Thursday, May 08, 2008

May 9th, "Days of Jimmy" Coming soon!

Update: we are hoping people can round up lots of flowers. If anyone can help Bob pick about five Plumeria trees Friday morning, please get in touch with him or me, thanks.

Cancel work, call in sick, or just go AWOL, because on Friday, May 9th about 1pm, one year after the date of his passing, we will all be getting together to celebrate the memory of our friend, Jimmy Hall. For those who never met him, he inspired much of what we do here with our paragliders, and was one of the true action heroes. To help Stefanie and the rest of Jimmy's family honor Jimmy's memory, we will be putting on a fly-in. No competition, just flying and celebrating the spirit he left with us.

The format is to get as many people as possible flying. This event will be staged up on launch: toplandings, refreshments, everything, up on the hill. If you fly a tandem then bring it, Stef would like to get Jimmy's parents and sister in the air. I am thinking of Reaper, Jorge, Doug, Ray, Bob, Sui and myself just for that. I guess Stef is flying solo again, so she plans to fly solo, good to shake off the dust. We will be dropping flowers and releasing balloons, so it should be quite the scene.

Bring your party face, bring your glider, bring the tandems, bring friends, bring at least one great Jimmy story, and then let's bring it all up the hill, for bleacher seats to what will surely be an epic flying afternoon.

Look for future updates here on windlines.net.

15 comments:

Doug said...

I am IN!! I wore my Jimmy shirt all day today and he continues to be an inspiration to me almost every day!

Doug

Suicide said...

All In!!

Brazilian Ray said...

more like jimmy!!! I'll bring the tandem.

flowers - biodegradable,
balloons - NOT. Think about it...
aloha

JeffMc said...

Actually, latex balloons biodegrade rather nicely since they're made from the sap of a rubber tree. Just don't use mylar balloons.

"Scientific research, most notably by D.K. Burchette in, “A Study of the Effect of Balloon Releases on the Environment,” demonstrates that latex balloons decompose at a rate equal to — or faster than — an oak leaf under similar conditions."

Gravity said...

Yup, I'm all in too.
Will bring tandem, BBQ, Kui (to play with Moki), Lei's to drop, beer, Jimmy T-shirt, extra Jimmy stickers, and tent.

This is gonna be a riot.

PS watch out for flying cake!

Anonymous said...

Dave, if it works out with weather, let me know when are you getting there and i'll come early to help you haul stuff up the hill ... coolers, ice, chairs, old people, whatevers ...

czech

Anonymous said...

Cool!... I now qualify as an "old people".

Brazilian Ray said...

my birthday was not too long ago.... can you haul me up too?

Anonymous said...

rsvp before 4-20, so i can start training

czech

firedave said...

One week from today! Break out that trick you have been holding back on! Even if it is just big ears!
I'm going for the first ever, aerial tandem passenger swap. Are any of you tandem passengers interested? Over water of course.
Conditions are looking like we might see moderate trades, which would be good for getting lots of people in the air.
We do need some people to grab flowers for dropping. If anyone has a plumeria tree in the neighborhood, collect some.
See you all Friday.

Alex said...

Dave, one thing I remember Jimmy doing often in the early days was a steep spiral, climb out of the exit and full stall when the wing was already tilting back from the climb. How come nobody does that anymore?

I'll see if I can find a blooming plumeria tree. What's better for dropping, whole flowers or indidivual petals? I assume we should wait until the day before to pick them, those flowers don't last that long.

How do you envision the flower drop working - will everyone have a bag of flowers? Do we scatter them a few at a time or drop them all at once on command? I think it would be cool if we could aim for something, like the LZ, or tandem passengers flying somewhere below and downwind. Might have to release a few tracers early to get the aim right.

JeffMc said...

I have a Plumeria tree in my yard (yellow) - I'll pick it clean the day before (and refrigerate them?)

...And I'm ready to throw down some SICK big ears!

-Jeff

firedave said...

That trick you are talking about Alex is the dynamic stall. Back in the day when the only tricks were spirals and stalls it was by far the most rad. Doug does a great one, and a few others as well. The manly way to enter the infinite tumble is on spiral exit to just pull SAT and go straight over the top.
I like Plumerias whole, they become like a sky of little helicopters spinning around, and the sink rate is pretty slow. Just tie a garbage bag full of them to your harness before launch. I think only a few people need to drop them, the rest of us can just fly through them, should be nice.

Anonymous said...

Yay. Lots of little helicopters spinning about. I'll pick some as well.

bob

firedave said...

Calling all XL gliders, to serve as tandems. So far, it looks like Friday might be a little windy.
Maybe we can have a glider swap and everyone moves down to a smaller glider. The lightest pilots have to tandem on the XL's. Just kidding. If it is very windy, top landings can be challenging as well. But, Alex and Peter have demonstrated it is flyable yesterday.
The show will go on, so stay tuned here for more updates.