[HN Gopher] Deaths at a California skydiving center, but the jum...
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Deaths at a California skydiving center, but the jumps go on
Author : nradov
Score : 66 points
Date : 2024-04-04 14:56 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.sfgate.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.sfgate.com)
| bell-cot wrote:
| I had a cousin who was a _serious_ parachute specialist in the US
| Army. My understanding is that he _only_ jumped when it was part
| of the job.
|
| I used to knew a young woman whose family owned & operated a
| skydiving center. Once she was decently over 25 (fully adult
| judgment, supposedly), she never jumped again.
| jeffbee wrote:
| I don't think this knowledge is obscure. "Sky sports" are one
| of the few things that make a person practically uninsurable,
| along with scuba diving, motorcycle racing, and private
| aviation.
| patch_cable wrote:
| Not sure about the others, but I have had no problem getting
| life insurance as a private pilot. Some companies won't touch
| it, but plenty will.
| bombcar wrote:
| It's a matter of risk balancing. A private pilot is more
| likely to die in a private plane crash, but also more
| likely to be able to afford paying for insurance.
|
| What insurers don't like is someone who throws off their
| "books" unexpectedly.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| I dive and fly. My life insurance is still cheaper than a
| smoker's.
| jeffbee wrote:
| Let me go warm up my excavator so I can figure out exactly
| how low that bar is.
| mlyle wrote:
| > make a person practically uninsurable, along with scuba
| diving, [...] and private aviation.
|
| I don't know about motorcycle racing, but scuba and private
| aviation are plenty insurable. $1M 20 year term life goes for
| ~$100/mo if you're a younger pilot. There will be a somewhat
| smaller set of insurers to choose from, and a couple of
| outliers who try to charge you _way more_.
| FireBeyond wrote:
| My life insurance has no issue with me being a firefighter,
| or sky diving, as long as I don't combine the two and do
| smokejumping.
| michaelt wrote:
| That's kinda the norm for dangerous sports, isn't it?
|
| Motorbikes are dangerous; people often die riding. For many
| people the risks exceeds the rewards, and they choose not to
| ride. Other people have a greater appetite for risk, and choose
| to live until they die.
|
| I myself refuse to strap on ice skates (or rollerblades) having
| had 20 titanium screws put into my arm after falling on the
| ice. But I knew the risk I was getting into when I got onto the
| ice.
| amluto wrote:
| I wish it was more socially acceptable to ice skate
| recreationally with safety gear. Falling on the ice hurts.
| Falling on the ice if you're dressed like you're playing
| hockey is considerably less unpleasant.
| giantg2 wrote:
| "I wish it was more socially acceptable to ice skate
| recreationally with safety gear."
|
| I can't remember a time when looking stupid stopped me from
| doing something. Perhaps that's just my natural state.
| DowagerDave wrote:
| "Core" gear like helmets and knee/wrist pads seems totally
| acceptable now. "Extreme" biking/skateboarding (outside of
| street bmx & skating) has largely adopted safety gear too.
| bartonfink wrote:
| I give you permission.
| jpgvm wrote:
| I wear figure skating protection when I'm skating
| recreationally, because the padding is slim it's basically
| imperceptible unless you are looking for it.
|
| Though in addition I also wear snowboarding wrist guards
| which aren't a common piece of safety attire on the ice but
| I just can't risk my wrists. With gloves on they aren't
| that noticeable either though, just looks like I'm wearing
| long gloves from a distance.
| mey wrote:
| As an outsider looking in, there is a bizarre combination of
| advanced safety tech and completely useless standards in
| motorcycle safety gear. https://m.youtube.com/@FortNine has
| amazing videos covering all aspects of motorcycles that I
| have been enjoying as an outsider, including clear
| information on airbags, helmets, clothing, visibility, and
| how horrible pickup trucks are. Is it dangerous? More than a
| car certainly, but with good gear and training, it "appears"
| you can control for a lot of risks.
| bombcar wrote:
| The key is the "and training" part. Private piloting a
| small plane is quite safe if you have the "and training" -
| and that training includes avoiding situations where you're
| putting yourself in danger.
|
| For motorcycle riding, that includes staying away from
| dangerous situations like bad weather, bad drivers, etc.
