Skyhook

Skyhook, sky hook or skyhooks may refer to:

Fiction

Music

Science

Sports

Technology

Smash (tennis)

A smash in tennis is a shot that is hit above the hitter's head with a serve-like motion. A smash can usually be hit with a high amount of force and is often a shot that ends the point. Most smashes are hit fairly near the net or in mid-court before the ball bounces, generally against lobs that have not been hit high enough or deep enough by the opponent. A player can also smash a very high ball from the baseline, generally on the bounce, although this is often a less forceful smash.

Smash commonly refers to the forehand smash; backhand smashes are rarer and more difficult to execute, especially for beginners, since they are basically high backhand volleys generally hit at an exact angle causing the ball to spin. Rod Laver and Jimmy Connors, both left-handers, were known for their very powerful backhand smashes. The forehand smash was first used in Tennis by Helena Rice on championship point in the 1890 Wimbledon Championships final.

In his 1979 autobiography Jack Kramer, who had a fine overhead himself, devotes a page to the best tennis strokes he had ever seen. He writes: "OVERHEAD—Schroeder just tops here, ahead of Rosewall and Newcombe.

Skyhook (skydiving)

The Skyhook is United Parachute Technologies version of a Main-Assisted Reserve Deployment system (MARD), a safety feature on skydiving parachute systems. It builds on the concept underlying an ordinary reserve static line (RSL), which uses the force of the departing main parachute to open the reserve parachute compartment after the malfunctioning main parachute is cut-away, by further using the force of the departing main parachute to extract the reserve parachute out of the reserve compartment. This greatly decreases the time, and hence loss of altitude, required to fully open the reserve parachute.

The Skyhook system is engineered so that it should not interfere with reserve deployment activated by directly pulling the reserve rip cord in situations where no main parachute had been deployed. The key component in the system, from which the Skyhook derives its name, is a cantilevered hook that grasps the reserve bridle about midway between the reserve pilot chute and the bag containing the packed reserve chute. If the departing main parachute applies more pull force on the bridle than the reserve pilot chute, then the main parachute will remain hooked onto the reserve bridle, and so it will pull the reserve parachute out of the reserve compartment. If the reserve pilot chute exerts more pull force on the bridle than the main parachute, then the main parachute will unhook and the reserve pilot chute will deploy the reserve parachute normally.