Good morning Mr. Hemmel,
You wrote:
"That would be 2,000,000/year, or 4,479 per day, 365 days per year for ten years. WOW! Anyone who believes this, please send me money."
Actually in the US it was approximately 2,200,000 skydives made in the United States alone in 2008. And the average for the better part of the last decade has been between 1.5 million and 2.5 million skydives per year in the US which brings us back to the approximate number of 20,000,000 skydives in ten years. Skydive City, located in Zephyrhills, Florida made 75,000 skydives over a 365 day calendar year in 2008. Skydive Deland made 80,000 skydives in 2008. (That's two dropzones out of 270 in the US) Our national governing organization, the United States Parachute Association (
www.uspa.org) keeps records of all of this information, it's available for all to see. (Thank you for continuing to validate my comment about your use of smoke and mirrors, it also goes on to show how little you really know about us or our industry).
You wrote:
"Very true, but then there are a LOT more aircraft than skydivers."
Really? Out of the approximately 20,000,000 skydives made over a decade, there were only 2 incidents in ten years.......both skydivering aircraft and skydivers, and both of them only resulted in one fatality in that ten year span.
Or better, by your logic, let's reduce the number of aircraft operations allowed at LCI altogether. If there are more pilots having WAY more accidents, let's limit the number of pilots and planes we have in the air. How about that? Imagine getting a call from the airport saying "I'm sorry Mr. Hemmel, you can't fly a paying flight today. We have too many planes in the air right now and you know you said it yourself, more planes causes more accidents". In all seriousness, what you wrote sounds like it makes it okay to justify aircraft collisions which happen all the time, but you would lead people to believe that skydiver/aircraft collisions are the greatest threat to all mankind, yet they happen so infrequently, it happened twice in ten years out of approximately 20,000,000 skydives.
You wrote:
"Land off-airport. Simple. Safe (but not profitable)"
As long as the FAA continues to state that we have an equal access to the airport as you, then we intend to land on the airport. Not profitable to land off the airport? Mr. Hemmel, do you charge a fee for your service? Would either of the flight schools on LCI be able to stay in business if they had to ferry their students back from an off field landing area? If you want to try and paint us as mavericks who are willing to sacrifice your safety to make a profit, then you'd be better off bringing facts to the table. Problem is, there aren't any to support your claim, to the contrary, the FACTS actually refute your claims, hence the smoke and mirrors you are compelled to keep showing.
You wrote:
"OR, it just might be a case of their being considerably more familiar with the local traffic, topography, weather, and other conditions and truly considering it to be unsafe."
As familiar as they may be with the local traffic et al, they are equally as unfamiliar with modern skydiving. To make a truly informed decision, they must be both familiar with the area and familiar with our sport. That's why the FAA continues to state that they (the FAA) are the exclusive decision maker in airport safety questions such as this. Only they know both sides of the story.
And to further illustrate my point, I would like to offer you and the community something to consider. Mary and I offered twice to make a demo jump into LCI to give the board that first hand view of what they would be voting on. From filing the NOTAM, to planning the jump, to landing in a predetermined landing area, we offered (twice) at our own cost of about $1000, to bring a plane up and make a skydive and let them see first hand how little impact we would have on the airport. We offered to fully educate them on what it is that we want to do.
Both times we were denied. We were told that it is "simply not an option." Ironic, huh?
Blue skies to all and to all a good flight,
Tom