| HarryHirsch wrote:
| _with good gear and training, it "appears" you can control
| for a lot of risks_
|
| I can't find the statistics right now but seem to remember
| that the main source of fatalities is young men (< 25
| years) on crotch rockets and alcohol. If you ride a
| sensible bike and stay sober, motorcyclists are only 3
| times as likely to die as automobile drivers.
| DowagerDave wrote:
| I think you demonstrate a common human scenario where we
| over-estimate the risk in notable activities and far under-
| estimate the boring ones. Motorcycle fatalities are about 25x
| higher than car, but car deaths are pretty low. Meanwhile
| smokers kill themselves and others at very high rates, and
| general inactivity leads to indirect deaths a magnitude
| higher. I'd also argue premature death from sky diving >
| slow, declining death from poor lifestyle, but I recognize
| that's not a universal opinion.
| akira2501 wrote:
| > and choose to live until they die.
|
| On the other hand, I didn't start really living my life until
| I nearly died.
| whartung wrote:
| I tried skydiving once, and was underwhelmed. Did nothing for
| me. I tried that "indoor skydiving" thing they had in Vegas,
| where you wear a particular style suit, and jump into an air
| stream powered by a propeller in the floor. The game is not
| getting slammed into the padded wall.
|
| Maybe because I did that first, skydiving was less
| interesting to me.
|
| Falling out of the plane, there was just a strong blast in my
| face. None of the "stomach drop" you get from the free fall
| rides at amusement parks, no sense of speed. Grounds
| approaching, but you're so high up its not approached THAT
| fast.
|
| Anyway, never again.
|
| That said, I do ride motorcycles. I have for a long, long
| time. Well versed in the statistics of riding, well aware of
| what I can and can't control. Aware of my efforts at
| mitigating those things that I do not control.
|
| I "know" it's a riskier activity, I do not perceive it as
| risky, but I do respect the situation. That said, I have a
| saying. I love motorcycling, I do not recommend it to anyone.
| It IS dangerous. It's especially dangerous to new riders.
| There is a learning curve, where the lessons can be painful,
| expensive, or worse.
|
| I do not ride to experience "risk", I don't "push the
| envelope", I have "chicken strips" on my tires. My bike has a
| "performance" mode, I do not use it. But I do love riding.
| It's a true joy in my life.
| giantg2 wrote:
| Most of the military jumpers have worn out backs, knees, etc
| from all the extra weight. Even if they wanted to jump for fun,
| they basically can't. At least that's for the guys I know.
| longerthoughts wrote:
| Not sure when the people you know were jumping but I've heard
| a few older (non-military) guys at drop zones complain about
| shoulder, back and hip issues from harder openings with the
| rigs they used in the '90s and early '00s.
|
| Parachutes are typically sized according to weight to manage
| rate of descent, so the extra weight shouldn't be an issue.
| Given the context I wonder if the military just calibrates
| around faster rate of descent because it's risky to stay in
| the air too long.
| giantg2 wrote:
| The extra weight is a factor in the harder openings. There
| are multiple different rigs even today, so I'm not sure if
| it's specific to one or another.
| hk1337 wrote:
| Averaging less than 1 death per year since they've been opened.
|
| Skydiving is a risk activity, a calculated a risk but a risk
| nonetheless.
| xeonmc wrote:
| The risk I took was calculated,
|
| but man, am I bad at math.
| RankingMember wrote:
| That still seems high given the industry-wide stats unless
| they're doing a crazy number of jumps per year
|
| https://www.uspa.org/discover/faqs/safety
| mikestew wrote:
| If a drop zone had anywhere near one death per year, I'd find
| somewhere else to jump. Skydiving isn't _that_ dangerous.
| longerthoughts wrote:
| I'm an experienced skydiver - one death per year is an insanely
| low bar for any drop zone. Lodi is notorious for incidents and
| I would never jump there.
|
| Skydiving seems insanely risky because it's scary but it's
| statistically not particularly risky [0], especially for
| conscientious skydivers at well-run drop zones. The calculation
| on "calculated risk" changes dramatically once you start
| blowing off safety protocol, which are what keep the sport
| relatively safe.
|
| [0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9859333/
| DoneWithAllThat wrote:
| As a former regular skydiver decades ago, Lodi has had a bad
| reputation for many years. Lots of upjumpers would never even
| consider going there.
| rlpb wrote:
| I did wonder if it was Lodi before even reading the article. I
| don't have any direct experience to know if the reputation is
| deserved, but indeed it does have one.
