Anyone ever done a Sky Dive?

Howdy folks,

Posting this here as I figure After Hours will get a fair few mods in it and one might have a better idea of where to move it to. I can't see a category that would obviously include sky dive discussion.


Anyway..


I've never done it before, would like to do it. Can find a website:

https://www.skydiveireland.ie/


But can't find any other websites out there at all. Not sure if €250 is cheap or expensive as can't seem to find anything to compare with, and also would be nice to see if there are other locations around the country to choose from to do it.


But seen as this is in AH for the moment, has anyone here ever tried it? Did you love it or hate it?

Cheers

Birneybau

Just muff ones. Many

frag420

I once dived upwards...toward the sky!

Someone reckoned it was a jump!?

Who knows?

17larsson

I done one in Fiji. Was pretty cool. Not as scary as I thought it would be but it was good to tick it off the bucket list.
It wasn't anywhere close to €250 though

Ken.

My uncle done one here a few years ago for charity. He had to collect ?350. ?150 went for the jump and 200 to charity.

http://skydive.ie/

whoopsadoodles

Barbie! wrote: »

My uncle done one here a few years ago for charity. He had to collect ?350. ?150 went for the jump and 200 to charity.

http://skydive.ie/

Did he cover the €150 himself?

Really bothers me when people take other folks money to pay for these bucket list experiences and the donators think it's all going to the charity.

Ken.

whoopsadoodles wrote: »

Did he cover the €150 himself?

Really bothers me when people take other folks money to pay for these bucket list experiences and the donators think it's all going to the charity.

Nope. That's the way it worked at the time. He collected over £350 but the charity still only got £200. This was in 19991/92

dreamers75

Yes did for the blind charity* a few years ago.

It was fcuking awesome, easily 30 of the best seconds of my life and I shat myself. Would deffo do it again.

* I did it for me.


Fairly sure that thing is still going raise X and get a free sky dive, think it was 1k raised or thereabouts.

whoopsadoodles

Barbie! wrote: »

Nope. That's the way it worked at the time. He collected over £350 but the charity still only got £200. This was in 19991/92

They all work like that. Even now.

Most people cough up the cost of the actual experience themselves. And I always ask before donating.

Also: 1991? That's 26 years ago. Little more than a few I'd have said.

5T3PH3N

I did one last year with my sister and 2 cousins with skydiveIreland. It's one of the best adrenaline rushes I've ever had. The worst part about it was thinking that there's probably not much else that will ever give the same rush as skydiving, so we're gonna have to do it again.

dreamers75

5T3PH3N wrote: »

I did one last year with my sister and 2 cousins with skydiveIreland. It's one of the best adrenaline rushes I've ever had. The worst part about it was thinking that there's probably not much else that will ever give the same rush as skydiving, so we're gonna have to do it again.

Wingsuit.

mfceiling

No

Birneybau

5T3PH3N wrote: »

I did one last year with my sister and 2 cousins with skydiveIreland. It's one of the best adrenaline rushes I've ever had. The worst part about it was thinking that there's probably not much else that will ever give the same rush as skydiving, so we're gonna have to do it again.

Heroin

5T3PH3N

Birneybau wrote: »

Heroin

Not even once;)

Noveight

Nope, nor would I be even slightly tempted to :eek:

Ken.

whoopsadoodles wrote: »

They all work like that. Even now.

Most people cough up the cost of the actual experience themselves. And I always ask before donating.

Also: 1991? That's 26 years ago. Little more than a few I'd have said.

It is only a few. I'm still young,I'm still young.

gidget

Yes, did one 3 years ago, 10,000 ft it was. It was one of those experiences i always said i wanted to do in my lifetime & just went & booked it one day. Loved every second of it, would do it again in a heartbeat, if it wasn't so pricey.

holystungun9

Yep, was grand.

Couldn't breath for a bit up there cos I never thought about the exhale part. Open your mouth and your lungs fill up like a balloon and not easy to breath back out.

Be aware that you can fix your day but the weather can interfere. It was my third trip before I got to go so just wanted to get it out of the way tbh.

mikeybrennan

I was going to do one for charity

I collected enough money for the jump but i couldn't get the 50 for the parachute

corner of hells

I did one years ago off a static line from 2000 feet.

It's a pretty good experience, well worth doing.

jimmurt

There's 3 dropzones in Ireland that cater for tandem students and one in NI.

A quick google search will find websites

Irish Parachute Club
Tandem Skydive in Westmeath
Skydive Ireland

The Wild Geese (NI)

In the IPC and Wild Geese you can also learn to skydive via AFF and static line.

