PD has been known to host some really fun and unique events, like PD Tvier and PD Big Boy Pants. This year, Project Orange, held at Skydive City, Zephyrhills, was no exception. The idea was to hold an event focused around the main canopy disciplines: Accuracy, Swooping and CRW. At the end of the week, everyone came together to participate in the Reserve Backyard Accuracy Challenge. And if that wasn’t enough, you also had Freefly and RW organizers, PD demos, a packing seminar and two open forum discussions with the man himself, John LeBlanc.
Canopy Piloting
The CP event (Lord of the Strings’) was held a little differently than normal, with competitors going head to head in a bracket-style competition. Everyone really enjoyed the format and the ability to immediately see who moves on. After each run, the other competitors ran to see the scores, cheering on their friends who advanced. Each event had slight variations to keep it interesting. A total of $5,000 was given out in prize money, with an additional $1,000 going to Cornelia Mihai as raft accuracy champ!
Classic Accuracy
A classic accuracy competition offered $2,000 in prize money, plus an avenue for jumpers to try accuracy for the first time. A sport accuracy competition was held at the same time, with Cheryl Stearns giving out advice and tips on how to land exactly where you want to. The FAI judging panel gave out scores for sport accuracy, set up as a target in the main landing area. Some even tried landing ZERO canopies on the tuffet… not as easy as it looks! 😉
Thread the Needle
The CRW dogs, led by Clean Air team members Chris Gay and Brian Pangburn (along with the help of Mike Lewis and the vision of Kirk Vanzandt), were able to accomplish something no-one has ever done before. After building a 12-way formation and punching out the center of it, PDFT’s Ian Bobo flew his Peregrine through the center of the formation. Since they accomplished this ‘Thread the Needle’ fly through on the first attempt, you’d think it was easy. But behind the CRW part of it was over 100 years of experience and over 100,000 skydives. Ian Bobo has over 17,000 jumps alone and 24 years in the sport. After achieving this jump, they kept pushing the limits and flew through a number of times, culminating in a jump where four PDFT members (Ian Bobo, Jessica Edgeinton, Gage Galle and Ian Drennan) all flew through on the last day of the event. It was incredible to watch from the ground and even more so from the view on the inside!
Reserve Backyard Accuracy
Another big highlight was the ‘Reserve Backyard Accuracy Challenge’, where registrants were set up with one of our PD or Optimum reserves and their skills of landing a reserve in a backyard were put to the test. With the landing area fully equipped with a pool, a dog, palm tree coolers and other inflatables, about 30 jumpers battled for first place and tried to avoid pummeling into any of our obstacles… OR the judges (who parked it in the pool). With so many ties, we ended up with a number of winners, all receiving gift certificates to the PD Gear Store and some PD swag.
Fun For All
UPT rep Greg Rau was also on site, with demo rigs and an actual skyhook/cutaway demonstration at the start of Backyard Accuracy. Project Orange saw a mix of skydivers from all disciplines and all levels. We had CRW dogs swooping the pond (Scott Lazarus landed his Lightning ON the raft!), CP competitors participating in the Reserve Backyard Accuracy Challenge, and everyone having a good time. Big thanks to Skydive City and everyone who helped make it such a storming success. We can’t wait till the next one!
For more Project Orange photos, see:
Ground action at Z Hills: PD@Facebook
Thread the Needle: NormanKent.com
