the ground school and check of understanding are finished we generally pack up for the day to give the student a break, a lot of information is taught during the lessons and the students are generally a little tired and still processing all the information, Infinite Skydiving have found that the general performance is much better waiting to jump the next day. AFF levels one to four can easily be achieved within a day with some of our students completing five and six before retiring for a well earned beer. The AFF course and 10 consolidation jumps can be done within a week or a few weekends of fair weather

 

 

 

 

 

 

Infinite skydivings AFF course is a full package containing the following:

• All lessons, parachute equipment and briefings required to attain ‘A’ license
• 8 levels of AFF with world class Instructors (all of our Instructors are world record holders, current or ex world champions & national champions in our excellent sport)
• 1 month membership to the British Parachute Association (B.P.A. the UK governing body for all civilian parachuting)
• 10 minutes flight training in the Airkix wind tunnel at milton Keynes coached by our AFF Instructors (£175.00 if booked separately through Airkix)
• Every level videoed to assist with de-briefing, imperative to see your progression (Available on DVD at the end of the course for a £50.00 donation to a charity we support)
• Free equipment loan throughout consolidation jumps (I.E. helmet/goggles/altimeter/Jumpsuit/parachute system)
• Free coaching and briefing for all consolidation jumps (10 jumps in total)
• Professional coaching and on hand advice throughout skydiving progression with briefings/parachute packing lessons as you approach ‘B’ license (50 jumps)
• Free logbook for you to keep a perfect log of all your descents (up too 200 in a book)

All of the above costs you £1,400.00 with no hidden extra’s (unlike many European courses we won’t mention) If you like we offer a level one only package for £375.00 if you wish to try the sport without committing to the full 8 levels (you can always carry on after you have completed level 1)

Check out some levels of AFF on our website

if you wish to take up this amazing sport then give us a call on 07876500515 or drop us a line on Info@infiniteskydiving.com and feel free to call just to discuss the course.

See you for an adrenaline packed 2011

regards

Infinite Skydiving Team

Dubai 2010..

Skydive Dubai

It’s rare that Skydiving is lucky enough to have a new dropzone open as we are a struggling sport with the price of real estate and cost of keeping a skydiving centre profitable in the current economic climate, so when the Emirate of Dubai opens a skydiving centre with two dz’s it really is something to celebrate throughout the sport. It is even rarer if not unheard of for a sport to have such backing as the prince of Dubai his highness Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed Al Maktoum who already has 300+ skydives and has a personal interest in seeing his project Fazza Sky grow into one of the world’s leading dropzones.

 

Fazza sky dropzone

So with a backdrop of the incredible Palm Jumeriah beneath you when you exit the aircraft the view is breathtaking and 90% of the time you are freefalling over the water between the palm and the dropzone.

 

The Twin otter jump aircraft run in generally parallel to the beach so the probability of landing in the water is fairly low with safety boats on all three sides of the dropzone on standby incase the unthinkable should happen. The minimum requirement to jump at the Palm dz is a USPA B License or equivalent with anyone below that standard jumping into the desert dropzone on highway 66 on the way to Al Alain exit 47.

 

The student dropzone in the desert of Dubai

The Desert dz caters for AFF students and those working towards B license with a Pilatus porter and Twin otter and at the moment a Shorts Skyvan as the jump aircraft.

With the available aircraft it is no suprise that the dz at the palm is hosting the 2011 International Parachute Championship and Gulf cup in Canopy swooping and FS 4 way with teams travelling from all over the world to compete.

In the future the world record 500 way team are looking to beat the current 400 way formation record in the skies over Dubai and the 2012 World Parachute Championships could be in either Dubai or Italy

Here are a few images taken with the GoPro HD over the Palm DZ.

If you want a fun place to skydive with spectacular views and a good vibe then pop over to Dubai and soak up some sun.

All the best

www.infiniteskydiving.co.uk

Freefly coaching with infinite skydiving

How do i fly head down? How do i transition in place? I seem to track across the sky when I am head down! I find it hard to dock when head up!…

All the above are statements or questions from skydivers who are trying to attain a competent degree of control in freefly skydiving. The answer to all of the above is get some coaching, both in the tunnel and in the sky! preferably by the same people as they will recognise the area’s you need to work on and that will make coaching easier as the communication will be well established.