MonkieSocks

Yep did it for Chartity thingy a good few years ago.

I was terrified standing on the Wing just before the jump.

Everything went crazy in my head when I let go of the plane, a few seconds of panic ( express elevator to hell man ) followed by relief when the chute had opened.

Then the sense of smells, that came up from the ground so far away (Not Poo Smell )

I imagined this is what the Burds smell, as they waft above us occasionally pausing to poo on our cars.

Then Terra Firma and the blissful sound of expletives I shouted and vowed never to repeat this horrid experience again.

duffman13

MonkieSocks wrote: »

Yep did it for Chartity thingy a good few years ago.

I was terrified standing on the Wing just before the jump.

Everything went crazy in my head when I let go of the plane, a few seconds of panic ( express elevator to hell man ) followed by relief when the chute had opened.

Then the sense of smells, that came up from the ground so far away (Not Poo Smell )

I imagined this is what the Burds smell, as they waft above us occasionally pausing to poo on our cars.

Then Terra Firma and the blissful sound of expletives I shouted and vowed never to repeat this horrid experience again.

Where the **** did you do it? Standing on a wing would be pretty tough going!

Did one last year OP probably going to do one again this summer. 250 in my mind is well worth it, you can get it cheaper if you wanna do it midweek.

TheDriver

Did a 14000 ft one, not for charity or anything. Just to do things that took me so far outside my comfort zone that I needed a map to get back

fryup

question for all you people who did it....

....was it a tandem jump?? or did you do it on you're own??

TheDriver

Tandem, nice to have company on the way down. Its all a bit surreal as you freefall for 60s, as if time stands still

duffman13

fryup wrote: »

question for all you people who did it....

....was it a tandem jump?? or did you do it on you're own??

Tandem, if you're doing a solo skydive you have to do a fairly decent amount if training including a number of tandem dives IIRC

qo2cj1dsne8y4k

No I'd say there's plenty of people that'd happily fu,ck me out of a plane but no intentions of soiling myself a mile high in the air

Samuel T. Cogley

Wore many a parachute never had occasion to use it. I don't know how many times I saw this 'safety video' it's missing the most hilarious part but still...

Never really got the attraction.

It always seemed like a kinda "safe" adrenaline rush, with no effort or energy, just hand over a ball of money and step out the side of a plane. There is an element of placing trust in someone else and of course in equipment, but you do it in other sports, like climbing when the lead climber tells you to climb and you trust him and look down the cliff face and see all the rocks you'll bounce off if he hasn't anchored the rope correctly. Plus that lasts for hours and takes huge effort.

Thumpette

Firstly I have to say that people who skydive for charity but use the fundraising to pay for the jump are a pet peeve of mine. No-one jumps unless they want to I'm some level so they should pay for the experience themselves!

I did one around 2 years ago. It was 6 months to the day my son was stillborn and we wanted to do something to remember him. To be honest I found it a bit boring. I guess being tandem makes it very simple. I loved the moment of jumping out of the plane. The few seconds of freefall were quite cool but once the parachute opens you are just hanging around. I think this could have been a lovely part particularly for the day that was in it if I'd been able to take it all in and have a mindful moment but the guy I was tandem with talked the whole time about the weather and the amazing scenery.

Overall I'm glad we did it but I wouldn't be bothered again I dont think.

Tokyo

Have done both tandem and solo jumps - I lived in South Africa at the time, where going to schools/courses for such things is infinitely cheaper than in Europe. Ended up doing a paragliding course in the end which was more enjoyable IMO - gliding for an hour and actually being able to take in the countryside below.

Tokyo

Threads like this always remind me of this video from a few years back - two planes carrying 9 skydivers collided mid air in Wisconsin, USA. All 9 skydivers landed safely, and I believe one of the pilots (presumably the one whose wing didn't go spiralling to the ground) managed to land - the other one bailed. All skydivers were wearing Go-pros, which resulted in some pretty amazing footage of the incident...

