Learning to fly: A 1000-mile road trip down the US coast to learn skydiving
Plummeting to earth on one of my early jumps!
Please note: The actions and responses I describe in this article are for understanding the risks associated with the sport only and should not necessarily be copied. If in any doubt as to the safety procedures in skydiving, consult a professional instructor and ask their advice. This hasn’t been written to put you off what is a very safe sport, just to highlight that problems do inevitably happen!
In 2010, whilst working alongside the US Marines in Quantico, Virginia (near Washington DC), we had the opportunity to do an accelerated free fall (AFF) skydiving course that overlooks the Cape Canaveral space centre. The problem was that it was all the way down in Florida – almost a thousand miles away. Queue some hasty organisation of hire cars, some impromptu and somewhat questionable navigation (GPS units were still kinda new), and we were on our way to Titusville!
It was my first time in the US and so understanding how it works was an entirely new experience, but we set off with a route plan that would see drive through North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, before entering Florida (aka the sunshine state) a few days later. A few days stopping at cheap motels passed by, and before we knew it, we were in Florida!
When we arrived in Titusville, the excitement was palpable. But it was also the proximity to the US space community that was also a big personal draw. Titusville is close to the Kennedy Space Centre, where residents and visitors can see space launches first-hand, and it also holds significant historical value as it was the site of the inaugural U.S. satellite launch, Explorer 1, in 1958.
Whilst we didn’t get a chance to catch it due to time constraints, visitors can apparently see the Space Walk of Fame and explore the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame, which made the location even more special.
Learning to fly
The first element of learning to fly would be ground school, where we’d learn how to operate the parachute, remedy the problems you can encounter with it, how to check it for serviceability, and how it should be maintained. Placing our trust in a piece of fabric seems odd now that I write this some years later, however the excitement of jumping out of plane as a young man can motivate you through some ludicrous things.
We’d jump out of a twin-turboprop Super King Air aircraft at 17,500 feet above sea level (around 5,300 metres or interestingly, the approximate height of Everest Base Camp), so we’d have around 45 seconds of freefall with 2 instructors to help stabilise us and make sure we’d learned how to ‘arch’ properly.
The side-opening door would require us learners to grasp the concept of ‘presenting’ yourself to the air stream (as opposed to exiting a Skyvan into ‘dirty air’ that I’d experience a few years later whilst roadtripping around Texas to build my jumping skills).
The tension was high, but I was excited to try my new skills out in the art of skydancing. After a few jumps, we’d move onto more advanced manoeuvres, such as ‘tracking’, where you move across the sky, or barrel rolls by bringing your arm to your chest. You could also speed up on slow your descent down by altering your span (essentially tucking into a ball or by stretching flat). Alongside the region’s incredible beauty and proximity to where NASA’s space rockets take off, it was the most fun you could have, and in those days, I realised I’d probably continue this as a hobby!
And then, complications at 4000 feet…
We’d learned the times we should cut-away in ground school, and this was fresh in my mind when I experienced complications in the parachute deployment on my 6th jump.
Feeling more confident in my newfound falling skills, the jumps now became incredibly exciting. We’d be using all of our newfound skills to ‘dock’ with the instructors (this is where you match your speed and the air pressure to high five a jump partner, thereby showing a high degree of control over your falling).
But after I’ve pulled the parachute release, I notice that rapid deceleration that occurs when the giant sail in your backpack inflates and pulls you from terminal velocity to a gentler float, hasn’t occurred. I look up and see a ‘ball of snot’ as some skydivers would to refer to it.
The parachute is bound up by several line twists, but it didn’t appear there was a ‘line-over’ (a different type of complication with an immediate remedy of cutting away), it just had not fully inflated and or met my assessment of the 3 S’s of being ‘square, stable, steerable’ as we had been taught in ground school. I could feel it was slowing my descent, however clearly not in any state to carry on in.
As beginners, we were deploying the parachute (aka ‘pulling’) at around 4000 feet so I calculated I had a moment to rectify it before I should cut it away and deploy the reserve (research had told me that I’d have to do a ‘hop and pop’ from an altitude of around 3,000 to 4,000 feet (900 to 1,200 metres) above the ground to get my UK skydiving licence). We had practiced the cut-away procedure endlessly in ground school, and whenever entering the aircraft that it had become muscle memory.
Kicking my legs like an eighties break-dancer managed to untwist the lines and allowed the parachute to fully inflate. My heart was racing and so I decided to sit out the rest of the day to allow my heartrate to come back to a normal level and decide if it was all worth it!
Nonetheless, we pressed on to complete a few more jumps, evaluating our skills, and I was relieved to pass the assessment. Despite the dramatic finish to the course, I couldn't deny that I had discovered a epic new hobby, one that would continue to challenge me and provide an exhilarating escape from the ordinary desk jobs I would go to in the coming years!
Image credits: SkyDive Space Center
