An award-winning reporter sets off
to experience the sport firsthand and lands with a real-life account
of the joy and dangers of skydiving.
When the tandem jump instructor started
twisting sideways I knew something must be wrong. Bound together by
a nylon harness and 4,500 feet above the desert floor, my first skydiving
experience was fast becoming a dangerous situation. The Arizona ground
was still approaching at a rate of about 150 mph, and the other divers
were nowhere to be seen.
Having spent considerable time in small planes I knew we were well
below the planned 5,000-foot parachute deployment, but gauging elevation
is difficult. Falling a thousand feet about every six seconds, we
had maybe 15 more seconds to safely open a canopy. The ground was
spinning closer.
"It's a very safe sport," the video-skydiver had said on the plane
ride up. "Statistically, skydiving is 10 times safer than scuba diving,"
he had added.
Now I was plummeting from a controlled adrenaline high to a solemn
fear of death. The wind batting at my nose and mouth, goggles twisting,
ears popping, the attached instructor jerked forcefully.
Suddenly the nylon harness yanked my body with an almost supernatural
force. The reserve parachute had deployed, slowing us much quicker
than the smaller main chute would have-had it opened.
"Whew!" Paul Gray sighed. With 15-plus years of experience, Gray is
a serious and skilled tandem instructor. Before I can say a word,
Paul starts giving directions for an unexpected emergency landing.
"Put your right foot on top of mine," he says in a collected and clear-minded
tone.
One Guarantee
Rule number one: there's only one guarantee in skydiving. "The only
guarantee is that one way or another you'll come back to Earth," says
James Cupples, sitting in front of his camper truck in a black jumpsuit
and sunglasses. "How you get there is completely up to you."
The 44-year-old "international man of leisure" won't let us call him
James or even Mr. Cupples. "It's Big Jim. I once met another Big Jim
in New York. Now he's medium-sized Jim," the six-foot-five former
healthcare professional jokes. Eight years ago Mr. Cupples trained
EMTs at New Jersey hospitals. Now he trains skydivers.
Big Jim demonstrates a trend in the exclusive, growing sport of skydiving:
business professionals who acquire a taste for danger-scraping, adrenaline-thumping
freefalls and call work quits to test the limits of the sky.
"Skydiving demands all your attention and half of your income for
the rest of your life," Big Jim says in a New York accent. "But I
was lucky. I got into it after having a career. Some of these poor
kids ain't got two sticks to rub together. They're scraping up $10
or $15 to go make a jump," jumps in which skydivers experiment with
maneuvers and skills ranging from sky acrobatics to group formations,
even gliding "birdsuits."
Back on the Ground
Back on the ground, Gray is visibly disturbed. Just his luck, the
day a reporter comes to write a story on skydiving, the main chute
doesn't open. He's been doing this for 15 years, 3,500 jumps and has
only used the emergency chute on three other tandem dives.
Shaken as he now appears, he did exactly what needed to be done: he
pulled the FAA-required second parachute. He executed safety like
a pro. But the unplanned extra freefall and the delay to deploy the
reserve chute landed us in the middle of the Arizona desert.
After a bumpy truck bed ride back to the dropzone hangar, a few seasoned
skydivers explain they've had to use their reserve chutes before too.
But the level of talk and the glances indicate this is still scary,
maybe because I'm a reporter, maybe because we were fairly low to
deploy, maybe because it was my first jump.
This doesn't normally happen; main chutes almost always open, and
when they don't, reserve chutes are the closest thing to a guarantee.
In fact, a look at Arizona skydiving fatalities reveals very few skydivers
die from parachute failure. Most accidents are caused by skydiver
error.
Arizona - Skydiver's Paradise
Arizona's sunny skies and warm weather make it a preferred "dropzone"
for skydivers the world over, especially during winter. The state
is home to at least six official zones, with the Eloy site serving
as the largest skydiving facility in the world.
Big Jim prefers the Coolidge dropzone to Eloy's commercial attractions.
