Tuesday, September 12, 2017
Despite a couple days of rain courtesy of the outer edges of Hurricane Irma, competitors are gathering for the start of the 2017 USPA National Parachuting Championships at Skydive Paraclete XP in Raeford, North Carolina. The event includes classic accuracy, canopy formation and canopy piloting.

The scheduled start for accuracy of Monday, September 11, was pushed back due to rain, but the 19 registered competitors are gathering Tuesday for the competitor briefing and a hopeful start of jumping. The CF event kicks off Wednedsay, and CP starts Friday.

Skydive-TV, an online and mobile skydiving TV channel, is again onsite to produce daily broadcasts of all the action. Scores for accuracy and canopy formation will be available at OmniSkore.com, and CP scores will be on Control Tower. Event updates will appear on the Facebook event page.

Wednesday, July 26, 2017
Beginning November 1, USPA will no longer be involved in indoor skydiving by supporting indoor skydiving national championships or selecting U.S. Teams for international indoor skydiving competitions. USPA will seek to cooperate with any emerging national governing body for tunnel flying.

Sunday, July 23, 2017

The USPA Board of Directors held its summer meeting July 21-23 in Seattle, Washington. Following are meeting highlights:

• The board voted to raise individual and introductory membership dues, rating fees and Group Member dues effective January 1, 2018.
• The board changed the Group Member pledge so that Group Member drop zones must now require individual USPA memberships once a student is cleared for self-supervision.
• Beginning November 1, USPA will no longer be involved in indoor skydiving by supporting indoor skydiving national championships or selecting U.S. Teams for international indoor skydiving competitions. USPA will seek to cooperate with any emerging national governing body for tunnel flying.
• The board determined that any aircraft used for high-altitude or wingsuit distance or time skydiving records must comply with all Federal Aviation Regulations related to that aircraft for the record to be valid.
• Effective immediately, the board increased the required number of evaluation jumps to obtain a Coach Examiner rating to 25.
• Effective immediately, the Safety & Training Committee will review all proficiency cards for candidates seeking a Coach Examiner or Instructor Examiner rating.
• The board awarded the USPA Gold Medal for Meritorious Service to Mark Baur, USPA #9091; Ben Crowell, USPA #73563; and Chuck Karcher, USPA #27444.
• The board awarded the USPA Regional Achievement Award to DeWayne Bruette, USPA #812; Harry Ervin, USPA #555; Miles Hubbard, USPA #1697; and Marilyn Wuest, USPA #56785, and Doug Wuest, USPA #57623.

The USPA Board will next meet March 2-4 in San Antonio, Texas.

Tuesday, July 18, 2017
The House bill that would privatize air traffic control, HR 2997, has been pulled and there will be no House vote this week. That indicates that House leadership does not think there are enough votes to pass it at this time. A vote on the bill will almost certainly be rescheduled. "The voices of USPA members and 120 other general aviation groups are being heard," said USPA's Executive Director Ed Scott. "We all need to be ready to weigh-in again in the coming weeks."

Friday, June 23, 2017

This week the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee released the draft of an FAA reauthorization bill, the 21st Century AIRR Act, that would remove air traffic control from the FAA and create a new private, non-profit corporation to run the nation's air traffic control system. The bill gives the privatized ATC corporation authority to enact new user fees to be paid by system users. While the bill also exempts general aviation operators from paying a user fee for air traffic control services, there is no guarantee that a future Congress or administration wouldn't remove that exemption. (The companion Senate bill proposes neither ATC privatization or aviation user fees.)