| margalabargala wrote:
| Agree. I got my A license a decade back, haven't jumped in 5
| years. Saw the headline and assumed Lodi.
| briffle wrote:
| The sad thing is, there is no way for an incoming new customer
| to know that.
| chabes wrote:
| I have jumped at this facility. My experience was similar to the
| description: rushed safety video that is playing while you are
| simultaneously given waivers to sign, forcing you to divert your
| focus between the two.
|
| Not that watching the safety video would have helped in this
| case, as the instructor was not properly trained and vetted in
| the first place.
|
| Still, it shows the careless attitude of the business, and the
| skewed priorities of profit over people.
| Phil_Latio wrote:
| But you still jumped.
| BHSPitMonkey wrote:
| Customers are not in a position to judge how much of a threat
| this might pose to their actual safety.
| giantg2 wrote:
| That's true for virtually everything. Most drivers have no
| idea how much danger they are in or may cause since our
| tests are a joke. Put them on a skid pad and/or autocross
| course (TireRack had a defensive driving AutoX program),
| and then they might start to learn about the vehicle
| dynamics.
| lupusreal wrote:
| Most drivers have a reasonable estimate of how common and
| serious car crashes are, since we drive and know people
| who drive and therefore have firsthand and secondhand
| experience with the matter
|
| The same probably can't be said for most skydivers (I
| assume most are first timers ticking off a bucket list
| item.)
| bombcar wrote:
| Because most people are drivers, they can recognize a
| "bad cab" or even a "bad bus" just when they see one.
|
| Most people are _not_ professional ship drivers, and so
| big ships are much harder to recognize as "bad" just by
| looking at it.
|
| And the entire world is filled with "required, but
| ignored" waivers and such, and people just kind of "do
| what the professionals are saying."
| giantg2 wrote:
| By that same logic the skydiver had a reasonable estimate
| of how dangerous it was based on the stereotypical view
| of the activity (and his prayer before doing it).
|
| The point isn't about if you think something is
| dangerous, but how dangerous it is. There are a bunch of
| near accidents and minor accidents because people fail to
| realize their limitations and the vehicle dynamics. I
| constantly see people texting, tailgating, and not
| understanding the law (right of way isuses). Many people
| are wildly overconfident, showing they don't really know
| the risks and engage in risky behavior that they aren't
| even aware of.
| lupusreal wrote:
| Stereotypes probably aren't a good basis for reasonable
| estimates. The average "I would never skydive" person
| probably severely overestimates the risks. Somebody who
| does decide to skydive... I can't say. But unless they
| looked up the statistics I think it's fair to say they
| have less information about it than an average driver.
|
| Also, drivers know all about near misses. Their
| propensity to near miss is based off their knowledge that
| major accidents are quiet infrequent for most drivers
| (most will never be in a life-threatening crash, and
| minor crashes are a "once in several years" occassion for
| most drivers.)
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| > Most drivers have no idea how much danger they are in
| or may cause...
|
| This is why we have safety regulations.
|
| > ...since our tests are a joke.
|
| That's news to me, but I know nothing about this space.
| Regardless, two wrongs don't make a right: we should have
| decent safety standards for both cars _and_ skydiving
| centers!
| michaelt wrote:
| Nobody goes skydiving expecting to be 100% safe. Nobody.
| The thrill of danger is the whole point of the sport.
|
| Unless they're providing skydiving to young children or the
| severely mentally disabled - which as I understand things,
| they aren't.
| organsnyder wrote:
| No, but they are expecting a certain level of competence
| that will minimize risk.
| tekla wrote:
| Damn, if only we could apply this standard to driving
| lazide wrote:
| Are you saying that vehicular manslaughter and reckless
| driving are not crimes?
| jader201 wrote:
| I think they are suggesting they're not adequately
| enforced.
|
| At least 10-25% of drivers I see in the road are
| constantly on their phone. So it's definitely not
| enforced enough to deter that.
| organsnyder wrote:
| I think drivers regularly underestimate the life-altering
| consequences of a serious accident, especially if they're
| at fault.
| epistasis wrote:
| They are new names for existing crimes that were invented
| to lessen the penalties.
|
| Additionally, enforcement is extremely weak, and even
| with these lesser penalties, police will do everything
| they can to avoid dealing them out, even when they apply.
