Not enough information in the news story for me to tell you what happened with the entire sequence but the bottom line is that the instructor failed to do his job. In tandem skydiving, the instructor is the only one wearing the parachutes (main and reserve); the student is wearing a harness that is attached to the instructor's harness. Though some instructors allow students to activate the main parachute (that is, after the instructor deploys the drogue 'chute shortly after exit from the aircraft) most do everything and the student is just along for the ride. In this case, whoever was designated to deploy the main parachute failed to do so or, due to a packing error, was unable to so. In any case, the instructor lost track of time and failed to deploy the reserve at a safe altitude and the tandem duo hit the ground as the reserve was opening. One must have a set procedure to deal with a main that doesn't open or partially opens and follow it with iron-clad discipline. Doing so saved my life on three occasions some years ago.
I’m hoping someone who skydives will chime in, specifics on ripe, binding, packing etc....
Someone died up where my mom jumps recently, tried to do some sort of swing or flare coming in, body slammed himself into the ground.
I dated a skydiver for a while. She and her clique were like addicts making a score every time they got set to make a jump. I never went with her because I didn't want to spend the $$, though the idea interested me at the time. I used to enjoy adrenaline sports a lot more before I broke my back (at work). The guys that went up with the girlfriend conveyed a lot to me during bonfires after their jumps.
This is the gist of what they conveyed: Chute packing is both science and art, but the way chutes open is left to 1000 variables, and inevitably, there are "failures" to open or inflate properly. Panicking is never your friend in such cases, as the backup chute is another opportunity with near the same odds of working properly as the main chute. I was told that when someone hits the ground, it's because they either didn't release their main chute properly after it failed or they didn't deploy their E chute in time. None of the guys had ever had a main chute fail to open. They could have been full of it, but I knew that between the 7 of them, they had over 500 jumps. One guy, btw, was in crutches when I first met him because he landed wrong and shattered his tibia.
I have parachuted at that airport. I made five static line jumps from a Cessna at 2,800 feet. At that time they did not offer tandem jumps. We had a main, and a reserve, and we were on our own.
I must say, I have done some dangerous stuff but climbing out on the strut of that little airplane, a half a mile above the earth, was really scary.
Very sad story I will keep an eye on it in the Atlanta news and see if they give a report on what went wrong. Horrible, sixty second nightmare for that little college girl once she realized she was going to die. Very sad.
When I was still jumping, I was a Tandem master in addition to other teaching certs. Tandem rigs were required to have an automatic opening device (AOD), that should have fired the reserve if it passed a certain altitude at a certain speed. Without knowing all the details, what I got from the article was the following. Main chute probably deployed but did not open properly. This would cause a spin in most all cases (noted in article) Procedure would be to release the main chute before deploying the reserve. Making sure the reserve had clean air to open into. Reserve handle was actually tied to the main chute riser on my rigs and should have deployed the reserve if the main was released. My guess is the main did give what we called a wrap. (not open cleanly) This might have slowed decent enough to keep the AOD from firing. Instructor gets caught up in trying to clear the wrap and gets too low before deploying the reserve. Alternatively, the release did not work for some reason and instructor had no choice but to deploy the reserve into the fowled main about. Reserve wraps around the fowled up main and neither can deploy properly. Just a guess but fits the few things known from the article.
When I was still jumping, I was a Tandem master in addition to other teaching certs. Tandem rigs were required to have an automatic opening device (AOD), that should have fired the reserve if it passed a certain altitude at a certain speed. Without knowing all the details, what I got from the article was the following. Main chute probably deployed but did not open properly. This would cause a spin in most all cases (noted in article) Procedure would be to release the main chute before deploying the reserve. Making sure the reserve had clean air to open into. Reserve handle was actually tied to the main chute riser on my rigs and should have deployed the reserve if the main was released. My guess is the main did give what we called a wrap. (not open cleanly) This might have slowed decent enough to keep the AOD from firing. Instructor gets caught up in trying to clear the wrap and gets too low before deploying the reserve. Alternatively, the release did not work for some reason and instructor had no choice but to deploy the reserve into the fowled main about. Reserve wraps around the fowled up main and neither can deploy properly. Just a guess but fits the few things known from the article.
That sounds about right. It's surprising how many are afraid of jettisoning their fouled first chute. You also need to give it a little time before deploying the secondary.
Terribly saddened to read this, my daughter wants to do a tandem when she turns 18. Says she will do it without our knowledge.
She did some 200ft free fall into a net in Dallas, Tx. Folded up in the net and her knee bonked her in the forehead pretty good. Earned an egg on the noggin for her thrill.
Her nana bout had heart failure when we showed the video to her.
Nana has her own Private Pilot, but is still a pinhead.
In this case, whoever was designated to deploy the main parachute failed to do so or, due to a packing error, was unable to so. In any case, the instructor lost track of time and failed to deploy the reserve at a safe altitude. . One must have a set procedure to deal with a main that doesn't open...
The A.D.D. has been around for decades.
Airtec, AAD, Mars, Aviacom, to name a common few.
Originally Posted by simonkenton7
climbing out on the strut of that little airplane, a half a mile above the earth, was really scary. .
There are those that have fear of jumping or just simple flying, and those that don't fear either.
However far worse than fear of flying/jumping is being a Covtard... 😂
In this case, whoever was designated to deploy the main parachute failed to do so or, due to a packing error, was unable to so. In any case, the instructor lost track of time and failed to deploy the reserve at a safe altitude. . One must have a set procedure to deal with a main that doesn't open...
The A.D.D. has been around for decades.
Airtec, AAD, Mars, Aviacom, to name a common few.
Originally Posted by simonkenton7
climbing out on the strut of that little airplane, a half a mile above the earth, was really scary. .
There are those that have fear of jumping or just simple flying, and those that don't fear either.
However, far worse than fear ot flying/jumping is being a Covtard... 😂
It is dangerous to jump from an airplane with a parachute. If you don't know that, read the Original Post again. It is the mark of a man to engage in a dangerous enterprise, and to be fearful, and yet to overcome that fear, and to go ahead and successfully complete the task. And to go back, having overcome that fear on the initial try, and do it again. It isn't as scary the second time.
When I learned how to do it 50 years ago--no tandem then--it was danged near impossible for a main chute to malfunction unless it was packed wrong. Rule: always pack your own parachute.
If a malfunction did occur, you were supposed to keep the main and deploy the reserve, under the theory that a reserve malfunction would at least let you keep the main. But you had to throw it out from your stomach, so it did not get entangled in the main. No way to practice this in advance.
The only emergency I saw, the guy did in fact release the main before pulling the reserve. Reserves are simple devices and even harder to malfunction.
There are a few other simple rules: Don't jump if the wind is high. Face the wind direction when you land (because the chute has forward speed in the direction you face and you want to cancel out wind speed), don't make a fast direction change when near the ground (because the chute will oscillate and hitting on an oscillation is bad), don't jump when you can't see the ground or when it's raining (rain makes the chute heavier and fall faster), and if you land in the water, immediately release your stuff because the undeployed reserve will fill with water and sink you.
Every fatality I ever heard of was caused by violating these simple rules.
Oh...don't look at the ground when you're about to land. You won't tense up and break an ankle (not so much a problem with more modern chutes).
The most dangerous part in our club was the airplane. Easy to chintz on the maintenance.
Its not a mandatory requirement to have fear like others do.
Originally Posted by simonkenton7
It is the mark of a man to engage in a dangerous enterprise, and to be fearful,.. . It isn't as scary the second time.
Its not good to generalize.
I know men that had no fear of flying in their training or on the job, till they had a near fatal Incident and they gave up flying after that. then Others I know didnt give it up after such Incident eventually to be killed in an aircraft.
No doubt there are the same diff. mix of people in a variety of chosen activities.
I used to think those private little Cessna 130’s (??) and the like droning overhead were sorta lame until I paid for a couple of flight hours for a student who was working on his pilot’s license. Cruising at 400 to 2,000 feet at around 100mph (?) on the backseat inside that thin aluminum and plexiglass shell gave me a different perspective entirely.
It didn’t scare me though. But having to climb out a door, cling to a strut and let go? Whole ‘nother level.
My mom goes every year after her birthday, always tandem, says she no longer has the arm strength to steer a chute even if she wanted to solo.
I think the odds of winning the Powerball are greater than BOTH chutes not deploying correctly.
I think the problem here wasn't that the reserve failed. It was because he used it too late to save them. That part might be found to be pilot error. We have a 500' bridge here that's used 1000 times a year for BASE jumping. In that game, they don't bother with reserve chutes because there isn't time to use it. If their chutes screw up, they die. About 1 a year bites it off this bridge. Some are accidents and some are pure stupidity.
Chutes failed to open apparently, ain’t this about unheard of anymore?
Apparently not...
One of my masters' students had made so many jumps that TWICE her main chute had failed to open. Twice!
Being a good prof and knowledgeable about statistics, I used this opportunity to teach her about Markov processes. Markov chain LINK
I used the number of her total jumps and the two failures, to calculate the how many jumps she would have to make before both her main and reserve chute failed on the same jump.
She continued to jump, but she started to pack both her main and reserve chutes herself -- very carefully, I presume!
I did one static line jump from 5,000 ft. at age 20 after a couple hours of ground training. Two of us jumped at the 5,000 ft. level then the instructor went up to 10,000 and did a free-fall. His main chute tangled and he had to ride his reserve down. That cured me.
.. I paid for a couple of flight hours for a student who was working on his pilot’s license. Cruising at 400 to 2,000 feet at around 100mph (?) on the backseat.. .
Did a 650 nm round-trip with a student PPL, in the 152 backseat I got motion sickness..LoL
only accepted the invitation because he had his instructor with him and offered to pay all our accommodation for inviting me.
Small FW piston engine buzz box contraptions I really don't see the attraction.
Honestly, I'd rather do aerobatics -- have, in both front and back seats, and it's a joy. Can't see just jumping, if I want to do tricks, they have those vertical wind tunnels, right?
.. I paid for a couple of flight hours for a student who was working on his pilot’s license. Cruising at 400 to 2,000 feet at around 100mph (?) on the backseat.. .
Did a 650 nm round-trip with a student PPL, in the 152 backseat I got motion sickness..LoL
only accepted the invitation because he had his instructor with him and offered to pay all our accommodation for inviting me.
Small FW piston engine buzz box contraptions I really don't see the attraction.
I came to the conclusion that that little Cessna was like a motorcycle with wings 😎 We were circling the school at 400-500 feet (minimum legal altitude IIRC) while staff and students waved. Perhaps I am too easily impressed.
Its not a mandatory requirement to have fear like others do.
Originally Posted by simonkenton7
It is the mark of a man to engage in a dangerous enterprise, and to be fearful,.. . It isn't as scary the second time.
Its not good to generalize.
I know men that had no fear of flying in their training or on the job, till they had a near fatal Incident and they gave up flying after that. then Others I know didnt give it up after such Incident eventually to be killed in an aircraft.
No doubt there are the same diff. mix of people in a variety of chosen activities.
So as a 19 year old kid, the first time you ever flew in an airplane, you had to climb out on the strut of the little Cessna, hang onto that strut for five seconds, a half a mile above the hard red Georgia clay, and then jump. And you would not be scared.
My God you are a real bad ass. Were you a Navy SEAL, or a Green Beret or what. You must be a real bad ass, you were never scared of anything. If I send you my email, would you please send me your autograph? I am honored to meet such a Real Man Badass such as you, Starman.
.. the first time you ever flew in an airplane, you had to climb out on the strut of the little Cessna, hang onto that strut for five seconds, a half a mile above the hard red Georgia clay, and then jump...
IT may disappoint you to know I was not afraid the first time I got into any type of aircraft or the first time I jumped... And it's not a 'hero' thing like you imagine, at least not to me.
Originally Posted by simonkenton7
My God you are a real bad ass. Were you a Navy SEAL, or a Green Beret or what. You must be a real bad ass, you were never scared of anything. If I send you my email, would you please send me your autograph? I am honored to meet such a Real Man Badass such as you, Starman.
WTF are you babbling about?
You need to get out more and discover that there are more relatively ordinary folk than you realize. that are not afraid of abseiling, jumping, flying, etc
You seem upset that not everybody feels the same way about it as you and others do.
.. the first time you ever flew in an airplane, you had to climb out on the strut of the little Cessna, hang onto that strut for five seconds, a half a mile above the hard red Georgia clay, and then jump...
IT may disappoint you to know I was not afraid the first time I got into any type of aircraft or the first time I jumped... And it's not a 'hero' thing like you imagine.
Originally Posted by simonkenton7
My God you are a real bad ass. Were you a Navy SEAL, or a Green Beret or what. You must be a real bad ass, you were never scared of anything. If I send you my email, would you please send me your autograph? I am honored to meet such a Real Man Badass such as you, Starman.
