They just built the biggest and fastest vertical wind tunnel in Raeford, NC (down by Fayetteville, NC). You can see what skydiving feels like without the parachute, falling part or danger part.

Youtube video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIamSG2UQJU

Link to their web site:
http://www.paracletexp.com

The price structure is $600 an hour for after hours prices and $1100 an hour for during the day. Most people only do 4 minutes their first time though and it's actually fairly tiring, so you're limited by that too.

1/11/2008 10:02:43 AM

so that means its only 40 bucks for 4 minutes?

1/11/2008 10:05:16 AM

Yes roughly if you buy it as blocked time in a group. Otherwise first time flyers are $54 I think.

1/11/2008 10:07:15 AM

this just seems like one of those things you can't really cheat on if you want to experience it

1/11/2008 10:13:06 AM

Yeah, now that there are lots of tunnels everywhere skydivers just use these to learn how to fly better faster. You can get a lot more air time and learn faster since you can do 30 min to an hour of tunnel a day versus only 10 skydives (about 10 minutes of freefall time) in a day. There are 10 year olds that can out fly me in the tunnel.

Skydiving is way cooler, but flying around in a 60 foot high room is also a lot of fun.

1/11/2008 10:20:00 AM

4 flights for $89 plus a T-shirt and DVD isn't too bad.

1/11/2008 10:20:55 AM

each flight is 1 minute.

for some reason that seems quick.

how long does it take to fall from a plane.

1/11/2008 10:26:19 AM

About a minute for 1 skydive from 13,500 ft depending on what type of skydiving you do as well as how high you open. Most people open a parachute at 3000 to 4000 ft. That yields 55 to 70 seconds of freefall. Per minute the tunnel is cheaper but you don't get the parachute flight which is also lots of fun.

1/11/2008 10:30:51 AM

Sounds pretty cool, but like it was mentioned seems like just a good way to practice moving through air, rather than trying to replace the skydiving experience.

I can't wait to go skydiving again, but hoping in a tunnel, eh, doesn't really raise the pulse

1/11/2008 1:38:26 PM

^

I met you briefly with Holly a few months ago. I am an instructor for solo jumps now (after you are done with tandem), so if you ever want to get jumping on your own let me know. If you do about 6 minutes in the tunnel most people ace the solo skydives that are with an instructor unless you forget to pull.

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 1:41 PM. Reason : a]

1/11/2008 1:40:46 PM

Quote :

"hey just built the biggest and fastest vertical wind tunnel in Raeford, NC"

Are there really a lot of other vertical tunnels there? I have never even heard of Raeford, I can't imagine to be a big place.

1/11/2008 1:43:21 PM

i may have to do this with the GF as her birthday present.

$138 for two people

1/11/2008 1:44:43 PM

It's the biggest and fastest in the world. It just happens to be in Raeford.

There are about 11 of them in the US now.

1/11/2008 1:45:05 PM

^were you one of the instructors that jumped in tandem with us? That was a great day man

I do want to jump more in the future, but just not at the moment due to a few things going on.

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 1:49 PM. Reason : k]

1/11/2008 1:48:29 PM

Nah I do the jumps after tandem when you're on your own equipment. At Carolina Sky Sports the student program to learn to skydive is 5 tandem jumps followed by 4 jumps with an instructor on your own equipment. I do those four. After that you are cleared to jump with a coach and at 25 jumps you get an A license and can jump with anyone.

Some places allow you to do the jumps on your own equipment from jump number one or after only 2 tandems. Carolina Sky Sports is unique in that they are the only drop zone in the country that makes you do five tandems.

1/11/2008 1:52:42 PM

That sounds pretty good. I definitely wouldn't want to jump solo so soon after starting, lol.

1/11/2008 1:54:31 PM

I am convinced that if it hadn't been for the tunnel at Ft Bragg, I would have never completed MFF.

I had a very difficult time maintaining a stable body position at first (I would lateral spin). I was so stressed out when we were on the tunnel because I thought that I was going to be dropped from the class and sent back to my unit (not good for a rigger). But I also remember thinking that if I weren't so stressed out, that the tunnel ought to be fun. I could entertain the idea of going to Raeford and checking this out.

1/11/2008 1:55:51 PM

^
I always wanted to try the Bragg tunnel. I hear it's pretty bad ass. Most people spin at first so it's no big deal, especially when you get free tunnel time. I envy that


Trust me no matter how bad you fuck up I'll get a canopy deployed for you All a tandem does is make you comfortable in the air and after that you can't really learn much from it. You have to learn to watch your altitude and open the canopy the yourself and when you are landing by yourself you have a radio for a while. You aren't completely on your own.