| tayo42 wrote:
| 4.4 on Google maps with tons of positive 5star reviews
| throwaway74432 wrote:
| Survivorship bias
| calibas wrote:
| I grew up in the area and the locals knew about all the deaths.
| If you told anybody you were going skydiving there, people
| would assume you were crazy or suicidal.
| recursive wrote:
| Several years ago, a co-worker got a work group together for
| a groupon for this place. I lived. I didn't know about any of
| this. I assumed this was all tightly regulated.
| foxyv wrote:
| Sky diving is dangerous, but not that dangerous. A single jump is
| less dangerous than bunion removal surgery. (0.004% chance of
| death for skydiving and 0.01% for bunion removal) This puts the
| LD50 of parachute jumps around 1,700 jumps. (Not exactly
| something I would do for a job but would try once without
| worrying too much.)
|
| However, there is definitely the possibility of death from
| jumping out of an airplane and I don't think any reasonable
| person would think there isn't.
|
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9859333/#:~:tex....
|
| https://edinburghorthopaedics.org/media/cfikoe2l/bunion-corr...
| SirMaster wrote:
| But is that sky diving number for just general skydiving, or a
| tandem dive with a completely new to the sport customer like
| anyone here would actually care about.
|
| Like one, I assume tandem has a higher incident rate, and also
| that first time divers has a higher rate as well.
| lupusreal wrote:
| The skydiving accident rate also includes very experienced
| divers who do exceedingly reckless things, like wingsuiting
| next to mountains.
| imzadi wrote:
| I mean, based on the observations in the article, there's
| really no way to know the accident rate with any certainty.
| No one is even keeping track. It's all reliant on self-
| reporting to a lobbying organization that most these places
| aren't even a part of.
| calmoo wrote:
| I would have assumed that tandem dives have a lower rate of
| fatality - I'd imagine that an instructor pays a bit more
| attention if someone else's life is at stake (this is just my
| intuition). edit: from a cursory google search, tandem dives
| are about 2.5 times safer.
| foxyv wrote:
| The source from the statistic is international including
| statistics from the USA, Germany and France. If you want
| further details you can read the NIH article here.
|
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9859333/#:~:tex.
| ..
|
| As I understand it, single beginner jumps are more dangerous
| than tandems with experienced jumpers which are more
| dangerous than experienced singletons. However, I don't think
| there is a significant difference overall. But in this study,
| there is no such data other than the overall statistics.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| Yeah on the subject of single beginner jumps, you're
| allowed to jump on a static line without too much training.
| What this means in practice is that you have to get
| yourself out of whatever situation is causing you to
| approach the ground at terminal velocity. Someone I worked
| with did a static line jump for her first skydiving
| experience and her chute twisted together. Luckily she
| remembered the training they gave her and she was able to
| kick her legs and get the chute untwisted, but she was
| probably in the top 10-20% of people I've met in terms of
| her willingness to pay attention and remember directions. I
| think a lot of people would give in to panic.
|
| When I skydived it was tandem, so at least I would be going
| out with someone who was experienced. I would probably do
| it again if I wasn't married with a child.
| bombcar wrote:
| I suspect that like many of these kinds of things, if you
| eliminate the "worst players" you get something significantly
| safer.
|
| Like this jump location, for example.
| margalabargala wrote:
| > This puts the LD50 of parachute jumps around 1,700 jumps.
|
| This suffers from the same issue as saying "200 years ago the
| life expectancy was 35".
|
| Most of the people who die skydiving are inexperienced,
| reckless, or both. They are not the sort of people who are
| likely to make it to 1700 jumps.
|
| If you say "among people who have survived 1700 skydives, how
| many died skydiving before reaching 3400?" I bet you will find
| it to be even safer.
| foxyv wrote:
| It's more of a rhetorical LD50. Otherwise Don Kellner would
| be dead as a doornail long before reaching his record.
|
| https://www.uspa.org/about-uspa/uspa-news/uspa-
| posthumously-...
|
| Edit: If the statistics held the same for him, at 46,000
| jumps he had a 99% chance of dying from a failure.
| jefftk wrote:
| _> 0.01% for bunion removal_
|
| That sounds implausibly high to me? When I click through I see:
|
| _There are general risks of surgery: wound infection 7%, bone
| infection 1%, painful scar (5%), blood clot in the leg or lung
| 1%, Complex regional Pain Syndrome(lasting debilitating pain)
| 1%, bone healing problems 1%, amputation 0.01%, death 0.01%._
|
| Amputation and death are really both 0.01%?