From tunnel to the sky.

Even with tunnel coaching to help you attain the body position basics you will need to tweak them for the sky as there are some slight differences once you are wearing a parachute. There are no short cuts to getting good in the air, however, competent concise coaching will help you achieve your aim faster and safer than the “try it and see” method.

We have just returned from a coaching week in Eloy Arizona at the skydive Arizona dropzone. Our main aims were to get our student (Michael Wilson-Roberts) to achieve the basic’s of head down skydiving whilst maintaining the highest degree of safety. We covered the following:

• Exits – both inside centre and tail were practised and we also included some head up exits.
• Basic body position – The daffy, straddle and stall flying positions were covered to give a broad spectrum of possibilities when flying larger formations.
• Transitions – Sit to head down transitions and head down to head down on varying axis
• Docking – controlled smooth low docking once stopped and static
• Movement – Controlled forward movement to cover distance with safe stopping before taking grips or transitioning
• Good altitude awareness
• Sub terminal transitions
• Transition from head down to track

Once the basic body position has been established and the student can start to feel the position rather than just hold a rigid shape then progress becomes rapid.

After 58 jumps we had Michael flying very smoothly, great exits and good transitions. Easily able to fly safely with other competent flyers.. check out his moves on the video…

get coached, get good… Fast!!!

Andy Ford

infiniteskydiving

FS Coaching at Infinite skydiving

For the 2010 season Infinite Skydiving have the pleasure of promoting their formation skydiving coaching school at the dropzone every weekend.

What’s new??

Once the AFF course and consolidation jumps have been completed we have British Parachute Association accredited coaches available to get you through the FS1 requirement (Manual). laid out here is the FS1 as in the BPA Operations manual.

6.4.         Formation Skydiving (FS)

6.4.1. To obtain Grade 1 in Formation Skydiving (FS1) the parachutist must, be introduced to FS by a CCI/Advanced Instructor nominated FS1 Grade parachutist or equivalent of proven FS instructional ability, have received a full safety brief and demonstrated the ability to:

a)            Control fall rate.

b)            Control horizontal movement, (forwards, backwards and sideways).

c)             Achieve ‘docking’ techniques.

d)            Turn in place.

e)             Dive and approach a target.

f)             Complete four points of 4-way FS.

N.B.(1)   No more than one Category 8 jumper per group, all other jumpers in any group must be FS1 parachutists.

N.B.(2)   Training programmes other than those contained in the BPA Formation Skydiving (FS) Manuals are acceptable for training for FS1, provided all the requirements of sub-para 6.4.1. (above) are met.

SEC 2/PAGE 9/FEB 2006

The cost is minimal at £45 per one on one coached jump with a full brief and video de-brief for each jump. You can also get the footage on DVD to take away at the end of the course for a charity donation to Karis kids who we are working with in 2010. (more about the charity later)

The FS1 is a fun and worth while level of skydiving to attain (mandatory if you want to jump with your mates) and we see many skydivers get a little lost as to where to get the correct high quality coaching needed to safely and quickly gain the qualification, learning the up to date techniques used by the UK’s best teams who are also still paying the worlds top coaches thousands of $$$ to coach them and filtering the skills and techniques down to you at such a small cost is fantastic value.

check out some of our current students:

Our coaches are Phil Hartree (also one of our AFF Instructors) Georgie Roles, 4 way FS team member from the “Jet Blondes” and currently uk FS team “Fend 4 Yourself” and Benji Dawson who also flies camera for our FS, AFF and Tandems providing awesome footage and images.

have fun in the skies and enjoy the journey

Fordy

Directions:

Only an hour from the capital we are easily reached from London and the South East as well as Bimingham and the West Midlands by both rail and road with the m40 corridor only a few miles from the Airfield.

