My First Skydive

I did my first skydive, at Chambersburg Skydiving Center, in Pennsylvania. Why I decided to skydive, is because it has always been something I wanted to do, it looked so fantastic, using the wind, and air currents to move your body around. I elected to do a tandem jump first, because it's a relatively inexpensive way to see if you really enjoy the sport.

I arrived at the place, at around 8:00 in the morning, and the whole dropzone was under a hold for clouds. See skydiving is a very weather dependant sport! There were a few people just hanging around and talking, drinking coffee, and packing parachutes, one of which, was my tandem master Randy. We shook hands, and he proceeded to explain to me, the parts and function, of each part of the parachute laid out on the floor in front of us. I also got a peek into what goes into packing these chutes, and Randy made it look so effortless.

Tandem jumps require a minimum of training, because you are attached to a very experienced jumpmaster, for the whole jump. Our training was a little linger, because we couldn't go up anyway, with the cloud hold. Randy covered every aspect of what we would be doing, from boarding the plane, to landing, and it was a lot for my brain to absorb. At no time during any of this, did I feel at all scared, which amazed me.

When the cloud hold was finally lifted, it was time to get into the air. We boarded the plane, with a bunch of other skydivers, and my videographer, and ascened to 13,000 feet, our jump altitude. During the ride up, Randy attached my harness to his harness, with 4 really big D-rings, because he was the only one with a parachute rig on! The rig for a tandem jump, is much bigger than a regular rig, because it has to support the weight of 2 people.

We were the last ones on the plane, other than the videographer hanging outside waiting for us. The first real chill of fear hit me in the door, looking out and down at nothing at all, except clouds. I didn't have long to think though, because Randy launched us in a front flip out the door!

Out we go, and i have lost all awareness of time, place, and body position, which continues, until we get into freefall, which was absolutely amazing, and very windy!

This was so exciting! The videographer was right in front of us, and making faces and smiling. Rnady had me doing all kinds of arm movements, and smiling, and pretty much whatever I wanted, for the duration of the freefall. But all too soon, it was time to open the parachute!

The opening, was like a jolt, and we were both yanked upright. There are two steering handles, called toggles, that Randy pulled loose form the risers on the chute, and I got to do most of the steering on the way down. It was pretty exciting, seeing how fast the parachute turns, and when you pull all the way down on the toggles, which is the brakes, how fast the parachute just seems to hang in the air. Randy also gave me a nice guided tour of the countryside on the way down, and thank god he was there, because I had no idea where the airport or landing zone were! He found it just fine though, and we landed, well, fairly well, although I sort of tripped. I was so excited after it all, and it was nice having a lot of jumpers at the place congratulating me! I also have a nice video of the whole jump, that I can watch anytime I like!