ChutingStar Skydive News

As of April 5, 2025, a new baseline 10% tariff was levied on all imports into United States. Some items, such as jumpsuits and helmet accessories, are being tariffed at a 25-30% rate. U.S. President Donald Trump has declared a national emergency with the U.S. trade deficit. Additional tariffs were announced and then paused for 90 days. On the heels of the tariffs, the American dollar has fallen in value.

All of this combined is already affecting the price on the gear you use to skydive. Skydivers use a wide-range of gear from manufacturers across the globe, so it is impossible for pricing to not be affected by the tariffs or falling dollar.

ChutingStar imports gear directly from some of your favorite manufacturers outside of the United States. And most manufacturers inside the United States use parts or materials that are sourced from overseas.

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(Written by ChutingStar's Henry Kochen.)

A 20-Year Journey of Growth, Safety, and Complacency

Over the last two decades, skydiving has evolved significantly, transforming from a niche thrill-seeking activity into a widely accessible and increasingly safe sport. From improved equipment technology to enhanced training protocols, the sport has made remarkable strides. However, amid this progress, a concerning trend has emerged: complacency among experienced skydivers and a lack of respect for the inherent risks of the sport. This is resulting in an unfortunate retrogression—more experienced skydivers getting injured or even killed, while newer participants neglect the importance of vigilance, discipline, and respect for safety.

The Growth of Skydiving: A Safer Sport

Skydiving has experienced exponential growth over the past 20 years. What was once seen as an extreme sport reserved for a select few has now become increasingly accessible to a broader audience. In 2000, skydiving was largely a sport for adrenaline junkies and military personnel, with the equipment and training far from the streamlined, professional systems we see today. However, advances in equipment technology and training have made skydiving more reliable and safer.

One of the major factors contributing to the sport's safety is the development of modern parachutes. The introduction of “square” or “ram-air” canopies, which are far more stable and predictable than the old round ones, revolutionized how skydivers navigate and land. These canopies are designed to offer better control, making the landing process less perilous.

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While ChutingStar may seem to some like some huge corporate monster of a company, we are a group 7 people serving the skydiving community out of one location in Marietta, Georgia. For the most part, we're available 24/7 in some manner be it in the shop, on the phone or online.

Since 1999, we've mostly been able to provide seamless support by staggering breaks for our staff and covering for each other's "specialty" so that you rarely know when one or two of us are gone for a few days.

Many skydiving manufacturers have a summer and a winter shutdown that may be a week or more. ChutingStar has always stayed open during those times to support skydivers with info, advice, parts and gear. That will be changing slightly this year.

For 2025, there will be a couple of staff breaks to give our group a breather. This will delay custom orders processing and some shipments, but we've scheduled these breaks around holidays and manufacturer shutdowns where we are limited in what we can do at that time anyway.

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It's time to boogie, boogie, boogie, boogie, boogie! And the ChutingStar Crew will be out there with you at drop zones all over the US, providing all the support and goods you could ask for.

The one and only Laura Bales is packing up the van with demos from Larsen & Brusgaard (altimeters), Cookie (G4 helmets), Alti-2 (altimeter mounts), Square1 (KISS helmets), and many more. Laura is available for container, canopy and jumpsuit orders as she'll be able to measure you up and walk you through the ordering process for any of your custom gear needs, including the helmet sizing kit for the Tonfly TFX Full Face Helmet.

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ChutingStar did start out as the Rigger Rant & Rave...so true to form...it's time for some ranting...and then some raving.

To all you complainers out there who have been living under a boulder or in some weird bubble, we're living in the middle of a freaking pandemic. COVID-related deaths, disruptions and shutdowns are real. Be happy you're even alive to read this.

Some skydiving gear manufacturers, stores and drop zones have gone out of business, some are having staffing issues and others just can't get the materials needed to complete manufacturing. Some are communicating well to dealers and customers, and some are a complete overwhelmed mess of misinformation.

Anything skydiving-related not currently in stock at ChutingStar, and still available to order from manufacturers, is on the way to us, being manufactured or on some sort of backorder awaiting the manufacturer to manufacture. We are in touch with the manufacturers about delays and backorders on a daily basis so we can communicate to you expected ship dates. But even then, those get pushed back due to more manufacturing or shipping delays.

