Head Up · Mastery · The jump

Head-Up 401

Fly head-up big-ways

Head-up big-ways: launching the base, building the line, holding a quiet slot, aborting clear.

What the course is about

You'll learn to fly an assigned slot in an organised head-up big-way. This follows Head-Up 202 and Head-Up 301, because a big-way slot needs crest-standard head-up flying and the level, closure and breakoff habits of small groups.

In Australia, formations larger than ten need a Star Crest and a Freefly Crest, head-up big-ways included.

What comes before it

Screen 2 · What you are watched on

What you are watched on

The same short list a coach ticks, in the same words. Nothing is hidden from you.

3.1

Launch the linked base from inside the aircraft, door kept clear for floaters, stabilising grips, heading and fall rate through the hill (base slots; ASM 96 pp.40–41).

Can you launch a linked base from inside the aircraft, keeping the door clear for floaters and holding grips, heading and fall rate through the hill?

3.5

Build the wacker line off the base, matching the line's level and radial spacing (wacker slots).

Can you fly onto the end of the line off the base, holding the line’s level and keeping even spacing out from the centre?

3.7

Hold the slot quietly, level within a head height, grips soft, inputs minimal, while monitoring the build and the traffic in own sector until the key or breakoff.

On a long build, can you hold your slot quietly on soft grips, level within a head height, watching your sector instead of putting inputs into the formation?

3.8 Safety critical

Fly the briefed abort on any instability or orientation loss: establishing back-fly, clearing off the formation's line, and not re-approaching (corking decelerates a flyer from ~175+ mph to ~120 mph, a collision hazard for anyone above the formation).

If you become unstable near a formation, do you fly the briefed abort, recover to back-fly, clear the formation’s line, and stay out?

Screen 3 · Safety and altitudes

Safety and altitudes

Everything here is a recommendation with a reason behind it. The drop zone you are jumping at, and your own limits on the day, decide what happens.

Safety-critical items on the short list

3.8

Fly the briefed abort on any instability or orientation loss: establishing back-fly, clearing off the formation's line, and not re-approaching (corking decelerates a flyer from ~175+ mph to ~120 mph, a collision hazard for anyone above the formation).

If you become unstable near a formation, do you fly the briefed abort, recover to back-fly, clear the formation’s line, and stay out?

Everything this course says about breakoff and deployment

1.3

State the staged breakoff plan: own wave, its altitude and assigned radial, and the deployment altitude. Guides: waves elevated with group size, e.g., first wave ≥6,000 ft and open by 4,500 ft, with ≥1,000 ft from own breakoff to deployment (cf. the elevated floors used for coached freefly display groups, ASM 96 p.15). Head-up big-way separation planning needs to be more conservative than head-down: gaining lateral separation from a head-up breakoff is inefficient, so at 10-way and larger the breakoff plan is the organiser's risk decision, higher floors are worth considering.

2.2

Complete a freefly-specific gear check: pin and handle protection for the gripped exit and aircraft stack-up, genuinely tight BOC (premature pilot-chute deployment is a documented head-up hazard, ASM 96 p.33), two audibles set to the briefed altitudes, AAD on.

4.1

Initiate breakoff with own wave at the briefed altitude (within −0/+300 ft), turning onto the assigned radial.

4.3

Transition to belly, washing off vertical speed and checking airspace before deployment (deployment at freefly speeds drives the hard-opening/line-twist incident class, ASM 109 p.69).

4.4

Deploy at the planned altitude, never above the formation or another group (ASM 112 p.88).

5.1

Debrief own jump against the per-jumper report card covering the 11 briefed areas of the jump, climbouts, quietness, presentation and breakoff among them; full card under Assessment conditions, comparing self-assessment against the organiser's card (Malchiodi debrief instrument, 2019 Australian HU record, ASM 96 pp.40–41).

5.4

Log the jump with a written reflection naming the unit, the slot flown and the outcome (e.g., "FFP-HU401, diver slot, 12-way, build held to breakoff"), retaining the report card as evidence, the report-card cycle only compounds if it lands in the logbook.

The altitudes here are the guides this site recommends, with the reasons on the full course page. Where the drop zone briefs something different, fly what the drop zone briefs.

Screen 4 · After the jump

After the jump

From the course's closing section, review.

5.1

Debrief own jump against the per-jumper report card covering the 11 briefed areas of the jump, climbouts, quietness, presentation and breakoff among them; full card under Assessment conditions, comparing self-assessment against the organiser's card (Malchiodi debrief instrument, 2019 Australian HU record, ASM 96 pp.40–41).

5.2

Analyse the formation video to locate own slot's contribution to the build, or the cause of any failure to build.

5.3

Identify one correction to carry into the next attempt's plan.

5.4

Log the jump with a written reflection naming the unit, the slot flown and the outcome (e.g., "FFP-HU401, diver slot, 12-way, build held to breakoff"), retaining the report card as evidence, the report-card cycle only compounds if it lands in the logbook.

One fault, one correction

Before the video, and before anyone else speaks, name the one fault from the jump and the one thing you will change on the next jump. Keep it to one of each, so you have one clear thing to fly.

Write them into your notes at the bottom of this card, and they will be here next time you open it.

Record this jump

You can record the jump yourself, because your own read of your flying is worth keeping. A record counts as verified once a coach signs it.