Skydiving Stats |
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| See also the USPA's Member Statistics and/or USPA's 1997 accident summary (PDF file) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| This posting taken from rec.skydiving: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| FAI/IPC Techical and Safety Subcommittee Congress Helsinki, Finland, October 1993 |
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| Global research on safety in parachuting 1991. Replies from 35 countries
of 62 were received. 26 had exact counts, nine had only estimated numbers.
Total of 245 162 jumpers made 4 848 025 jumps. 74 died, which makes 1 fatality per 65 513 jumps. Preliminary research gives ratio of 1:64 091 for year 1992. Experienced jumpers (over 250 jumps), who cover 24% of all jumpers, made half of all jumps, but were involved only in 35% of accidents. Students cover 48% of all jumpers, but they made only 17% of jumps, and were involved in 38% of accidents. Human error was cause of 92% of fatalities. Approximately 75% of victims would have been saved with AAD. RSL/Stevens system might have saved 35%. If all jumpers would had used both AAD and RSL, amount of victims might had decreased from 74 to 20. In 75% of accidents reserve hasn't been used at all or it had been used
too low. |
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| Swiss research on cut-away failure | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Most cut-aways were done by those with 1-100 jumps experience, they had made 0.23% of all jumps. People with over 1000 jumps had least cut-aways, 0.1%. Also jumpers with competition experience had less cut-aways. Half of jumpers who did cut-away felt stressed afterwards. 77% said the situation was what they had expected. Many were surprised of spinning and g-powers under malfunctioning main. Most common, 70%, reason for cut-away was packing failure. Probability for reserve use was 1:500 in Switzerland. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| From: White_Scott@semail.jsc.nasa.gov (TSW) Newsgroups: rec.skydiving Subject: Re: Risks Date: Mon, 05 Dec 1994 17:22:21 -0600 Formatted in HTML by Bradley C. Spatz, 06Dec94). Reformatted for UWMSC by Christian J. Young, 29Jan98; Christy West, 25Mar98 |
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| Some Skydiving Stats taken from Dan Poynter's Parachuting: A Skydiver's Handbook (6th edition) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| In a recent year over 140 people died scuba diving, 856 bicycling, over 7,000 drowned, 1154 died of bee stings, and 80 by lightning. In 1982, 43,990 people were killed in highway accidents, 1,171 boating fatalities, 235 airline deaths, and 1,164 light aircraft general aviation fatalities. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Student injuries run about 2%. So out of 90,000 students, 1,800 can expect to be injured. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| "Why we jump. The explanation use to be simple: jumpers were crazy! Some psychologists talked of Freudian death wishes while others believed in fear displacement or denying one fear in their lives by directing their attention to another more manageable one. Others theorized that participants in high risk sports were acting out psychopathic fantasies in an attempt to make up for feelings of inadequacy or to demonstrate omnipotence. So much for the non-jumping ground hog, whuffo head shrink community." | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Fortunately, in the last 25 years, the shrinks have decided that pursuing a high risk sport is not all that bad. Perhaps more of them have tried skydiving. Bruce Ogilvie, professor emeritus of psychology at San Jose State University conducted a study of 293 high-risk competitors including skydivers, race car drivers, fencers and aerobatic pilots in 1973 using psychological batteries and personal interviews. Ogilvie found risk-takers to be success oriented, strongly extroverted, above average in abstract ability and superior in intelligence when compared to the general population. He found these athletes are rarely reckless in their risk taking; their risk-taking is cool and calculated. He estimates that 6% of the athletes compete out of anger or out of deep feelings of inferiority or because they are trying to prove something about themselves. The other 94% are emotionally stable." | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Also from rec.skydiving: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| For a comparison to other sports, check the table printed on page 13 of the April 1990 issue of Parachutist. Here is a comparison of the risks of participating in various activities. It was put together by the U.S. Hang Gliding Association using data collected from various air sports organizations and melding it with data from the National Safety Council and other sources. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| It says the skydiving stats are for 1988, and it implies that the other figures are for 1989. You can also get fatality stats from just about any almanac or "fact book". From: dappel@grafted.UUCP (Dave Appel) Newsgroups: rec.skydiving Subject: Re: Tandem safety,was Re: INFO/SUGGESTIONS for first jump. Date: 27 May 92 19:52:28 GMT |
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...And once you have tasted flight, you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been and there you long to return ... |
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