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Jump 255 - Third Malfunction Wins a Bad Eye
This may very well be the last time I ever
do RW work again. Not only do I suck at
it... I got hurt at it.
Well, I shouldn't blame RW.
Jim asked me to do video on his 35th jump.
I was more than glad to help a fellow
Georgia Techer, but I cautioned him that I
have zero RW skills.
We exited and, as I had expected, he was
much better at RW than I was.
He pulled at 4500 and I caught the opening
on video.
I then deployed. What started as an
excellent opening turned ugly as the lines
twisted. The canopy partially inflated and
spun me horizontally to the ground. I
fought it for a while as the G forces grew,
but eventually cut away.
As I cutaway something hit me in the eye.
I don't know exactly what it was, but I
suspect it was the three ring system.
I fell about 500 more feet while I flipped
onto my stomach and deployed my reserve.
The reserve opening was so hard that it
shut down my camera.
Immediately upon opening I couldn't see out
of my left eye. I thought that I had a cut
under my eye and that blood had splattered
onto the lens of my goggles. I kept trying
to clean the blood out but I still couldn't
see.
So I took the goggles off and attempted to
clean my eye out directly but I found I
couldn't.
Landing with no depth perception was
interesting. I flared too high but stood
up the landing.
Tim Marek was the closest person to me. I
showed him my eye and he immediately said
that we were going to the hospital. I'm
glad he did.
Michael, Chris and everybody else were
awesome about tracking down my canopy.
Thanks guys.
Tim drove me to the hospital and sat
through all of the paperwork and
examinations.
The first doctor had no idea what was going
on and gave me a scary feeling. He said "I
can't even find the retina." Excellent.
Thanks Doc. That's wonderful news. You are
an artist of optimism.
They referred me to an optomitrist. Dr.
Deen took care of me. He was a character.
He said that my eye appeared to be fine and
would recover shortly.
Big thanks to Tim and everybody who helped
me out. It meant a lot to me.
Malfunction?
YesReserve Canopy
Malfunction Type
3000Deployment Altitude
3000Freefall Time
0hrs : 1min : 0sec Container
joereger.com Mirage G3Main Canopy
Atair Cobalt 135Jump Number
255Aircraft
Maneuver
Exit Altitude
13500
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