Skydiving

SkyDiving

At the end of August (2003) I celebrated (in advance) my 40th birthday by going skydiving along with my dad Jerry and brother Rob.

We flew up to 14,000 feet in an airplane called a "twin otter," then did tandem dives out the door. A "tandem dive" is when you have an experienced jumper strapped to your back. We had free-fall for about 50 seconds down to 5,000 feet, followed by about a 4 minute ride under the parachute canopy. I had a videographer take a video of the jump, from which these pictures are taken.

If you want to try it some time, the folks there were great. Check out www.skydivecsc.com, which is physically located about 3 miles west of Hinkley, IL, about an hour outside of Chicago.

Below are some pictures of the event in case you are interested. Check out the 8 minute video (or an 80MB avi video download)

Getting Ready

The plane, the altimeter strapped to my wrist.

What am I doing? We're next out the door.

Out the door. In the fourth frame you can see the line to the four foot square drogue chute. This keeps tandem jumpers speed down to ~130 mph, otherwise you would reach about 180 mph, with a much bigger jolt when your chute opens.

Yeah baby. The world at ~8,000 ft.

Altimiter at 5,000 ft.: time to pull the rip cord. Chute Opening.

So maybe I won't die after all. Approximate view from ~4,000 ft.

Landing. My dad, myself, my brother, survivors all.

Lest this account seem heroic, it bears mentioning that for those of you (like me) who do not like going on twisty-turning carnival rides, do not follow my example in eating a greasy bacon-and-egg sandwich shortly before jumping.