In Fall of 2015, I told my son that for Christmas I didn’t want “stuff”.  I wanted an experience.  Well, that became a gift certificate for a parachute jump.  That definitely qualified as an “experience” in September of 2016.

To start the day, there was about 5 hours of classroom work–how things work, how to get out typical problems, etc.  It was a lot of information crammed into that time.  There was no way I was going to remember all of it.  I told the instructor that if something happened with my parachute, I’d just pull the backup chute.

Finally, in mid-afternoon it was my turn. Five of us piled into a small Cessna. I sat on the floor next to the pilot, facing back.  I was feeling surprisingly calm.  We ascended to 4,000 feet.  Then the instructor opened the door.  Bam!  The wind caught the door and opened it very loudly.  That got my attention!  We were flying level at about 100 mph.  I was first up.  I reached around and grabbed the wing strut, then scooted over to place my feet on a small step above the wheel.  Next, I worked my hands further out on the strut.  (At this point, I’m thinking, “Am I really doing this?”.)  Then I took my feet off the step, just holding onto the strut, flying along with the plane like Superman.  After a few seconds, I looked over to the instructor, who gave me a thumbs up.  With that, I let go of the strut and began falling away.  Woohoo!

A few seconds later the static line attached to the plane pulled my parachute out.  It opened up perfectly.  I checked the controls to make sure I could maneuver the parachute.  Then I looked around for the landing zone.  Uh oh!

The landing zone was a field behind a farmhouse.  Unfortunately, this part of Ohio was full of farms and fields.  Then I remembered the farm had an above ground pool on one side, and an algae-covered pond on the other.  So I looked around for that.  I didn’t see it.  On the radio strapped to my chest, I heard the instructor saying “rah rah, rah rah”.  Because of my hearing, I couldn’t understand what he was saying.  (Later I learned that he was saying, “Turn left, turn left”.)  I kept looking around as the ground got closer.  I finally looked over my left shoulder.  There it was behind me.

I was surprised at how easy it was to control my chute.  I pulled down on the left control and it turned around.  I got lined up with the landing zone.  Just one problem.  It had taken so long to find the landing zone that I had lost a lot of altitude–and I didn’t have enough to make it.

I managed to avoid hitting a tree and landed in a soybean field adjacent to the landing zone.  The landing wasn’t exactly smooth, however.  Watching the other parachutists land earlier in the day, I noticed the first-timers would flare their chutes too soon.  They were supposed to do it about 10-12 feet above the ground for a nice, soft, stand-up landing.  But with the ground rapidly approaching, they flared about 20 feet above the ground.  This meant they dropped like a rock.  So I kept telling myself to wait longer before flaring–which I did.  Unfortunately, I waited too long.  Just a few feet above the ground.  I basically drove my body feet first into the ground.

I laid there for a few seconds before checking if I was injured.  No excruciating pain. Check!  No arms or legs twisted at an odd angle. Check!  I stood and gave a thumbs up.  Though, for the next two weeks I could barely walk.  My legs were just so jammed up.  But I did it!  It was cool!