 0930
(T2) DING we're live on the internet! DZTV setup in progress, teams
are getting in their final training jumps, judges are hobbing knobs, and
where's my camera...
1400
(T2) World Cup setup is nearing completion. When the competition
begins on Monday, these pages will be updated by Liz Crichton-Stuart
and Roy Wagner, and I might be ducking in from work to toss in a couple
of cents.
No pictures today, need camera with flash card tomorrow.
Opening Ceremony
(Liz) The Opening Ceremony kicked off with Jason Peters flying
the American flag, followed by the IPC and FAI flags and then every
country in alphabetical order landing alongside the competitors.
Kirby then took to the skies with the Red Bull stunt plane and did a
very impressive show. Next up was a demo of skydivers under
burning canopies. Yes, you have read right - burning canopies!
Led by Steve Curtis, each demo jumper did a hop n' pop from the DC 3 and
set fire to their canopy. One jumper cut away his burning canopy,
got his main out only to have a malfunction on that - of course
that only led to more excitement. On the ground there was a line
of fire, which the demo jumpers swooped alongside. To finish off, the
DC3 did a very low fly by and everyone retired to the competition hangar
for food, beer and the tunes of Mariachi.
Sunday 23 October
 0900
(Roy) Official practice began at 0800 and continues until 1600. At
1700 the manifest draw will be done, and the competitor's briefing will
follow. The competition will start with Canopy Formations at 0630
tomorrow, weather permitting, and in Arizona it almost always does. The
schedule for the meet can be found
here. When the window opens, scroll down to Schedule.
 1400
(T2) Official practice continues under sunny skies and warm
temperatures. There are 16 4-way FS teams, plus 7 more women teams.
8-Way FS will have France, Italy, Russia, and two USA teams. CF has 6
rotation teams (half of them from Russia), 6 4-way sequential, and 14
2-way sequential. I am working on finding a local AE enthusiast to write
up some tidbits for us here. Anyone out there interested? Email me at
timw@omniskore.com. 1520
(T2) HACK HACK. FS team listings, 4-way draw and scoring results
pages will be online at 1700 local time. NSL guru Kurt Gaebel has some
good World Cup coverage over
at his site. Check it out. |
0930
