The Jump

Ever thought about going skydiving but you think you don’t have the nerve or that heights scare you? Ever question an instructor by asking why something shouldn’t be done and he doesn’t give you an explanation so you go ahead and try it? Want to know what it’s like to be really high without doing any drugs? Well, the answers to these questions lies within this story! I will share with you one of the most exhilarating moments in my life and also give you a better understanding of what kind of person I am.

It was a cool day in late December of 1986. I had made up my mind that I would do something absolutely different and fun. I had made a pact with myself that every year I would try something new and different and this year I had chosen to go skydiving.

Now, I’m not scared of heights, but I’m also not one to be stoic when standing at the edge. I would consider myself in between with a little trepidation about being up high on something. If I have to, I will suppress the sweaty palms. But this day, I totally took up the task of not just being up high, but for some twisted reason to let myself fall from that height.

I chose a place in Hollister, California, called Adventure Aerosports. It was the most reasonably priced jump school around the area. They offered different types of training and jumps: tandem that consists of a couple hours of training and the student gets strapped to an instructor and they jump together, accelerated freefall where the student gets a few more hours of training and then they jump with two instructors and during the freefall the instructors help control the student and physically puts them into the correct dive position, and finally the progressive static-line which involves the most training and right off the bat the student dives solo without the aid of an instructor. I had chosen the last type as my thought was, ‘if I am going to die, I will not take anyone with me.’

So with that decided, I arrived early Saturday morning for the jump classes. The schedule involved going through the parts of the parachute, how they operate, how it evolved to its present form, the physics of skydiving, how to get the dive and chute to do what you want, the initial jump choreography, and finally, right before the jump, the safety involved and how to deal with emergencies. Not a bad idea to have that right before the jump, that way we can still have fresh in our minds what to do in case something goes wrong and also, by the time the students got to that part of the lesson they are fully committed to doing the jump.

It was quite fascinating to learn about the different types of chutes and how they’ve evolved over time to become one of the most elegantly designed and maneuverable things one could put in a backpack and entrust their lives with. Let me go into a brief rundown, and I mean really brief, of the two main types of chutes used. The traditional circular chute had controls and maneuverability that were extremely limited. The chutist can attempt to control the direction of the chute by pulling on the lines, but dang if the control will allow them to do spins, circles, or whatever. That barn that they’re heading straight towards will be inevitable and the impact will not be pretty (a note on this a little later). The second type, which is more common today, is the rectangular chute. It is highly controllable and easily maneuverable. The profile of the chute is in the shape of a wing. In the back corner of each side are sets of lines that attach to the chute and go down towards the chutist and ending in a single line with a toggle that the chutist holds on to. In order to control the chute, all the chutist has to do is pull the toggle down in the direction they wish to go. The part of the chute the lines are attached to pulls down slightly giving the chute some drag. At that point the chute then turns around that pivot point in a slow and gentle turn. In some cases, if the chutist lets go of one toggle and pulls really hard on the remaining toggle, they can do what’s called a corkscrew. That maneuver is for the more advanced divers. What happens then is the chute pivots so tight around that point that the chutist gets thrown out to the side. With the chute in the center in an almost vertical position, the chutist spins around it hence the name corkscrew. To recover all they have to do is release the toggle and the chute will then stabilize back into a horizontal position. On a side note, the instructor that day broke his leg a few weeks later when doing this move. He failed to release the toggle in time to recover and he ended up screwing himself into the ground. Go figure.

Well, anyways, suffice it to say that the chutes of today are very safe and highly controllable that one should not have any trepidation of entrusting their lives to them. The corkscrew maneuver was not taught to us that day. But another maneuver that was taught was the stalling of the chute. When one lands, one has to do a stall. The reason is the chute is coming down at an angle with a horizontal speed of about 20 miles per hour. Stalling the chute in effect retards the forward speed and descent. If done at just the right moment before landing, a landing can feel like jumping off the bottom step of a staircase. Now, a little bit more detail on what happens during a stall. To initiate a stall, the chutist pulls both toggles down past their waistline. A normal turn involves pulling the toggle down to just near the stomach and only one at a time. The stall pulls both severely down at the same time. I already mentioned the chute comes down at an angle. The angle position is such that the chute is slightly ahead of the chutist and their body is angled a little towards the ground. During a stall, the back of the chute pulls down and ends up behind the chutist. The chutist is then in a position where their back is towards the ground and they are facing the sky. With this position, the 20 miles per hour forward speed is terminated and they are in a standstill position. If the stall is held for too long, then the back of the chute will collapse and the chutist will lose control of it and they will then need to remember what the heck the instructor said in dealing with a collapsed chute.

So, you can see that the chute is a very awesome piece of work and extremely fun to play with. Just before lunch the last thing they covered was the choreography of the first jump. No, we were not doing any fancy chute work like you see at air shows. Instead, we were required to practice three turns in each direction and three stalls in preparation for landing. The turns seemed to be quite simple and self-explanatory. When the instructor talked about how we were to perform our stalls he said,

“Pull the toggles down past your waist for a count of four seconds. At the end of four seconds you will slowly raise the toggles back over your head no faster than two seconds.”

I raised my hand and asked, “What happens if we raise them back up too fast?”

He looked at me, smiled, and said, “You just don’t.” And he left it at that.

I shrugged and the lesson continued on. He talked about the landing zone and how it was about half a mile wide and about a mile long. He wanted us to come down in as near the center as possible. There was a river on one side, “don’t fall in there, you might drown,” a road on another side, “don’t overshoot, you don’t want to dodge traffic,” and a hill on another side. Way off into one corner of the drop zone was a barn; the instructor said we should not have much problem as we shouldn’t even get close to it.

“However, we had one student make their turns, then their stalls, then lined up for the landing right in line with the barn and did not waver from the line. He went straight into the barn at 20 miles per hour and then just slide down the side of it. So don’t freeze up!” the jumpmaster ordered.

During the day and during lunch our class was getting butterflies. At first we were extremely enthused and raring to go. After lunch they covered a couple more things and then took us out to the hanging harnesses to work on emergency procedures. It was then when we started to get a bit nervous. They talked about what kind of common malfunctions one may experience. Being on a static line throws in a unique twist in that when the chutist jumps out of the plane the chute is attached to a long line back to the plane. This provides an automatic way of releasing the chute, as on the first few jumps, there are too many things a new person has to remember and being in the correct dive position is extremely critical. The static line helps the student in getting used to falling and doing everything correctly before they are expected to open their own chute. The unique twist the static line throws in is when the chute is pulled out of the pack, the chute will twist around and the lines will become wrapped around themselves. What the chutist does at that point is to reach up, pull the lines to either side, and kick their legs in a bicycle like fashion. The last emergency procedure they covered was the ejection of the primary chute and the release of the emergency chute. In a way the release of the emergency chute is automated to occur a few thousand feet off the ground but if the primary chute was not ejected first, well then you’ll just be throwing your emergency chute into a failed chute and so you can just kiss your butt goodbye.

With all that accomplished, the time came for us to suit up and jump. They asked us to put ourselves into groups of three. They strapped us into our chutes and dang, they harnessed us in so tight that we couldn’t stand up straight. I could just see myself losing my jewels if I made the wrong move in this harness. When it came time for our group to go up we were lead to the tarmac. As we were waiting for the plane to arrive they asked us to set the dive order. I turned to the rest of the group and said,

“I’m sorry, but I don’t want to see anyone die before me so I’d like to be the first to jump,” at which the rest of the group had now qualms about going after me.

The plane arrived and dang, what a milk crate! It was a little Cessna with landing gear that did not retract. There was only one seat in the plane and that was for the pilot. The other two in the group crawled in first and crawled to the back of the plane and huddled down. Then the jumpmaster went in next huddled right behind the pilot. Finally I went in right next to the exit door with my face right on the dash of the plane. Already our hearts were beating fast in scared anticipation and we did not say too much while on the tarmac and while we taxied down the runway. I believe we were all too busy praying that we wouldn’t die. As we taxied down the tarmac the jumpmaster said,

“Everyone lean forward!”

‘What the freak?!’ I thought to myself. We have to lean forward to take off?! ‘Oh my God, what the hell did I get myself in to?!’

I leaned forward as instructed, my face making intimate contact with the windshield. ‘What have I gotten myself into? I’m going to die!’ I reassured myself.

We struggled up into the air and then proceeded to the drop zone. The group was extremely quiet in their silent reflection of their lives. The jumpmaster was giving his final directions, words that we thought will probably be the last ones we would ever hear, besides the screams of sheer terror as we fall.

We struggled up to our drop altitude of 5,000 feet and it was quiet fascinating to see the landscape from this height with as little protection as this milk crate offered. We got over the jump zone and circled. Our hearts began to beat faster. There are four commands they taught us that we had to know and follow. They were: Door! Cut! Mount the strut! and Go! Each one had their own special meaning and they were done in that exact order.

With my heart already beating as fast as I thought it could, the jumpmaster yelled, “Door!”

I instantly grabbed onto the handles just inside the plane as the jumpmaster reached over and opened the door. The door swung up right under the wing and if the person next to the door wasn’t holding on they would instantly be sucked out. ‘Damn! My heart just started beating faster!’

The jumpmaster surveyed the area outside the door. Soon as he felt it was right he yelled the next command, “Cut!”

‘Damn! My heart is beating ever faster!’ I thought as the pilot throttled the plane down to a slower speed. They didn’t want us to get caught in the tail as we jumped out. I anticipated with sweaty palms the next command.

“Mount the strut!” yelled the jumpmaster.

‘Ack! My death has arrived!’ I thought to myself as I willed my arms and legs out the door on their death walk.

I reached my right hand out, grabbed the strut, placed my right foot onto the metal pad just above the tire, placed my left hand onto the strut, and finally followed with my left foot onto the pad. I was now all the way outside the plan and was required to move my hands as far out onto the strut as possible. When I got to the end I was required to let my feet fall off the metal pad and then dangle from the strut by just my hands. As soon as we hung there we were required to look back at the jumpmaster inside the plane. Um, nope, not me. I instantly looked down at the ground about 5,000 feet below and my jaw dropped as I let out a loud “Ahhhh!”

“Look back!” the jumpmaster yelled to me.

‘Oh yeah, I forgot’ I realized. I looked back and soon as I did, he ordered his last command.

“GO!”

That was the most unsure I’ve ever been in my life in trusting the instructions of another. But hell, I didn’t want to look like a fool by having to crawl back inside (which wouldn’t be the first time one of their students did) so I said my final farewells to the world and let go.

They said during the classes that on the first couple jumps one has a good chance of experiencing sensory input overload. So much so that one loses total vision as if someone pulled a white sheet over their head. I just let go of an airplane 5,000 feet into the air and falling towards my imminent doom. Falling, is the chute going to open, I’m supposed to be in what position?, what the hell am I supposed to do? All these thoughts racing through the mind. And of course, that’s what I experienced. It was actually quite fascinating. It literally does look like someone pulled a white sheet over my eyes. I was supposed to be in a freefall position, count up to four seconds, then verify the chute opened up. Well, I forgot the first two steps, no arch in my back, no four-second count. ‘Oh! Check the chute!’ I realized as I felt a sudden tug and deceleration. I looked up and sure enough, the grandest site I’ve ever seen as the chute opened up above me. The lines of course were twisted and instinctively I reached up, pulled them apart, and kicked my feet back and forth to untwist them.

The chute fully opened up and I was now suspended in the harness a few thousand feet off the ground.

‘Wow! How quiet! How peaceful! No sound but the sound of the wind!’ I thought to myself. The tightness of the harness was long forgotten as I felt extremely secured into it. I bounced around to test how secure it was and was quite pleased with the feeling of security.

I drifted lazily around as I practice my turns.

‘So much control! This is totally awesome!’ I have never felt such a high adrenaline rush in my life.

‘Oh yeah, gotta practice my stalls’ I thought to myself.

I pulled down both toggles past my waist and counted for four seconds. I gently moved from a chute in front, body angled towards the ground position, to a chute behind, body angled up position. I slowly raised the toggles back over my head during a two second count and gently moved back into the original position.

‘Hmmm, that was interesting’ I thought to myself. I then sit myself back into my second practice stall and this time I wondered,

‘What would happen if I moved the toggles back up much faster?’ at which time I shot them back overhead in a split second.

I went from a chute behind, body up position, to a chute in front, body down position in a split second and almost lost my lunch. It was just as bad, if not worse, than a roller coaster ride as you drop down.

