This guy is packing my parachute for me. I was very, very nice to him.
Cool tattoo. My chute’s not likely to burst into flames, is it?
“With a warning label this big, you know they gotta be fun!”
At one point, one of the guys came to me with a liability waiver. He said, “I am obligated to explain for you the risks of skydiving.”
“Ok, what are the risks of skydiving?” I asked.
“There is chance you will die. Please sign here.”
The parachute itself also came with one of the more awesome warning labels I’ve ever seen. Text:
Sport parachuting is a hazardous activity that can result in injury or death.
Parachutes sometimes malfunction even when they are properly designed, built, assembled, packed, maintained and used. The results of such malfunctions are sometimes serious injury or death. If you use this parachute–or if you allow someone else to use it–you are accepting parachuting’s risks and accepting the fact that the Wonderhog Vector [great name!] or its components may malfunction.
If you are not willing to accept the risks of sport parachuting, or if you aren’t willing to accept the possibility that your Wonderhog Vector or its components may malfunction and perhaps cause you to be injured or killed, then you should reconsider your involvement in sport parachuting.
The entire warning label’s tone is basically like, “Look, if you’re too much of a wimp to accept that you might get killed jumping out of a plane, maybe you shouldn’t jump out of planes, you coward.”
I figured my overall odds of survival were pretty good, but as a precaution I did write a brief goodbye note to my friends and family and tuck it into my wallet.
Our plane was a tiny little single-engine Cessna. It was actually a tight squeeze to fit four jumpers plus the pilot. I’d never been in a plane that small before, and I had a brief moment of concern over its reliability before realizing, “What are you worried about? If something does go wrong, this is the first time you’ve ever been on a plane where bailing out is a totally viable option.”
Our pilot and my tandem instructor. The pilot was really cool. Whereas the jumper guys seemed like they were mostly jocky adrenaline-junkie types, our pilot seemed a bit more subdued and cerebral. He said he’d done four or five jumps, but many years ago. After we landed (Spoiler alert: I survived) I spent a while talking to him about flying. Piloting for skydiving drops is apparently rather tricky, since you get an enormous amount of drag on one side of the plane when you’ve got people climbing out onto the wing.
I’m glad you made it down alright! haha
Not going to lie, your face as you’re falling backwards out of the plane is, priceless. (: