Skydivers Collide in Mid-Air
The date was 03/03/2006, just another sunny day and perfect weather in Zephyrhills, Florida. That was my jump #241. Me and 2 other friends formed a little skydiving team. We had been jumping together pretty much since my 40th jump. This team still exists today. We always jumped together, practicing and improving maneuvers in different styles of flight. That day another jumper asked to jump with us since none of his friends were there. This is a common practice at Drop Zones and we accepted since he was a regular at the DZ. As usual we planned our jump, and that consisted of a "four way head down freefly". A four way just represents how many people are jumping together. Head down is when we try to fly head first to the ground the entirety of the flight, reaching much faster speeds, in excess of 200 mph. Finally, freefly is the style that includes, among other maneuvers, head down. As the plane reached the exit altitude (13,500 ft) we gathered at the door and jumped out. Our plan was to jump out linked to each other as we appeared at the door, and remain like that for as long as we could. Since this is a very advanced maneuver, we knew that wasn't gonna last to long. Our back up plan was, once we break away, to transition to an easier position to regroup. We jumped out and soon after, as our speed passed the 200 mph mark, was too difficult to hold on so we got separated. We got separated into 2 groups of 2. Then I got some extra separation from the person closest to me (Richard). Since I had no visual of the other 2 jumpers Richard and I decided to stay close together till the end of the jump. For being over 6 feet tall, i'm able to deflect with my legs a great amount of air, causing me to fly horizontally in great speeds as well. When I moved towards Richard my speed in the direction of the ground was about 210 mph, which made my horizontal speed increase almost instantly. I approached Richard very fast, so fast that I had to move to the side not to hit him. As I passed Richard I turned my body to maintain eye contact with him, and that was when I flew into the other jumper (which was the new guy). On the video you can see me in the distance flying up side down to the point of impact. The little computer I carried on my helmet showed that my horizontal speed was 83 mph. Its funny to remember that I never ever used a helmet on my skydives, and still don’t, but that day my friends wanted me to carry the flight computer, so I had no choice but to wear it.... decision that probably made the accident really bad, but not fatal. The split second before the impact you can see that the jumper I hit saw me. He had that split second to brace himself. And me, I had no idea anybody was there. Upon impact, my legs went numb, I couldn’t breath, and I felt the biggest pain of my life in every single bone. I was confused. Had no idea what happened. Wasn’t sure if I had hit a plane or a bird. I totally lost my balance and could not position my body to a stable fall, as you can see, I was spinning. The pain I felt was so strong I waited to pull my parachute on a very low altitude. I knew that I would still have to cope with the impact of the opening. Thankfully that was a very smooth opening, in fact was even weird, I cannot remember any opening in all my career as smooth as that one. On the way down, under a canopy and still confused, my levels of adrenaline that kept me awake lowered and I felt I was going to pass out. I got this blurred vision, couldn’t feel half of my body and my breathing was still really bad. If I were to pass out under my canopy, I could make matters worse. I could land on the water or maybe on a tree...who knows? So I started to slap myself in the face to keep me awake. Finally I got to the ground. Made a pretty decent landing, but obviously not on my feet. I passed out as soon as I touched ground. My friends, already there and waiting for me, said I was out only for a minute or two. They couldn’t believe I was alive. The other guy was fine, hurting a little but completely okay.
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