WTF are you babbling about?
You need to get out more and discover that there are more relatively ordinary folk than you realize. that are not afraid of abseiling, jumping, flying, etc
You seem upset that not everybody feels the same way about it as you do.
ABSEILING? WHAT A [bleep]. Starfish and stool sample are our subject matter experts on schidt that they have never done. Nary a cred in the pair but they never fail to talk smack.
I will await the onslaught of attacks on my parentage, sexuality et al.
Continuing to LMAO. while knowing that abseiling is the brit and eurotrash word for rappeling. Which is what Americans do.
From earlier this afternoon. Tried to post then but for some reason the campfire was down.
Couple of other points. The main on a tandem rig can be packed by the Tandem master. The reserve MUST be packed by a licensed rigger. Think it used to be every 4 months but may be different now. They have to sign off with their name and license and then seal the rig with their little lead marker. You owe the rigger a bottle of their favorite whiskey if you pull the reserve, as they just saved your life.
The swing or flare you referenced is called a swoop. You take either the right or left control handle (controls your turns) and pull it all the way to the bottom. If held, it can literally put the leading edge of your chute below you. You can easily hit the ground doing 60mph+ or more if you time it wrong. Or you can land as softly as stepping of a chair if you flare (pull both control handles down evenly and smoothly) properly. Choice is yours but inevitably people screw it up from time to time.
I jumped over 30 years and saw literally hundreds of thousands of jumps and made thousands of my own. Never saw anyone killed. Yes, occasional broken bones, sprains, etc. but that is true of any high speed sport. Most skydiving deaths are actually the result of an airplane crash. Plane crashes with 10 on board and they are reported on the news as skydiving accident. That is like saying a group of friends were driving to the ocean to scuba dive and had a wreck on the way. Not a scuba death is it.
The only perfectly good airplanes have jump doors. What you that have not jumped do not realize is, landing in an airplane is like having a hot, beautiful women willing and able and you saying no, lets just go home. You miss the absolute best part!
Adding now:
The 2nd jump is always the hardest to make. The first, you do not know what will happen. You just know you will do it no matter what does. The 2nd one, you know. And your mind is screaming at you because you do know. You are born with two fears. All others are learned behavior. 1. Fear of loud noises 2. FEAR OF FALLING!
.. the first time you ever flew in an airplane, you had to climb out on the strut of the little Cessna, hang onto that strut for five seconds, a half a mile above the hard red Georgia clay, and then jump...
IT may disappoint you to know I was not afraid the first time I got into any type of aircraft or the first time I jumped... And it's not a 'hero' thing like you imagine, at least not to me.
Originally Posted by simonkenton7
My God you are a real bad ass. Were you a Navy SEAL, or a Green Beret or what. You must be a real bad ass, you were never scared of anything. If I send you my email, would you please send me your autograph? I am honored to meet such a Real Man Badass such as you, Starman.
WTF are you babbling about?
You need to get out more and discover that there are more relatively ordinary folk than you realize. that are not afraid of abseiling, jumping, flying, etc
You seem upset that not everybody feels the same way about it as you and others do.
Quote
you were never scared of anything.
I never made any such claim.
Dear God, starman please continue with your stories of your bravery. You are one man in a million. Not scared of jumping from a little Cessna. I am honored to be able to correspond with such a warrior as you. Go ahead Mr. Bad Ass and list for all of us, the five most dangerous things you have done.
Dear God, starman please continue with your stories of your bravery. You are one man in a million. Not scared of jumping from a little Cessna. I am honored to be able to correspond with such a warrior as you. Go ahead Mr. Bad Ass and list for all of us, the five most dangerous things you have done.
Nobody is claiming it as bravery or heroics or being a warrior, except you.
People do such things for simple personal pleasure or satisfaction...but evidently you can only perceive things through your own narrow mindset.
You are no different to those that fear guns and cannot understand that others don't. Some view handling and firing a weapon as bravery, others just take to such like a duck to water.
Originally Posted by simonkenton7
list for all of us, the five most dangerous things you have done.
How do you rate danger?
Some look at statistics as a measure, others just rely on pre-conceived fears.
Was to go sky diving with a girl( Katie) I worked with few years ago. We were just friends and she knew I had been into climbing and slack jumping back then for a number of years
She was big into BASE jumping. Had like 600 jumps under her belt at the time. Her boyfriend was a wing suit designer, manufacturer, and had thousands of jumps under his belt.
