My mom jumped out of a plane once.
I've never even been in a plane, except for the time I got to tour the cockpit once when I was in Boy Scouts.
That changed today. I got to ride up in one, but I never got to land in it. Don't get me wrong, it didn't crash. I just had to jump out of a perfectly good airplane.
About a month ago, my mom and I were talking about skydiving. She went a few years ago and I, being an Ironworker, have never been above 300', give or take a few feet. I agreed to jump with her because she wanted to go again.
Like I said, I've never been in an airplane. I've gone up mountain regions, over mountain passes, and seen big mountains, but I've never been really that high. Mostly in a car, except for the few times we hiked up the 7292' Black Elk Peak in Western South Dakota. That's it.
So, we arranged a jump about a month ago. Sunday on Labor Day Weekend. At 12:00 noon. High noon, as they used to call it. That's when blood was going to be shed (at least in the old west days). I spent a few weeks looking up statistics, watching videos, and mentally preparing myself (and my wife) for the jump day.
The day finally arrived. I looked at the weather forecast and it was supposed to be around 80 degrees with 10 - 15 mph winds, but gusts could push between 20 - 30 mph for a few hours in the afternoon. We were scheduled for a noon start time.
We arrived just before noon, check in and headed to the classroom for a video and some training. We learned all the basics. How to fall off the plane with our tandem jumper, how to fall, how to steer the chute, and how to land. As excited as we were, we still had to wait.
And we waited...
And we waited...
And we waited...
If I had any anxiety about the flight or the fall, I had a lot of time to think about it. I didn't want to eat so there wouldn't be any food in my system to throw up, but I drank plenty of water. My wife and kids came. So did the neighbor and a few of the neighborhood kids. They had some fun watching some of the earlier jumpers come down and then played volleyball while my mom and I waited.
After I finally got called to suit up, I calmly waked to the hanger to get my harness on. My mom was about 20 minutes behind me for some reason. We were supposed to be on the same plane. After getting suited up and waiting about 30 minutes, the harness came off because there were too strong of wind gusts to jump. They can jump in 16mph winds, but not when the wind gusts are getting upwards of 25 - 30 mph. We'd just have to wait it out.
After about 5 hrs., all of which the neighbor left and my family did as well, we finally got the call to suit back up. I texted my wife and kids and they came back with my camera to shoot me.
We boarded the plane and lifted off.
We went over the instructions that I was supposed to remember:
Lean my head to his shoulder, grab my harness with both hands, shove my hips forward., and kick him in the butt with my feet as soon as we're out of the plane.
We lifted higher and higher. I kept high fiving everyone on the plane, most of all, my mom. The first time on a plane wasn't bad, except I had to clearing my ears to keep them from popping. We rose above the clouds. I read that we couldn't jump out in the clouds because you never know what you'd hit, a bird, someone else, or the plane (which made perfect sense). So we waited for a clearing between clouds.
He did most of the work walking from the seating area to the jump door. That reminded me of a garage door on an airplane ( I thought it was going to be fancier or more high tech at least). I felt like I was walking very lazily, as he was doing most of the work, I was trying to help support my weight in the 4 foot ceilings of the plane, but was underwhelmed with how much my foot placement meant nothing as we staggered towards the door like a drunk man looking for another free beer at the bar.
After the Blue light came on (which meant 2 minutes until the jump) we staged ourselves at the door, which meant we were going to be the first tandem out of the plane at 14,000 feet.
Then we rocked back and forth 3 times and fell out!
We free fell for about 30 seconds going around 125mph.
After that, we did a few banked turns, which upset my stomach (I can handle roller coasters, but get queasy on the Tilt-a-whirl). We do this to slowly reduce altitude. I never actually got sick at any point, but this point was the closest I got.
After that, we were ready to land. They teach you to put your feet straight out in front of you, but I've put on a little weight since high school, so I need my hands to hike up my legs...
You skid to a stop on you butt. Less of a skid if you have a good tandem partner like I did. Then you stand there collecting your dignity while he collects the chute and you walk back the the hanger together, like you're the hero of the day, while he sits there in the wings packing back up his chute for the next victim.
It was an exhilarating experience that I'll never forget and hopefully, One day, I'll get my wife and kids to jump from a perfectly good airplane.
On a side note:
After the jump, you may experience an adrenaline high that will last you all night, rendering you from sleep, like I'm experiencing right now!
You were warned!!!
Now, here's my full video of the jump:
https://youtu.be/AAK6zw8PVUk