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ChutingStar long carried and used the white Sport Smoke Skydiver Smoke Grenade (recently discontinued), which was a big part of demonstration jumps for decades.

Skydivers use one of our smoke mounts to attach the smoke to their shoe or ankle, and the smoke gives a definite "wow factor" for people on the ground whether it's used in freefall or under canopy. For several years, we've had requests for colored smoke but we could only find specialized manufacturers with complicated ignition systems and/or the smoke canisters needed larger brackets.

But we were recently turned on to a UK smoke grenade company, Enola Gaye, that now distributes in the United States. Skydivers, drop zones and demo teams had started trying two different "wire pull" smoke grenades from the company with great success.

The EG18 and EG18X smoke grenades not only come in several colors, but have a lower price than the Sport Smoke and can be used with all of our existing skydiver smoke grenade brackets. And then this year they added two larger "pro" smoke options in the CM75 The Cloud Maker and the SD75 The Fastest Cloud Maker giving skydivers the most options for smoke grenades every!

Here's a comparison of the 4 different smoke grenades we currently carry for skydiving:

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(Latest update October 2020, with new youth sizing info!)

Cookie Helmets created quite the buzz in the skydiving world when they unveiled the G4 Full Face Skydiving Helmet on Feb. 4 at the 2019 Parachute Industry Association Symposium.

The G4 is the next step up in the full face helmet progression that started with the GAS back in 2007 as a solid, easy-to-use carbon fiber full face helmet with a visor that didn't flip-up. That soon progressed to Cookie's first flip-up visor full face helmet with the G2 in 2009, also made of carbon fiber.

But it really was the G3 in 2011 that radically changed the skydiving helmet scene as Cookie was able to produce the helmet on a larger scale, in more colors and with a consistent production standard due to a switch to the ABS material shell. The G3 has become the worldwide standard for not only experienced skydivers, but also new skydivers and wind tunnel flyers due the reliability of the opening mechanism, the quality of the construction and the availability of the helmets and parts all over the skydiving world.

Cookie hasn't rested on that success, and instead continued testing and developing new ideas for the next full face helmet, which has now been showcased with the G4.

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Like most everyone else during this pandemic, ChutingStar and our crew members have been negatively affected during this COVID-19 pandemic. This worldwide shutdown will indeed change the world forever, and has resulted in the loss of loved ones. At the same time, we're encouraged by the love and strength of the human resolve to not only survive, but make the best of the situation. Stories of families becoming closer, communities supporting each other and businesses switching gears to keep staff employed show us hope for tomorrow. In our April Survey on Audibles, we put in one question at the end asking "Good, Bad or Indifferent, how has the Coronavirus and worldwide shutdown affected you?" These are the raw responses below. I think the biggest takeaway I get out of these is that we're not alone in our struggles and fear. Empathize with your fellow human during this time. They may put on an "everything's fine" front, but deep down we all have many of the same issues during this time. Encourage, support and help others as you're able. Continue reading →

As we wrapped up our final ChutingStar Parachute Rigging School course for 2019, I ended up placing this group's canopy patch right above our first course patch from 2008. Detailed memories of that first course 11 years ago are starting to fade, but fresh in my mind are all of those riggers and riggers-to-be who birthed what the ChutingStar Rigging Family has become today.

With the help of the late great Hell Yeah Jack Hammer and ultra detail-oriented Ryan Vosser, we kicked off the first-ever ChutingStar Rigging School in 2008 by pouring all of our knowledge, tips and tricks into John Barnes, Warren Cleary and John Dean. Warren, who didn't technically sign-up for the course, was woken up from the bunkhouse that morning and was told he had to take the course. Ha! He would later work for ChutingStar, become the lead instructor for our rigging courses for several years and earn his Master Rigger certificate. Continue reading →

ChutingStar's newsletter will help you stay in the know on the latest skydiving gear with links to new gear, expert advice blog articles and coupon codes for special event sales. Our e-mail information blasts are short and sweet...getting you the info you need to know quickly and allowing you to click over if you need the full scoop. Sign up at this link, or click the image above. You can unsubscribe, or resubscribe, at any time. Continue reading →