Wildsurfer

duffman13 wrote: »

Tandem, if you're doing a solo skydive you have to do a fairly decent amount if training including a number of tandem dives IIRC

I did a static line solo on my first jump back in early nineties. Chute is attached by a line to plane so when you jump it pulls the chute open. Only thing is if it malfunctions you have to pull the reserve yourself which was the scariest thing about doing the solo. Would you freeze once you went into free fall?! Which obviously happened somewhere because when I went back a few years later I had to do tandem as solos were not allowed for beginners. Tandem was better though as the free fall is where the real buzz is. When I was doing my solo first day all sorts of stuff was going on. One pilot had the wrong drop zone on his navigation and the lads who jumped ended up at a different airstrip 7 miles away. Another first timers chute failed and he was free falling for a while before he realised th pull the reserve. And another lad had an epileptic fit just as he was about to jump.. Jaysus I've never seen a plane come back down to earth so fast.. Ambulances the whole lot called. A few lads on that plane were white coming off and just went straight home.

Auguste Comte

gidget wrote: »

Yes, did one 3 years ago, 10,000 ft it was. It was one of those experiences i always said i wanted to do in my lifetime & just went & booked it one day. Loved every second of it, would do it again in a heartbeat, if it wasn't so pricey.

If it's a sport you fancy taking up it gets a lot cheaper. Tandem jumps are great for getting the whole freefall and canopy ride buzz and are pricey.

If you then think it's for you there are two ways forward from there. AFF, ie accelerated free fall which is expensive but the quickest way to gain the skills to be able to go to full altitude and jump on your own.

Your first few jumps are done with two instructors holding on to you and you have certain exercises that you carry out on each jump focusing on body position, falling stable, altitude awareness and opening your own parachute.

You then do some jumps with one instructor learning more skills, turning, moving forwards, backwards etc. These jumps are generally done from 13,000 feet.

The last jump on the course is a hop and pop which is done from a lower altitude and as the name suggests you exit, get stable and open straight away.

The course is based on 8 levels and some people complete it in 8 jumps, most have to repeat some of the jumps to get the skills right.

A lot of people who choose to go down the AFF route go abroad to somewhere like this to do this course for weather reasons altho it is available at the IPC, it can just take longer due to our weather.

The cheaper option is to do a static line course, where your first jumps are done using static line gear which is automatically opened when you leave the plane and take place from around 3500 feet and you fly your own parachute to a hopefully graceful landing back on the airfield aided by radio instructions from the ground, this is the same in aff. Once you demonstrate that you can exit the plane in a stable position you are given a dummy rip cord to pull and when you show you can consistently do this then the next move is a 3 second free with no static line.

After this the free fall times are increased and other exercises are included in the jumps, turns moving forward etc and before you know it you will be jumping with your friends having the best fun you can have with your cloths on. All parachutes today are equipped with an AAD so if you are not able to open for some reason the aprachute will open its self. Once you have your own gear which can be bought 2nd hand for reasonable money then you can jump for less than the price of a game of golf.

And as the saying goes, only skydivers know why the birds sing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RY-UH_Uu8g8

jimmurt

duffman13 wrote: »

Tandem, if you're doing a solo skydive you have to do a fairly decent amount if training including a number of tandem dives IIRC

No it's not necessary to do tandems before. You can if you want and some dropzones might make you do one.

One day of intense training and all going well you can do your first solo jump, that day after course.

airvan

It's definitely worth doing at least once. I did two tandem jumps and there's no question it's exhilarating and an adrenalin rush. They were freebies too because I worked for them. Can't understand why anyone would think it's 'safe' or 'boring'. I've seen some hair raising moments over the years. The moment you go out that door you know you've committed yourself to something you have no control over. You are falling towards earth at high speed trusting only to a piece of cloth and expertise of a total stranger.

I've seen hundreds if not thousands of people jump and everyone of them were absolutely buzzing afterwards.

As for the charity angle. Often groups would jump together on the day. Between them they would often raise thousands and many people would pay for their own jump and give the donations to charity. I was involved in one weekend in Kerry where approximately 70 people jumped for one charity over two days. The amount raised hit five figures. So don't knock the charity element. Yes of course some of the money went to operator but it's not a charity and everyone involved has to be paid for their work. They may be doing the job for the love of it but they're all professionals.

If you want to learn to skydive solo, only the Irish Parachute Club provide training these days. The other two concentrate on tandems. The IPC are a club first and foremost while the other two are businesses. So pick the one that suits.

The most danger you'll be in will be the drive to the dropzone and the fact that you might get sucked in with the atmosphere and want to continue skydiving. Next thing you'll be spending a fortune on gear and travelling all over the world visiting dropzones and living the crazy life of a skydiver. I could tell you stories!!

Go for it.

Dr Crayfish

To answer your question, yes. Every female on Plenty of Fish.

DanMurphy

Did my skydiving in the Army.
Great experience.
Heed your instructors, take in the advice.
You'll be fine.
Jump and Enjoyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!