The Secret to Pilot Chute Packing

Brian Germain shares a better way to pack your parachute's pilot chute.

Hey, I'm Brian Germain, and I wanted to share with everybody

a parachute packing method that might actually

change the way you think about packing your pilot chute.

I know what you're thinking. What's the difference, right?

I wad it up. As long as it fits in there, and it extracts nicely when I clear the pilot chute,

you know or get a hard pull. What's the difference?

Well, here's the difference.

We can on occasion, get an out-of-sequence deployment,

which the deployment pin gets extracted or the closing loop breaks during freefall,

or maybe while you're climbing out of the airplane or

and now we've got ourselves what's called a "horseshoe malfunction."

The idea is that the parachute goes, but

we did not put the pilot chute out there, so therefore

it may get stuck in the pouch,

in which case I would now cut away, dump my reserve, and my stuff--

my main would still be attached and be in my pouch.

So there's a pretty good chance of actually having an entanglement,

a main-reserve entanglement.

So to help prevent that, we need to pack the parachute

in a manner that allows us to extract it by the handle, and

by the bridle itself,

in the event that things leave in an order that we didn't originally plan on.

So this particular method allows the bridle to extract very nicely

and then the bridle can pull the pilot chute out

So now I don't actually have to reach back and throw the pilot chute in those cases.

And if I do, it's still going to be extractable.

But there are many methods that actually prevent this from happening.

One method involves -- I'm going to do a very rough quick job here to get the idea across--

The bridle exiting the bottom of the pilot chute.

If I put the bridle in this way, what happens then is

this will turn sideways, in the event that the bridle tries to extract the pilot chute.

And it may jam up in there.

And especially if I've got a very strong spandex pouch,

or a Cordora pouch that some of the manufacturers use,

there's a pretty good chance there's a lock in there

indefinitely, and by indefinitely I mean the rest of the way. All right?

So we have to make sure first of all that

this bridle extracts in a manner that allows it to all

without turning sideways.

But we also have to make sure that the bridle reaches the end here

and does not bunch the pilot chute up.

So this particular method--and it's not the only method that accomplishes this goal--

it's the one I use because I know it works.

And I've been using it for over 20 years

and I've had numerous people come to me and

say, "Brian, thank you. That's totally saved my life."

I love that ???

So here's the drill.

A little bit of space.

If I lay the pilot chute on its back

If I lift it from the bridle attachment, and

then I bring the edge of the pilot chute down

so it ???

and then I cut it in half, so I create a half-moon shape.

So let's do that one more time.

I want to lift the bridle, and I'm going to

close it up, and everything else can be pretty standard.

This is a very common method, to cut it in thirds first

and then bring the bottom up.

So from here, if I was to just roll this thing up,

just from here, what happens then is that this is stressed.

???

So do it again.

Lay it on it's back.

And now I'm going to lift, close, cut it in thirds,

cut it in half by lifting the bottom up.

And you'll see why I bring the bottom up and not the top down.

This is a wonderful trick.

If you place the pilot chute itself on the rig,

right where it's going to be ultimately,

that way when you pull the bridle,

and I like it inside

you can do this inside or outside.

Back and forth inside here.

And then I'll roll it up,

very neatly.

And then place this whole thing into here

in the event that I've got an out-of-sequence deployment,

I remove that away

Very little effort. Give it a try, it's not that hard.

Here's the alternative.

If I was to have the bridle exiting the bottom of the pilot chute,

and then tuck it in, there's a high probability there will not be --oh, look at that--

oh, a lot inside there.

You may not extract in the event of a horseshoe

And then I've got my main trailing behind me

even though I've cut away, and grab this handle.

and maybe I can extract it.

It may be very difficult to get it out of there.

But if I use this pilot packing method, I don't have to worry about that.