Re: [climbmaster5k] how many jumps should i have before i start base jumping
Dear Climbmaster:
I suspect that you are surprised at the responses you have gotten, and at the overall brusque attitude of the responders. I've spent a bit of time watching these fora, and I think I can shed a bit of light on your situation. Please understand, I wish you well, as does everyone else who responded. Although it may not seem so to you, we really are trying to help.
The fact that you, like so many others, have asked your question at all, means that you, like so many others, have no conception of the world of BASE jumping about which you are so excited. There are a couple of additional problems with your question.
The first is that you are asking SOMEBODY ELSE to set standards for you, to make an evaluation on which your life will depend. Nobody else wants that responsibility, at least not for someone they don't know, and know well. You will have to learn to take responsibility for your own actions, and the fact that you want someone else to decide for you is prima facie evidence that you are not mentally ready for BASE, the first requirement for which is acceptance that your life is YOUR responsibility, and nobody else's.
Attitude apart, if you are not competent to evaluate your own physical skill set against those skills required to BASE jump more than once, then you aren't competent to BASE jump. There are so many things that you do not know that you don't know, and excitement and enthusiasm are no substitute for good judgment, which comes from making mistakes. Mistakes in BASE are often immediately fatal, and frequently very painful and expensive.
Whuffos think that jumpers are living on the edge, but the reality is that if you can follow directions and do important things in the proper sequence, one at a time, you will have a long career skydiving. Skydivers know that BASE jumping is truly unforgiving, because you have to do many things perfectly, most at the same time. You need to learn those things in the more forgiving field of skydiving, where you have thousands of feet of empty air to cushion your errors and to allow you to (most likely) live to learn from your mistakes, and develop good judgment, and so you don't have to think about your responses in the middle of a BASE jump gone slightly awry. A moment's inattention is all it takes for yet another fatality report.
I was jumping in Nevada in 1980 and almost off status, when legal El Cap jumps were being made, some of them by my jumpmasters and instructors, and I knew that this was an opportunity I would probably not have again for a long time, if ever. My instructor, who made one of the last legal BASE jumps off the Wall of Morning light, was gentle but firm in telling me that I wasn't ready yet, that there was so much I did not know yet. And he was right. It's been over thirty years, and I'm safe in saying that I now have a pretty good grasp of what my limitations are, mental and physical, and I'm really glad that my instructor squashed my youthful enthusiasm as he did. Sometimes that is what's needed.
Edited to add:
For full disclosure purposes, I am not current, and have not BASE jumped. Yet. I am however, an expert in various forms of high speed contact with unforgiving surfaces, and who knows, my BASE cherry may yet get POPped.
Blue skies!