They both died BASE jumping from a bridge in California when they drowned after the jump.
After that I decided I was never going to go sky diving. Too close to home for me to try it. Stopped slack jumping after that as well
The 2nd jump is always the hardest to make. The first, you do not know what will happen. You just know you will do it no matter what does. The 2nd one, you know. And your mind is screaming at you because you do know.
Yep. My first jump I faced the wrong (downwind) direction while landing and got the wind knocked out of me. I knew that if I didn't make the second jump the same day, I'd never come back.
Here are some of the things I saw or that happened to people I knew:
My chute somehow opened as the plane started to taxi. There was no side door on the plane (so the jumpers could get out). If that happened at altitude, the chute would have dragged me out and snagged on the tail, likely killing the pilot, me of course, and the other jumpers maybe.
Since it's cold at altitude, they later bought a door for the plane that had a lever the pilot could pull to cause the door open and to spring up to the wing. The first time they used it, it sprang up, hit the wing, and fell off the plane. It landed in a suburban back yard.
A club safety officer was demonstrating what to do if you landed in a lake. He jumped in the lake deliberately and paddled around telling the guys to immediately unhook the stuff and not paddle around like that. He went under and drowned.
The throttle of the Cessna 180 came off in the pilot's hand at altitude. He then had two speeds: Full and off. The jumpers said "bye," landed far from the field, but the pilot was able to dead stick it safely down.
My friend did an exhibition jump for pay. On the appointed day, it was raining and windy but he did not want to forfeit the money. He came down toward some power lines, made a violent maneuver to miss them, and smashed into the ground at speed. He ended up with a 8" pin in his leg and pain as he got older.
We didn't have refueling at our field. Our pilot wanted to fly to another field to get gas. The jumpers prevailed on him to take them up first. The approach wasn't quite right and the jumpers asked him to make a couple of more passes. He ran out of gas, the jumpers got out, and the Cessna ground-looped as the pilot landed it, totaling it. Lo and behold someone had forgotten to pay the insurance. End of club. By that time I had moved elsewhere, however.
I've done some schit to my body that i'm paying for now. Hockey, motocross, rodeo, yada ya. My friends wanted ti jump out of an airplane and I told them to kiss my a$$, not on the left side, not on the right side....but right down the middle!!!!
It's interesting how experience forges and tempers ones approach to things..
My CP instructor had many thousands of hrs Oil platform transfer and mountain flying, He said its not a nice feeling when you are OEI (one engine inoperable ) in a Super Puma far out over a wintery North Sea under heavy conditions.. I remember wanting to cut across a large spance of water, rather than following the coast, he said I prefer you hug the coast. He was most certainly a risk taker, but no more than was necessary to complete an assigned task [out to platforms, searching for bird/crew downed at sea, Ferrying an aircraft, etc.] .. Just didn't like crossing large areas of water unecessarily or 'just because you can' .
The 2nd jump is always the hardest to make. The first, you do not know what will happen. You just know you will do it no matter what does. The 2nd one, you know. And your mind is screaming at you because you do know.
Yep. My first jump I faced the wrong (downwind) direction while landing and got the wind knocked out of me. I knew that if I didn't make the second jump the same day, I'd never come back.
Here are some of the things I saw or that happened to people I knew:
My chute somehow opened as the plane started to taxi. There was no side door on the plane (so the jumpers could get out). If that happened at altitude, the chute would have dragged me out and snagged on the tail, likely killing the pilot, me of course, and the other jumpers maybe.
Since it's cold at altitude, they later bought a door for the plane that had a lever the pilot could pull to cause the door open and to spring up to the wing. The first time they used it, it sprang up, hit the wing, and fell off the plane. It landed in a suburban back yard.
A club safety officer was demonstrating what to do if you landed in a lake. He jumped in the lake deliberately and paddled around telling the guys to immediately unhook the stuff and not paddle around like that. He went under and drowned.
The throttle of the Cessna 180 came off in the pilot's hand at altitude. He then had two speeds: Full and off. The jumpers said "bye," landed far from the field, but the pilot was able to dead stick it safely down.
My friend did an exhibition jump for pay. On the appointed day, it was raining and windy but he did not want to forfeit the money. He came down toward some power lines, made a violent maneuver to miss them, and smashed into the ground at speed. He ended up with a 8" pin in his leg and pain as he got older.