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 1:59 PM. Reason : a]

1/11/2008 1:58:09 PM

1100 for an hour? fuck that, put the money into AFF training. 7 non-tandem jumps and you're ready to go.

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 2:00 PM. Reason : a]

1/11/2008 1:59:18 PM

^

Yeah but with 6 minutes in the tunnel you'll pass AFF with flying colors and make my life as an AFF instructor much easier



[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 2:01 PM. Reason : a]

1/11/2008 2:01:17 PM

i think doing AFF w/ my BFF would be OOC!

1/11/2008 2:10:12 PM

Quote :

"Are there really a lot of other vertical tunnels there? I have never even heard of Raeford, I can't imagine to be a big place."

A Grammar Patrolman after my own heart.

1/11/2008 2:13:45 PM

And then we can do an RW or vRW jump with our AADs and RSL and that way we can be safe when we deploy our BOC PCs. Or we could do a CRW jump with our BFF.


In addition to cool acronyms you have sayings like, "Man we were in the middle of this 3-way and this chick just dumped in my face."

1/11/2008 2:22:18 PM

excuse me sir

initialisms, not acronyms.

1/11/2008 2:26:18 PM

2 questions about skydiving:

First: This is the standard body position ('trim') I use when scuba diving. It's the position I naturally go to and is nice for a variety of reasons (non-silting, more surface area to use while descending/ascending to have more control, etc).
It seems that this is fairly similar to the position used in skydiving. How quickly could one expect to become comfortable getting to this position? One of the previous posters mentioned that it takes awhile.


Second: Do you have to actively equalize the increasing pressure in your ears while descending, or does it automatically happen with all the air rushing around your head and (presumably) into your nose/mouth?

1/11/2008 2:41:03 PM

Most people have the basics of belly to earth freefall in 7 jumps (which is why AFF is 7 jumps long). AFF is how you actually learn to skydive including flying your body in freefall and the parachute. After that you can usually turn on your own and keep a heading but not much else. By your A license (25 jumps) you should be able to move forward and backward and up and down. In the tunnel you can get that in about 10 minutes.

Pressure in your ears usually fixes itself automatically (it isn't that much pressure difference relative to scuba diving, though you can't skydive after a scuba dive in the same day) though sometimes you have to swallow to get it to clear when you are under canopy. The body position for normal freefall is similar, but you use your legs and arms to control movement. Extending your legs causes you to move forward and bringing them in causes you to move backward. You can also side slide and move up and down relative to someone else. Most of the spinning occurs because peoples legs are asymmetrical and most people don't have a good sense of what their bodies are doing especially in a high stress situation.

There are other body positions in freeflying which is where you see people sit flying and flying upside down relative to other people. That takes much longer to get the basics of because it's more unstable. It takes about 100 jumps of practice to just be able to fly stable both head down and in a sitflying position and that isn't even counting moving forward and backward.

Belly to Earth:


Freeflying:


[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 2:59 PM. Reason : a]

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 3:06 PM. Reason : a]

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 3:08 PM. Reason : a]

1/11/2008 2:56:58 PM

Cool, thanks for the reply.

So how many jumps (of all types) do you have?

1/11/2008 3:07:47 PM

Quote :

""Man we were in the middle of this 3-way and this chick just dumped in my face.""

1/11/2008 3:09:46 PM

About 1400 skydives total not including my 200 BASE jumps.

Probably 1000 freefly jumps 300 belly to earth jumps (RW) and the rest Coaching/AFF or getting out lower to just fly the parachute.

1/11/2008 3:13:45 PM

Sweet.

Right now I'm really into scuba and don't need another expensive hobby. I probably have ~$5k invested in the gear alone...

I suppose one advantage of scuba is that I can go diving for multiple hours at a time, whereas each jump apparently only lasts ~1 minute.

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 3:17 PM. Reason : Recalculated gear cost. In all honesty I probably don't want to know anyway...]

1/11/2008 3:16:52 PM

I didn't know you were an instructor! How cool

I'd love to get my certification, I've been flirting with the idea ever since I went to Carolina Sky Sports for the first time.

soooo, aside from Carolina Sky Sports, are there places around here to go skydiving?

1/11/2008 3:19:19 PM

^near Charlotte.

