Re: The first self-driving vehicle on Mars has proven to be a smashing success

"Stephen Harding"  wrote in message news:[email protected]...

You just seem to hang in the air.  However, as one gets closer to the
ground, it seems the ground is slowly accelerating towards you until
you're suddenly quite close and need to make like a banana to roll into
your landing.

I was struck by how difficult it was to judge the distance to the
ground; from just "floating there" to sudden accelerated impact!

Great experience but my parachute jumping days were over after the first
jump!

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I had that problem with hang gliding, compounded by a Rogallo's slow 
response to control inputs. By the 6th flight I had the timing down and 
stuck the landing, then switched to the safer sport of dirt biking. I can 
see bumps ahead on the ground but not in the air. I found that unlike some I 
wasn't born to fly, everything I care about is on the ground. My stomach 
particularly doesn't like sudden drops as experienced over the Hudson at Old 
Rhinebeck. After an intro flight the instructor said that students divide 
into flyers and builders. I'm clearly the latter.

In the Army the first unit I was attached to used various light aircraft to 
fly me on field repair calls, an officer pilot played chauffeur to a 
sergeant.  In the second we drove which I actually preferred when I could 
drive my car because I could take shortcuts through rural Germany.

As a kid I read that a paratrooper landing is like falling from 20', so I 
had to try jumping off roofs. My knees and feet never fully recovered.