Infinite skydiving AFF course

www.infinite skydiving have started training students this year to qualify for their british parachute association skydiving license. Matt Short has completed his AFF ground school and is awaiting the weather before making his level one skydive with Infinite Skydiving. After 6 hours groundschool covering all the required modules of the Accelerated freefall course Matt is ready to go and very excited about getting in the air. Matt from London wanted to complete AFF last year but decided to wait for the start of the 2010 season to train and make the most of the days getting lighter  and the weather getting better to pursue his new sport…

We look forward to putting video of Matt’s AFF level’s up for you to enjoy.

regards

Fordy

European Sequential VFS bigway 2010

The event to start the 2010 season for the hardcore freeflyer will most definitely be at Skydive Spain this coming March. An invitation to Europe’s seasoned and proven head down flyers with the right attitude towards team play have been sent and the 30 available slots were snapped up within a few days, even at the top if you snooze you lose!.

With 2 Do-28 15 place Dorniers going to 16,000 + ft the event organiser Andrew Lovemore of Skydive Spain envisages multiple point 15 and 30 way formations yet unseen on the European freefly scene with load organiser’s Fabian Raidel and Mike Carpenter at the helm. The Invites for the team consisted of representatives from Volare, Skywalkers, Aria, The Bad Lieutenants, Darkside Freefly and Babylon to name a few…

The sequential scene in Europe has been lacking somewhat behind the likes of the Lodi Sequentials, Project Horizon and Summerfest where multiple point skydives are a matter of course, hopefully this event can redress the balance with the awesome available talent we have here.

Check back to see the progression toward what could be described as the biggest European freefly event of 2010..

laters and have a great christmas

Fordy

www.infiniteskydiving.com

July 31st 2009… World Record VFS 108 way day…

8am on the ramp, kitted up ready to go.. dirt dived and in the air by 0845, running in on the 2 minute call with O² still on, red light comes on and the climb out begins.. As front float i have a radio to leave on the verbal ready from the base plane, the ready is the key and the visual is totally different from the previous jumps for me as I am now lower than the base and looking at it as it accelerates fast, people swarm towards the centre.. the build reaches 102 or something along those figures. My personal skydive was shocking as my slot seemed to be a way away from where i was on exit and the visual was totally different than expected, even though I had the same slot but different exit… not getting to your slot is a non excusable offense on a WR attempt and the canopy ride was full of remonstration and emotion, i can say with fervour that after so many successful dives to the slot, i hate front float ha ha

The attempts throughout the day have seen a 106 and other big but incomplete builds, many people are commenting on how the huge amount of people makes everything fairly confusing, a huge shifting picture, inverted and incredibly fast… if it was easy it wouldn’t be a world record huh!

Will try and get some footage to add some time today..

Ciao for now

Fordy

July 31st (and some from the 30th) record day..

29th July…

9 am briefing in the auditorium, yeah! Skydive Chicago have an auditorium that seats at least 100 for those big way de-brief moments. Rook Nelson takes the centre stage to brief the crowd about the day’s events. Two 44 way’s and a 40 ish way with Babylon, Rook /Mike Swanson and Dave Gershfeld running the 3 groups…

Rook and Mikes group build a fairly nice formation, and on the second attempt after a few slot changes the build is even swifter. Babylon’s 44 way seems to be going well also and on the 3rd attempt Rook and Mikes group build a fairly trouble free formation.

Ok, I have been lame with updates today… will upload video shortly!!

30th July

After an awesome night jump with fireworks and impressive swoops the evening was lit up with a huge firework display.. A 9 am start for the record participants confirms that the Skyvan is indeed out of action and cost prohibits getting another one in, another Otter however is due here in a few hours. So the aircraft scenario means that an 80 way is the first goal of the day as soon as the cloud dissipates.

Rook has given the briefing for the O² use and everyone has been alloted a slot for the formation. the “Alpha team” or hungry bench are waiting to see the outcome and putting together some smaller dives.. video taking time to upload with everyone on their laptops e-mailing away!!!

So far after not being on the original 80 way I went to update and grab a coffee, only to be grabbed 5 minutes later by an excited David G, dragging me to the dirt dive that i was late for?? I had been pulled into the 80 way just not told ha ha! hence lack of keyboard action… So, 2 x 80 way attempts later and the weather has come in a little cloudy so were on a weather/blogging update hold…

The first 80 way attempt the aircraft had some climb out/communication issues causing the left Otter to stay on board as they hadn’t received a green on climb out call.. No wonder the dive to the base was traffic free!! but the rest seemed to build quite smoothly..