We didn't have refueling at our field. Our pilot wanted to fly to another field to get gas. The jumpers prevailed on him to take them up first. The approach wasn't quite right and the jumpers asked him to make a couple of more passes. He ran out of gas, the jumpers got out, and the Cessna ground-looped as the pilot landed it, totaling it. Lo and behold someone had forgotten to pay the insurance. End of club. By that time I had moved elsewhere, however.
I would have found another club, long before all that happened.
I made 20 jumps half a century ago, before my ROTC commander made me quit because as a pilot candidate, I was forbidden to skydive or scuba. But I remember the first bit of a little ditty we all sang at the bar after jump days: (to the tune of Beautiful Dreamer)
Horrible streamer, open for me! Blue skies above me but no canopy...
I figure that you're more likely to die in a car crash. So that's what I kept telling myself as I sat on the edge of the door with my legs dangling out of the plane into the wild blue yonder.
P.S. - It was fun as schit and I'd highly recommend it if you're in decent shape and like adrenaline rushes. We did a free fall for maybe a minute but it seemed like forever. They made us land on our ass in the grass.
I made 20 jumps half a century ago, before my ROTC commander made me quit because as a pilot candidate, I was forbidden to skydive or scuba. But I remember the first bit of a little ditty we all sang at the bar after jump days: (to the tune of Beautiful Dreamer)
Horrible streamer, open for me! Blue skies above me but no canopy...
I looked at the ground briefly before landing on my 4 th jump. Big mistake. My knees hit my head pretty hard lol. Jumping in a strong wind sucks.
Originally Posted by IndyCA35
When I learned how to do it 50 years ago--no tandem then--it was danged near impossible for a main chute to malfunction unless it was packed wrong. Rule: always pack your own parachute.
If a malfunction did occur, you were supposed to keep the main and deploy the reserve, under the theory that a reserve malfunction would at least let you keep the main. But you had to throw it out from your stomach, so it did not get entangled in the main. No way to practice this in advance.
The only emergency I saw, the guy did in fact release the main before pulling the reserve. Reserves are simple devices and even harder to malfunction.
There are a few other simple rules: Don't jump if the wind is high. Face the wind direction when you land (because the chute has forward speed in the direction you face and you want to cancel out wind speed), don't make a fast direction change when near the ground (because the chute will oscillate and hitting on an oscillation is bad), don't jump when you can't see the ground or when it's raining (rain makes the chute heavier and fall faster), and if you land in the water, immediately release your stuff because the undeployed reserve will fill with water and sink you.
Every fatality I ever heard of was caused by violating these simple rules.
Oh...don't look at the ground when you're about to land. You won't tense up and break an ankle (not so much a problem with more modern chutes).
The most dangerous part in our club was the airplane. Easy to chintz on the maintenance.
My father was a pilot in WWII stationed in India. His C-46 took fire and was going down. Everyone else bailed but he decided to belly-up land the plane, being deathly afraid of parachutes. His landing went without incident but when he jumped to the ground from the cargo door 12' above the ground he hurt his back. Bothered him all his life.
It happens.. The local club has lost a couple over the last dozen years... One guy made a divot in a field about 100 yards W of the landing strip... That was about five years ago.. Another made a divot at a different club N of me about 45 miles back in 2010 or so.. Chute happens... (PUN!)
NO WAY am I jumping out of a perfectly good flying airplane... Even it the wings are gone and the fuselage is on fire, I'll STILL try to land that sob.....
My sponsor from my first AF duty station died during a jump a few months after I arrived on base. His wife normally jumped with him but stayed on the ground that day and watched him come down. They came to our barracks that evening looking for volunteers to form a search party because he came down in a heavily wooded area but they found him before we arrived on site. We used to joke about chutes on our tankers. Our chutes had a pocket that held an inspection log that we checked before we sized the harness for our use. Had to verify the two inspection dates were current before use. The log was also the warrantee card, if the chute didn't work you just returned the card for a full refund on the chute.
I have had two failures, and witnessed 3 others. Most do not result in fatalities. That being said this tandem BS should be outlawed. Other than that jumping is both beautiful and a way to overcome your fears. Personally I'd rather jump from a plane than being on the top of a 50' extension ladder which I've also needed to do often.
Whole ‘nother level.