| foxyv wrote:
| Surgery has gotten a lot safer in the last couple decades
| however, there are still risks. General anesthesia used to be
| ten times more dangerous than it is now but it's still not
| zero.
| jefftk wrote:
| Why would you use general anesthesia for bunion removal?
| Wouldn't local be fine?
| foxyv wrote:
| I do not know. But they do according the source I linked.
| pugworthy wrote:
| You might want to read up on what it is. It's not like
| scraping a callus off the side of your foot.
|
| Even mild may involve removal of bone and realignment of
| muscles, tendons, and ligaments surrounding the joint.
|
| Source: https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/treatment-
| tests-and-t...
| brailsafe wrote:
| Seems plausible. My relative died after getting a small cut
| on her toe which led to a staph infection that spread to her
| kidneys. Symptoms aren't necessarily as obviously tied to
| such an origin as one would think, and can be easily
| overlooked for too long.
| jpsouth wrote:
| I know a person who got a hairline fracture on his foot
| from dropping a knife on his steel toe cap boot - the metal
| knife handle hit the boot, not the blade.
|
| 6 weeks later, he was getting amputated above the knee due
| to sepsis - had he left it another week or two, he'd be
| dead.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| I wrote a whole piece on this topic:
|
| https://albertcory50.substack.com/p/how-about-not-overcoming...
|
| Basically, getting all macho about "overcoming your fear" is BS.
| If you want to risk your life for the adrenaline high of
| surviving, go ahead. But don't try to shame anyone for not
| wanting to.
| omoikane wrote:
| There might be some meta-fear to go with the peer pressure
| argument, such as "if I don't overcome my fear and go on this
| rafting offsite with my coworkers, I am afraid I won't be
| accepted as part of the team".
|
| I was invited to some rafting trip many years ago, which I
| didn't go at all. One of my friends went. It was a two-segment
| experience, he was in the boat for the first segment and
| decided to get out and walk the second segment. I think he
| described it as not unlike getting flushed down the toilet, so
| I thought I made a good choice. Also, nobody got hurt but
| everyone got sunburns.
| jessriedel wrote:
| > According to its data, there were 10 fatalities out of an
| estimated 3.65 million jumps in 2023
|
| So, among the USPA's membership, there's a ~3 * 10^-6 chance of
| death per jump, which is basically compatible with how it had
| been described to me in the past: ~1/1000 chance that your main
| chute doesn't deploy, times a ~1/1000 chance that the reserve
| doesn't deploy, times a small factor because people (especially
| beginners) do dumb stuff.
|
| At $10M statistical life in the US, that's $30 per jump, which is
| less than, but not vastly less than, the price of the jump
| itself. It seems quite plausible that the jump centers that are
| _not_ members of the USPA have higher risk, which could start too
| look overly risky (in the specific sense that consumers would be
| much less likely to participate if they had access to the
| figures). But I 'd bet it's less than $200/jump worth of risk.
|
| I wish these sorts of discussions would focus more on the numbers
| and making sure the risks are tracked and public.
| bnprks wrote:
| The article also gives reason to be skeptical of the quoted "10
| fatalities out of an estimated 3.65 million jumps in 2023". If
| we count 28 known fatalities at this one facility from 1983 to
| 2021, we get around 0.75 fatalities per year.
|
| In other words, we would expect that 14 facilities of similar
| death counts to the one in the article would equal the total US
| fatalities for a year. The USPA dropzone locator [1] lists 142
| facilities, so if we take everything at face value then this
| facility is ~10x worse than the average for USPA members.
|
| > But I'd bet it's less than $200/jump worth of risk
|
| In this case at least, it seems that this specific facility is
| higher risk than that. And with a lack of legally mandated
| reporting requirements, I'd say the onus is on a facility to
| prove safety once it's averaging a death every 1.3 years.
|
| [1]: https://www.uspa.org/dzlocator?pagesize=16&Country=US
| jessriedel wrote:
| > so if we take everything at face value then this facility
| is ~10x worse than the average for USPA members.
|
| The issue is that I would expect at least a factor of 10
| typical variation in the number of yearly jumps done at
| different facilities, so it's hard to conclude anything
| without getting at least a rough guess of how many jumps they
| are doing. (The article correctly notes that the inability to
| find this number publicly is a real problem.)
