How safe is it, really?

Happy Dog asks;

Does the waiver relate to the jump facility AND the manufacturer?

I jumped once, just to see what it was like. The first thing that they
do when you get to the jump facility (at least the one that I went to in
Maine), was tell you that it's real dangerous, and that you could get
killed. Then, they sat us down and showed us a 1/2 hour long movie of
parachuting accidents (real ones), with folks falling out of the sky,
hitting the ground, and dying. After that, they asked us to sign
waivers that said that no matter what happened, EVEN IF THE PILOT OF THE
JUMP PLANE CRASHED ON PURPOSE (and similar wording for just about every
other possibility) that we wouldn't sue anyone, and that we were
completely aware of all the dangers.

Obviously, we couldn't sign away anyone ELSE's right to sue, so I'm sure
that if I had been killed my wife would have approached a lawyer, but
the fact that I signed a document that showed that I understood ALL the
risks, even the absurdly remote ones (like the pilot crashing on
purpose) means that she'd never win.

Anyway, the waivers I signed applied to everyone and anyone that had
ever been born, much less the facility and MFG.

It was an interesting experience :-).

--
Marc J. Zeitlin
http://marc.zeitlin.home.comcast.net/
http://www.cozybuilders.org/
Copyright (c) 2004