Second attempt was way better with a 5 minute, 2 minute and 1 minute call before Green on making everyone more aware of the fast approaching exit. The build went well with really spot on heading base and fast flowing traffic free flight to slot, some issues in one of the pod or pod links mean’t that a 74 way was completed.. sure was the biggest formation I have ever been in… as the current world record is 69

Another 80 way attempt, awesome skydive, the pod i was in built and must have flown for 15 seconds, seemed more like 30!! the base was super smooth and everything seemed to go well, upon landing most people seemed to think it all went well! Alas 1 out by about a ft… 12″ away from a WR 80 way AAAhhhhhh!! how close can it get.. So on with the 108 way.. We are all chilling between de-brief and call to dirt dive. My new lens has arrived, HD Opteka, wicked!

laters (will edit and post video later)

Fordy

18:30 Having dirt dived the 108 way we are at the mercy of the weather and that isn’t a good thing by the colour of the skies… stood down until 8am tomorrow for the 108 way H/D WR attempt. Will attempt to get some stuff up here to read and watch asap.

Ciao

Fordy

Summerfest and the head down world record attempt.. 28th July 09

Arriving at 9 am the DZ was pretty quiet, maybe the hellfish toga party got too a few people , The skies are blue but threatening to change to black as the day goes on so the organisers are hustling to get the loads going whilst the weather holds… Dave G’s group is in the air so i decide to throw my hat in the ring with Noah too see how things shape up.. And the 2 organisers hook up to create an 18 way sequential dive followed by a 22 way sequential.. what more could you want, some no pressure long dives to the base to ease into the day…

Some footage from the first 2 jumps of the day, both nice jumps with minor error’s to correct to see them complete..

Nice relaxing lunch, really not worth queuing for the food, 15 minutes waiting to order and 30 to get a sandwich, at least it’s served with a smile!!!!!  So a coffee and walmart goodies are the order of the day.. With the incredible humidity hydration is without doubt the most important factor here, by 2 or 3 pm you can feel pretty knackered if you haven’t caned the water all day.

Dave G’s group again this afternoon with a nice fairly complicated 14 way with a 9 way chunk out of the Otter with a couple of floaters and a the rest diving. Fairly fast build to the first point and a smooth transition to the big round, moved across for the in/out facing and the levels became a problem… We decided to transition the out-facers to head up anyway and the rest is history Will post video later…

Weather hold.. Brit’s all over the dropzone are scratching their head and looking confused?? a couple of clouds have built somewhere near Idaho and were stuck on the deck.. good time to update and chase people for a quick chat.

Wicked wicked cool skydive, 20 way sequential from 13oooft because of the weather, check out the image of point #1 from babylon cameraflyer Kuri, taken with the Canon eos 5D mk2 (for you camera geeks).

Weather seems to be closing in a little, feels like another storm approaching with the intense humidity.. The only load going is a hop an pop load doing a swoop n chug!

Quick interview with Liz Chare from the UK..

Hey Liz, first of all how many jumps do you have? “300, did my 300th today with Jim Lewis who was also doing his 300th jump ;-) We did a rodeo.. very cool”

First time at Summerfest? “no, 3rd time here.. “

Why do you come back? “It’s the biggest boogie I can find, with super super friendly people, brilliant load organising and the DZ is the sweetest set up”.. Oh! and a great party!!!

Do you jump much in the Uk? “No not really, have done a few..”

Why not? “Cost and weather mostly, I have also found some UK dropzones less welcoming than US DZ’s”

What’s you main aim or goal here at the Summerfest boogie? “to improve my skills in FS and build up my wingsuit jumps, i currently have 17 and i love it”

Thanks Liz, go cheer jim on in the swoop n chug

Hmmm, have just been and checked out “swoop n chug” fairly disturbed by the sight of the second guy down doing it naked, from the distance he slid on landing i think his evening may taken up removing impacted grass….

Have finished the next short video clip.. I feel obliged on behalf of youtube to apologise for them removing all of the soundtracks within minutes of upload… will upload soon. Also some images from the pond and maybe a clip or two of the evening swoopers.

Some fun and demanding flying for Dave G’s 20 ways…

Tomorrow, July 29th is the warm up day for the attempts.. 40 ways are the aim of the day and when i know more i’ll tell ya..

Ciao for now

Fordy