I Jumped Out of a Plane… ‘Nuff Said - Part 1

A little girl, around the age of 5, all curls and big brown eyes, sat next to her Daddy on a plane, thousands of miles in the air.

Nose pressed to the window, watching the white wisps speed past, her breath fogged up the glass. Turning to her father, she said "Daddy, I want to touch a cloud! I want to know what they feel like!"

Gripping the arm rest with white-knuckled hands, he replied, "Aim, you are crazy!"

"Aim, you are crazy!" my dad repeated 17 years later. I told him I was going skydiving.

So on September 3, 2009, my friend Lindsay picked me up and we drove across the Bay Bridge to the little town of Easton, Md to go skydiving.

We turned on to a gravel drive way lined with cornfields and parked near a trailer with the words "Skydive Maryland" emblazoned across the side. (I guess we are in the right place.)

We met up with Lindsay's friend Lee, who was jumping too. The three of us walked around the trailer, looking for people. We saw a few buildings and a bunch of little 2-seater planes. (Oh crap, is THAT what I jump out of? For some reason, I had been picturing myself falling out of a Jumbo Jet or a 747 but looking at these little puddle jumpers makes me uncomfortable. Could they even get high enough for me to safely jump out of it?!)

We walked into the office and talked to the guy who works there, Lance. He comforted me some by saying he has jumped out of a plane THOUSANDS of times. (Hmm... he still seems to be in one piece.)

We signed a few legal papers and I felt like I'm signing my life away. (Apparently, if I die, I can't sue them. Well that makes sense, because I'll be DEAD! Oh... but my parents, kids, kids' kids, cousins, mother-in-laws, etc. can't sue either. Maybe I should have bought a life insurance policy before I decided to leap to my death from 10,000 feet. Oh well... too late now! I signed on the dotted line. *Gulp*)

Lance the Skydiver brought us out to the field where all the planes were parked. He explained that we were the only people who were jumping that day so they only had a small staff on hand. Since each of us were doing a tandem jump (meaning we had an expert plane-leaper strapped to our backs), we would each go up in the plane and jump separately.

He showed us the gear and gave us a little bit of training. I figured training would consist of learning to pull the cord for the chute and how to land some place other than a tree. But no. We had to lay down on our stomachs, arch our backs and put our arms and legs up... kind of like a beached whale. This is the position we would be in while falling. And that's all the training we got because apparently the tandem dude does the rest. (What if he is old and has a heart attack before he pulls the chute cord?!)

So then we met Bobby, the guy who will (hopefully) get us from the airplane to the ground safely. (And he is kind of old! And kind of crazy. Hey at least if I die, I'll die doing something crazy, with a crazy person.) If I'm going to trust anyone to keep me alive while skydiving, it would be Bobby. He has been skydiving for 30+ years, doing at least one or two jumps almost every single day.

Lindsay went first... I gave her a big hug and asked her to please not die. Lee and I sat near the training center and watched the plane take off. We chatted with another guy, Shawn, who is a hang glider (yup, hang gliding got added to my Life List!). He was sitting in a golf cart, ready to pick Lindsay and Bobby the Tandem Dude up from the big field that they will (hopefully) land in.

The three of us were chatting when all of a sudden Shawn looked to the sky and said "Is that..?!? Noo..." Lee and I looked to the sky and saw Lindsay floating down toward the field and everything looked fine. Then we saw a black thing floating down away from them. We were confused and Shawn wouldn't say anything more.

She landed just fine and came over to us, looking a little shocked. We asked how it went and she said it was fun but she had a scary ride. As they were falling, Bobby went to pull the cord and goes "Oh shit." and they continued falling. A few seconds later, he pulled another cord and the parachute came out. Apparently, the first chute didn't release, he had to cut it off them (that was the black thing we saw) and he had to use the RESERVE CHUTE!!! (Holy crap.)

Apparently that only happens about once every 6 years. So Lindsay defied the odds and survived. I guess I'll be ok.

(Don't want my posts to be too long.. my own skydiving experience is in the next post!)