OK as promised Dads parachute story. It seems this all happened about 30 years ago when he and 3 friends went to do a charity parachute jump. This was in the days of personal responsibility (if someone shot you it was your own fault for not ducking) and Health and safety didn’t exist and the first thing they had to do was sign a form saying any death or injury received as a result of this activity was your problem. A lot of people were doing this charity event that week and there had been 2 broken legs a broken ankle and numerous bangs and sprains since the start. Dad admits that all of them had second thoughts on hearing those statistics but chickening out was not an option so they signed. Now this was not the woosy tandem jumps of today but you actually had to jump out alone and under your own steam and the first half of the day was taken up with what to do in an emergency and how to land. I’ll firstly cover what you are taught and then reality. TAUGHT 1: Sit sideways in the door and the instructor will tap you on the shoulder to let you know when to jump. He is not allowed to push you the choice to go is yours. REALITY 1: You sit sideways facing forwards legs outside right hand behind you holding edge of door left hand in front. With wind flow etc your tightly clenched butt cheeks on the door frame are all that are actually keeping you in the plane and the instructors ‘tap’ on the shoulder is more than enough to push you over the edge. TAUGHT 2: Count ‘1 thousand 2 thousand 3 thousand check’ slowly then look up to ensure your parachute is billowing above your head. REALITY 2: All your senses hit the panic button and inform your brain you have just done something that is going to kill you. Your brain is aware you have a parachute and tells your senses to stay calm but the pushing of the panic buttons has put your body into ‘about to die’ mode and time almost stands still. Brain does the count but in a fraction of a second and when you look up to ‘check ’there is no parachute. TAUGHT 3: If there is no parachute when you check alter your position using arm and leg movements and turn over on your back. Locate your toggle on your spare chute, pull and in a controlled manner open and deploy by throwing it away from your body. REALITY 3: Scream TAUGHT 4: Assuming main chute has opened reach up and grab guide handles which will steer you in the direction you wish to go REALITY 4: Cry with relief TAUGHT 5: Gain control and enjoy the feeling of gently drifting to the ground REALITY 5: Regret not having done your No.2’s BEFORE you went up in the plane and swear that you will never ever ever do this again. TAUGHT 6: Prepare for landing by putting feet together and bending legs at knee’s. DO NOT under any circumstances look down as ‘ground rush’ will confuse you. REALITY 6: Look down to see how far you have to go and instantly hit the ground Taught 7: Roll in a controlled manner to the left or right, jump to feet and gather in parachute to avoid being dragged. REALITY 7: Collapse like a pile of poop and kiss ground. Recommence screaming as parachute takes you for a horizontal trip across field And that apparently is all there is to it. I will not be putting parachute jumping on my wish list…………………
Posted on: Mon, 12 Aug 2013 16:30:36 +0000
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