About halfway between Phoenix and Tucson, Coolidge is a sleepy town
with a small municipal airport where RVs and campers surround the
Arizona Skydiving hangar. This is where the skydivers live, where
they enjoy free camping and comradery between jumps.
The traveling jumpers range in age from 18 to 65 and possess a wide
range of experience. Some have jumped as many as 8,000 times. Others
have just completed the mandatory 20 tandem dives before going solo.
In a tandem jump the beginning skydiver is attached to the belly of
an experienced pro, like Gray, who pulls the cords and ensures proper
deployment and a safe landing.
Going Back Up
Back at the hangar Gray encourages me to take a second dive to erase
what was at the least a very scary first-time jump. As I ponder the
possibility, I tell myself that no tandem skydiver has ever died in
Arizona. Still, the picture of the ground spinning ever closer is
seared into my mind.
A good reporter will do anything for a story and literally throw caution
to the wind, right? A short time later, the Cessna is taxiing down
the runway and preparing for lift off number two.
The DropZone Sub-culture
Back at the dropzone, friendly dogs wander through the carpeted hangar
and jumpers talk about the first-timer emergency deployment.
"It's the most excitement you can have with your clothes on," Big
Jim jokes as the buzz of a returning drop plane zooms overhead. The
unpredictable nature of the sport makes skydiving exactly what it
is: an unparalleled rush. The possibility of death, after all, is
one of the factors that separates it from most weekend sports.
Seasoned jumpers say the number of skydiving deaths is relatively
low. Nationwide, 21 skydiving fatalities were reported in 2004, but
more than 2.4 million skydivers jumped from planes. For the last five
years about one in every 100,000 skydivers has died. Enthusiasts say
that's a low rate considering the inherent dangers of the sport.
The Mind Clearing Rush
Ahwatukee resident Lynda Robinson concurs. The 41-year-old director
of Intertel University hasn't quit her job yet, but she jumps for
the same reasons as Big Jim. "Having to work during the week, when
you go down to the dropzone you don't think about work," she says.
"You have to be focused, aware, on your game."
Big Jim agrees. "Skydiving basically cleanses your mind, so it attracts
a lot of high-stress people," he says. "Anybody with a high-stress
job is going to love the release."
Robinson, who now skydives at least two weekends per month, says she
didn't really enjoy skydiving until her 30th jump. "I actually was
so nervous the first time that the nervousness overtook me. I was
so focused on the tasks that I forgot to have fun," she explains.
"I was talking to people about it, and they said keep it up," she
adds. Consistent with her relentless personality, Robinson continued
jumping until she found the high other jumpers were experiencing.
She now trains with an eight-way aerial team.
Like other divers, both Robinson and Big Jim used to have other hobbies
like scuba diving, but both say that once you skydive, you never go
back to another sport. "Mountain climbing, skiing, scuba, all that
stuff's sitting in the closet," Big Jim says.
Round Two
"You're a trooper," a video skydiver tells me as we prepare to exit
the plane for jump number two. I tell myself that statistically it's
nearly impossible for anything to go wrong this time.
The ride up seemed faster, and the clouds are letting more sun through.
At 13,000 feet I can see where the sky fades from an almost clear
light blue to a darker midnight color.
The door opens. The wind is familiar, so is the adrenaline. The jump
off the step can only be described as a rollercoaster multiplied times
40. After a few seconds of complete sensory overload the rush is still
indescribable.
At about that moment, the 120 mph gusts convince me to breathe through
my mouth, which is wearing an uncontrollable smile. I refuse to acknowledge
the thought of the chute not opening again.
After a controlled freefall encircled by two videographers, our main
canopy opens and we are sailing, controlled, well above the ground.
The view is beautiful, and I feel like a bird.
"Keep your eyes on the heavens," Gray says.
After landing the videographer asks me if I'll ever be going up again.
"I wouldn't be surprised if I do," I say. And after I watch the DVD
of a freefalling, smiling second-time skydiver, I'm even more prone
to go a third time.
Like Big Jim said, there's only one guarantee in skydiving. But jumping
with an experienced tandem pro is the closest thing to a guaranteed
rush and a very, very probable safe landing.
Sky's
the Limit