‘Alrighty then! I’m not doing that again!’ I mumbled.

I practiced my last stall without incident and prepared myself for landing. Another thing they taught us during class was the concept of ground shy. This happens when you’re preparing for landing and it involves the chutist seeing the ground approaching fast and misjudging the time of stalling their chute. What ends up happening is they stall it too soon and so by the time the stall is in progress, they’re nowhere near the ground. So they release, and before they can stall again they’ve already hit the ground at 20 miles per hour. Not a good feeling.

‘Well, that’s not going to happen to me’ I said determinedly. ‘Wait….. wait….. wait…… STALL!’ as I pulled the toggles down.

‘Damn! No ground!’

‘Release!’

‘Stall!’

Smack! Right into the ground and there goes my standing landing.

But at that point it really didn’t matter as I was safely on the ground with an extreme adrenaline rush and as happy as can be. The rest of the group came down and we were all stoked up in excitement. Finally the jumpmaster arrived laughing really hard.

“I always catch someone on that question!” he laughed out loud.

We all looked puzzled at him and he looked right at me and explained,

“I saw your dive, your practice stalls, and what you did on your second stall. Did you lose your lunch?”

I wrinkled my nose and said,

“You could’ve warned me.”

He chuckled and replied, “But that would’ve ruined the fun,” then he winked.

On the ride back to the airport we were excitedly recalling the jump and said, “Let’s go back up!”

We all agreed and found ourselves back on the tarmac. This time I wanted to be the last one out as I wanted to see what it looked like as one jumped.

The second ride up in the plane was even more quiet as we were now asking ourselves, ‘What the heck are we doing?! We survived the first time, what makes us think we’ll survive the second time?!’

The second jump was as nerve wracking, if not worse, than the first. I still got sensory input overload but at least I didn’t yell out. The lady photographer said I screamed on the first jump, I insist that it was just a yell. And I did not try that fast un-stall move I did the first time. Once was enough.

This time, as I was preparing for the landing I thought to myself,

‘Perhaps I stalled too late. I’ll stall sooner.’ Yes, go ahead and ask why I thought it out that way as it contradicts what happened the first time. Well, suffice it to say, that I got my reasoning backwards.

So I started my stall sooner and when I realized the mistake I un-stalled and stalled again. At least I didn’t smack into the ground before the second stall. However, I still was not near enough and ended up having to un-stall and stall again.

Smack! Into the ground again but damn if I was not determined to stand up on the landing. I did, but it was all so painful as both ankles throbbed in pain. But I didn’t fall! And I smiled in pain.

So that was my first two jumps ever. I made a few more jumps in the following weeks and with each new jump my comfort level increased. I felt bad for this one couple that I went up with that were new to skydiving. The guy was over six foot tall and the girl couldn’t have been much more than five feet. Heck, if she huddled down on the tarmac, she’d be able to hide behind her chute pack. When we went up, I was the last to go and he was the first. When the guy let his legs swing away from the plane the whole plane swayed under his weight. I looked over and felt really bad for his girlfriend as she looked like a scared bunny rabbit. When it was her turn to go, she ever so cautiously got out onto the strut and when the jumpmaster yelled “GO!” her eyes went as big as saucers as she froze. Her glasses made the effect more dramatic and I felt really bad for her. The jumpmaster leaned out the door and with only about a foot of space between their faces he yelled “GO!” one more time and in effect, he scared her off the plane.

My final jump before retiring the sport (for a while) was the best jump I ever had. It actually felt like I was floating. My back was in the correct arch, I was horizontal to the ground, and I watched the plane gracefully fly away. I thought to myself, ‘So this is what it feels like to die. It’s so peaceful.’ For a moment I forgot the practice ripcord pulls I was supposed to do as I was caught up in the moment. When I finally remembered the chute was beginning to open. I looked down, couldn’t see the practice ripcord in the arch I was in, un-arched for a moment, found it and pulled. The jumpmaster said that momentary un-arch would have been enough to throw me into a tumble if it was freefall and so I had to do one more static jump before freefall. At the time I was satisfied with what I did up to that point and finished my adventures with skydiving.

But, I have not totally walked away from the sport. I do intend on trying my hand again someday.

All images & contents copyright © G.A. Trammel 1992 - 2003