Personally speaking
Personally, I have been parachuting since 27th June 1993 when I did something called a “Static line” course with what was then the "Devon & Somerset Parachute School". It was something that I had always wanted to do, and on reaching the age of 30 I did my first jump, so began another chapter. I've now made over 900 jumps, but in skydiving as in many other walks of life, it's quality that counts, not quantity. And with the building in recent years of two wind tunnels in the UK, you can learn to fly without resorting to jumping out of a plane
Training as a Skydiver
You can do a parachute jump and or train as a Skydiver via a number of routes, I trained by gradual progression through the RAPS (Ram Air Progression System), the other popular method of becoming a Skydiver is by doing an "Accelerated Free Fall" course.
Tandem Skydive
Many people do a Tandem jump either for fun or as a means of raising money for charity. New Zealand and Australia are places where you might jump against a backdrop of spectacular scenery, although you can do so in many other parts of the world.
One Tandem master I know had 14,000 skydives at the last count. With an average of say 40 seconds freefall on each of those jumps he has spent about 4 working weeks just falling through the air!
Skydiving for Dummies - an average skydive
The planes takes off and flies you and your friends, each with his or her own main parachute and a reserve emergency parachute in one self contained system, to a height of 12,000 feet or 2 ¼ miles, that's about a third of the height of the plane that took you on holiday abroad. You and your friends climb out of the plane when it's above the point at which you are hoping to land. You then let go of the plane and fall in a controlled safe way, having fun, breathing normally, carrying out the manoeuvres that you've rehearsed on the ground and are now desperately trying to remember in the air relative to each other for about 60 seconds before you deploy (open) your parachute and save your life. There is then a 3-5 minute ride under your canopy until you land.
Got it? That's a minute in freefall with no parachute open, just falling through the sky at about 120 mph driven by gravity, your top speed restricted by friction and then you open your parachute all on your own with your own little hand. Then gently floating down to earth and laughing at your own incompetence.
Ram Air Parachute
In case you hadn't heard, they don't use handkerchiefs with string any more, parachutes are no longer round, nor are they made of silk. There have been "square" parachutes around since the seventies. Round parachutes are still used for military deployments and you still occasionally encounter someone who has a round parachute as a reserve, although rounds are still found widely as aircraft emergency systems.
No indeed, the square parachute has now been around for decades and is now, at the top end of proficiency, a finely tuned wing capable of very high speeds, steep turns and long looooooooonnnnnnnnnnnggggggggg swoops. For student parachutists, however the square is a docile predictable steerable aerofoil with a forward speed of about 20mph. When you come in to land into wind, that's with the wind of the day blowing into your face, about 10 feet above the ground you pull down on both steering toggles and your canopy floats you to the ground so that you have a no more of a jolt than if you stepped off the kerb onto the road.
Anyone for Skiing
Skydiving is, for the keenest, as with many sports, a way of life - most weekends spent at the dropzone and it takes over your life and your bank account. And then what do you do for your annual holiday? Go skydiving of course. Some people only ever skydive once a year as their holiday treat, only ever jumping abroad and combining it with a holiday. One of the most popular places to do this is Spain where there are a number of dropzones.
Copyright © A.Edmonds 2006