1/11/2008 3:19:43 PM

^ Skydive Carolina in Chester, SC is really close to Charlotte. Adrenaline Air Sports in Jonesville, NC is a lot smaller but pretty cool vibe. There's also a drop zone in Raeford (probably one of the oldest in the country). Open since the 50s.

I have a friend that's into SCUBA too. He's a NAUI instructor. He's been more into skydiving for the past several years. The intensity and fun factor is much higher skydiving from what I hear. I've only do pool scuba dives at this point but I want to do it at some point. One of the other instructors at Carolina Sky Sports is big into cave diving and SCUBA instruction. Does both a lot.

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 3:24 PM. Reason : a]

1/11/2008 3:21:34 PM

I wonder how much it costs to build one of those.

I mean they are gonna be raking in a TON of revenue assuming they stay booked up and keep it open long hours.

1/11/2008 3:24:53 PM

$10,000,000 for the one in Raeford. You can build the smaller original models for about $3,000,000.

Even still it'd take about 5-6 years to pay off that loan at 1100 an hour.

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 3:28 PM. Reason : a]

1/11/2008 3:26:56 PM

Quote :

"The intensity and fun factor is much higher skydiving from what I hear."

I can see that, but I'd say it depends on the person.

For me, scuba is about seeing the beauty of the underwater world. It's peaceful, and things (most of the time...if you aren't on a scooter ) move slowly. Skydiving seems to be more about fast-paced excitement. Two opposite ends of the spectrum.

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 3:29 PM. Reason : ]

1/11/2008 3:28:36 PM

Nah it's a lot about the beauty too. You ever see the suns rays cutting through clouds? Its a lot of fun playing in that even if it's only for a minute at a time. Also you see cool things like rainbow halos around your silhouette on a cloud and it's just kind of awe inspiring to fly up to your friend and give him the middle finger then fly circles around each other. I mean look at the mountain picture. The scenery is always awesome, especially at sunset.



[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 3:32 PM. Reason : a]

1/11/2008 3:31:25 PM

Quote :

"The scenery is always awesome, especially at sunset. "

I believe it! Perhaps one day I'll experience it.


Seeing the sunrays as you peer down into the water is pretty sweet too. (sorry, didn't mean to turn this into an argument )

Go talk to those two instructors. Since they were both certified at State (and one got his instructorship through here), I know they'd set you up right. Taking time off from work to go skydiving and scubadiving sounds like it's be a cool trip.

1/11/2008 3:35:31 PM

14^ To add to Cael's statement, the trim position that you posted does represent the stable body position that a free-fall parachutist would want to achieve, but it is much more difficult to arrive at that position in flight than it is while underwater.

In flight, you have the wind coming against your body mass. In the water, with some simple balance and practice you can easily achieve that trim. You also have a few things working for you - time and bouyancy. "The sky is less forgiving than the sea"...

Anyhow, you shouldn't worry about how long it takes to achieve a stable body position. What made it difficult for me was that at the wind tunnel, we only had four sessions over two days (iirc) to "get it". When it was coming down to crunch time an instructor would spend some more time with you. It was important to get it right b/c at the time, there were no tandem rigs in MFF school. So if you didn't get it at that point then you were dropped.

1/11/2008 3:41:44 PM

Tandems kind of work against you anyway because it messes up the students leg position. Most of the students I see coming off of tandem have bad leg position their first few solo jumps which makes them wildly unstable. How much time do you get in a session at Bragg?

1/11/2008 3:45:43 PM

I bet going directly from skydiving to scuba would be pretty sweet. Land in the water and just keep dropping down...

1/11/2008 4:01:06 PM

i wanna do this indoor one.

is there a lot of getting use to? like is my first visit gonna be like first time getting high? nothings happens cuz you gotta do it again?

i dont want to go and not be use to it or whatever you need to get use to because its one of those things you have to do 3-4 times to get good at it.

1/11/2008 5:46:25 PM

^^^ 5-15 minutes. Everyone in class takes turns with an instructor.

[Edited on January 11, 2008 at 5:47 PM. Reason : .]

1/11/2008 5:47:02 PM

i did this in vegas a few years ago

real skydiving was better

1/11/2008 6:29:08 PM

The one in vegas sucks. Its 90 mph wind on a 10 ft column. Its nothing like the skyventure tunnels. this one is 16ft and 180 mph. you could fly in it naked if you wanted. On my way there now

1/11/2008 6:53:17 PM

looks like fun - great post

1/12/2008 9:17:04 PM