| calibas wrote:
| Yes, but those statistics are only for USPA members. They don't
| include the more sketchy places like the skydiving center the
| article is talking about.
|
| So it seems the lesson here is to make sure you only jump at
| places that are part of the USPA.
| margalabargala wrote:
| > At $10M statistical life in the US, that's $30 per jump,
| which is less than, but not vastly less than, the price of the
| jump itself.
|
| You may be comparing to the price of a tandem jump.
|
| If you're a USPA member with a skydiving license and your own
| parachute, the price of a ride to 10k feet in a Cessna 172 is
| as low as $25.
| ThrustVectoring wrote:
| Highway driving is currently at 1.5 deaths per 100 million
| miles driven, so "~3 * 10^-6" is roughly equal to driving 200
| miles on the freeway.
| michaelt wrote:
| _> "We didn't stop because we don't like the guy, we didn't stop
| because we weren't interested in the guy," the center's former
| owner, Bill Dause, told the local TV station, KFSN-TV, that day.
| "We didn't stop because life goes on."_
|
| If there was ever a quote that makes me understand why corporate
| PR teams tell everyone else not to talk to the press without
| training....
| scrumper wrote:
| Right? Took a while to parse and fix that: "We didn't _not_
| stop because we don 't like the guy, we didn't _not_ stop
| because we weren 't interested... we didn't stop because life
| goes on."
|
| Then the other guy from the lobby association saying
| "denunciate" like it's a real word in his refusal to be
| interviewed.
|
| Not getting a great sense of care about attention to detail in
| the industry, which I guess is the angle of the article.
| superq wrote:
| No [sic] though. Journalistic standards are low today.
| giantg2 wrote:
| Kind of odd the article talks about the instructor's English, but
| nothing of his experience or qualifications, or who packed the
| parachute (oftentimes it's 1 or 2 expert individuals, not the
| instructor; but we don't know if that's even a factor).
|
| They probably rushed through the video since it was tandem.
| There's not really much you are supposed to do as a passenger,
| more what not to do. Doesn't seem like it would have helped here
| anyways. I've thought about skydiving before. I think I'd want to
| go AFF. Partly because I want to actually learn about it, but
| also I'm near the weight limit for most tandem jumps.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| There are things you have to do while tandem but they're things
| that make it easier for the instructor to control the descent,
| and also things that lower the risk of you breaking something
| when you reach the ground. My instructor spent about 15 minutes
| explaining it before we hopped in the plane. It was pretty
| straightforward.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| The article is bizarre when it says: "Kwon had been neither
| officially certified nor properly trained to lead tandem jumps
| in the U.S.".
|
| So what if it wasn't in the US. Does it vary much elsewhere?
| deadbabe wrote:
| When you jump out of a plane and your parachute fails and you
| know you're going to die, there should be no sense of surprise.
| Only terror about what could happen next.
| jerlam wrote:
| The situation sounds eerily familiar to the Verruckt waterslide
| incident, where self-taught engineers built an unsafe waterslide
| resulting in numerous injuries but was thankfully closed
| following the death of a politician's son.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verr%C3%BCckt#Design
|
| - Self-regulation of inherently dangerous activity
|
| - Unclear jurisdiction of what government organization, if any,
| enforced existing regulations
|
| - Non-reporting of injuries and events
| bombcar wrote:
| I daresay many people who jump don't realize just how unregulated
| this whole thing is.
| Ancalagon wrote:
| Oh god I thought this was gonna be Oceanside
| arange wrote:
| the people going here are actively jumping out of an airplane.
| they chose to do this and are well aware of the risks. is it
| dumb? possibly. is this some mad profiteering stealing money from
| millions and casually ignoring people dying left and right in
| some cold-hearted money-making scheme? absolutely not.
| disclaimer: i'm one of those dumb ppl who jumped at this place -
| quite enjoyed it. slow news day i guess.
| longerthoughts wrote:
| Lodi is a notoriously unsafe drop zone (I'm an experienced
| skydiver in the bay area). I don't know if it's a cold-hearted
| greed thing so much as it's an anti-rules, anti-establishment
| thing where they like to scoff at safety and protocol. I
| wouldn't jump there or even do a group dive with anybody who
| regularly jumps there.
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