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I guess I have to up the payoff to get some good weather happening again.
I apologize for not keeping up on the updates since, even though the weather has been against us, there is still a lot happening at SDC.
We have to go back two weeks when SDC’s Flying Fish hosted a 4-way scrambles. The team was able to get a few teams together consisting of newer jumpers eager to learn. Unfortunately the winds were gusting into the high teens and as the golden rules state, “Know when to say No”. Thanks to the Flying Fish for organizing a great event.
Ben Crooch had his first weekend in the freefly arena. Thanks Ben for getting people off the couch and in the air! Ben will be organizing again this weekend.
Also last weekend we held our annual Staff Meeting. I can tell when we are doing good cause the room gets more and more filled. This year we ran out of seats! Thanks to the great team that I have for working towards making Skydive Chicago the best DZ period!
It seems like with the weather lately the bar seems to be hopping at night. Sprits are high as the weather slowly starts to get warmer and warmer. EAT UP is doing a great job with the café and I’m looking forward to moving out to the Tiki Bar, hopefully soon!
My teammate Mick and I have been taking advantage of the bad weather and have been working on the 100-way Freefly dive plan. Mick has come up with some great formations and now all we have to do is engineer it to flow out of 1 skyvan and 4 otters. Unlike typical formations our base flips over on exit which ads another challenge to make sure everyone is in the correct slot for exit. Those of you who are interested in trying out can attend the Skydive AZ camp coming up May 9-10. Standard is hosting a camp here June 13-14. These are the last two camps so get off your butt!
This past weekend SDC Rhythm XP hosted another Team for a Day with a great turnout, but unfortunately the winds turned out too! Rhythm, being the great team that they are, kept everyone interested by giving seminars and dirt diving with the participants. I have seen a lot of ‘team’ events and they truly do host a great event that is well worth the $10 they ask! Rhythm also hosted our first continuing education of the year. They focused on body position and again had people on creepers to backup their lecture. Thanks Rhythm you guys rock! Their next event is coming up May 9-10.
This past weekend we also sent an Otter over to Skydive Spaceland to help them out with the 120-ways BJ Worth was organizing. Dave and Karry headed over in N10EA from Sebastian. They battled the weather but were able to get in some attempts but didn’t quite reach their goal. Thanks to the Spaceland crew for the invite. Our Otter will be back in Spaceland for their upcoming Nationals in October.
To cover Sebastian while the Otter was gone Jerry Baker flew the caravan down. Dodging weather on the way down there he arrived and was put right to work. The caravan is a really good fit with the 6-person minimum they were able to fly almost 80 loads for the week! The caravan is back at SDC for the next few weeks.
We are starting up the sunset picture contest once again. This year we will be doing sunset of the month. If you took a photo in March or April that you would like to enter please send it to Erin@skydivechicago.com. Check out details for the contest HERE.
Coming up May 8-9 is an AFF rating course with Bram Clement. You must pre-register for this course and can sign up at www.skydiveratings.com.
Also May 8-16 is Para-concepts riggers course. You can take your written and practical all on-site! Certainly an all-inclusive course, find out more info at www.para-concepts.com
Brain Germain will be in town; May 23-24 hosting is World Famous Canopy Course. Come attend the course that everyone has been talking about. You can register with manifest. This course is both lecture and jumps.
The weather looks great this weekend and we will have both the Caravan and Otter on the flight line. The teams will be training so the loads will be going!
Rook
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