I’m pretty sure that most folks who spend a good bit of time in aviation will have had a few lucky learning experiences, close shaves that they walked away from. Hanging out at the FBO (Fixed Base Operator) or the DZ (Drop Zone)you hear them all the time. Jokingly they start out with “No shit, there I was flat on my back…”. My aviation career has spanned five decades and I have a few good ones in my repertoire but I reckon the one I’m about to tell you was the closest shave of them all and I really was flat on my back. I was sitting out on our front veranda having a cup of coffee the other day and realised that I have had 25 years of bonus days since then.
It happened in my home town of DeLand, Florida on Sunday morning, 20 June 1993, Father's Day. My mom told me she had bought some spicy Italian sausage at the butcher and was going to make a pot of sauce so the plan was to have a big meal around noon or so. Initially I hadn’t planned on going to the DZ on Sunday. I’d spent all day Saturday at the DZ and that night a bunch of us went over to Scotty Carbone’s house for a party. Before leaving, Scotty invited me to go on an early morning jump that he was organising. I said OK and figured I’d make a jump or two before heading out to my mom and dad's house for the afternoon. Florida in June is always hot and muggy so getting out to the DZ early while it was still cool and then heading out to the lake and hanging out with my folks for the rest the day was a perfect plan. After jumping with Scotty’s group it was still not too hot so I quickly packed up and manifested for another load.
It happened in my home town of DeLand, Florida on Sunday morning, 20 June 1993, Father's Day. My mom told me she had bought some spicy Italian sausage at the butcher and was going to make a pot of sauce so the plan was to have a big meal around noon or so. Initially I hadn’t planned on going to the DZ on Sunday. I’d spent all day Saturday at the DZ and that night a bunch of us went over to Scotty Carbone’s house for a party. Before leaving, Scotty invited me to go on an early morning jump that he was organising. I said OK and figured I’d make a jump or two before heading out to my mom and dad's house for the afternoon. Florida in June is always hot and muggy so getting out to the DZ early while it was still cool and then heading out to the lake and hanging out with my folks for the rest the day was a perfect plan. After jumping with Scotty’s group it was still not too hot so I quickly packed up and manifested for another load.
My Jonathan canopy with a typical Florida summer sky. I'm wearing shorts, T-shirt and sandals. The tapered elliptical wing tips on the canopy are evident.
By this time in my career I had over 1,800 jumps and had logged about 150-200 hours flying. I was pretty current inside and out of an aeroplane. In the late 1980’s and early '90s a new generation of parachutes were being developed that were lighter and faster and more manoeuvrable than previous designs. They were also less docile and less forgiving than the previous generation. These new canopies were finished with a silicon coating that made them zero-porosity so performance did not degrade with age as had happened with earlier canopies. All came in a variety of sizes so the higher you loaded them up the faster they went. I had recently purchased a zippy little number called a "Jonathan" that had semi-elliptical wings and because of this feature it was very fast in a turn. The idea had come from a Spitfire wing. I still jump a similar design called a "Stiletto" made by a different manufacturer only this one is a bit smaller (higher wing loading) and faster. At the time of my incident I had about 25 jumps on my new "Jonathan".
The second jump was a sit-fly jump. In those days we called it chute assis, I guess because that’s what the French skydivers called it. Sit flying is just what it sounds like. All of the participants assume a body position in freefall that is like sitting in a chair rather than falling in a flat, belly-to-earth position. The sit position is very comfortable and affords better visibility than any other freefall position. Back in '93 this style of flying was getting popular and we had special sit-fly suits with wings on the arms and short pants giving us more drag on top and less on the legs. We also had web fingered gloves so we could catch more air. After about a year we realised that the sit body position is much easier without extra drag and these days no one wears stuff like that.
The second jump was a sit-fly jump. In those days we called it chute assis, I guess because that’s what the French skydivers called it. Sit flying is just what it sounds like. All of the participants assume a body position in freefall that is like sitting in a chair rather than falling in a flat, belly-to-earth position. The sit position is very comfortable and affords better visibility than any other freefall position. Back in '93 this style of flying was getting popular and we had special sit-fly suits with wings on the arms and short pants giving us more drag on top and less on the legs. We also had web fingered gloves so we could catch more air. After about a year we realised that the sit body position is much easier without extra drag and these days no one wears stuff like that.
A sit fly jump showing the type of jumpsuit and gloves I was wearing. The cutaway and reserve ripcord pillows are evident on the right and left main lift webs of these two jumpers. My reserve ripcord handle is made out of stainless steel rather than being a soft pillow like the jumper on the right has. Photo: Atlanta Skydiving Center.
In this painting titled "Selfie with David Bowie" I've depicted myself transitioning from a sit fly position to a head down body position. The red cutaway handle is visible on the right main lift web and you can see a bit of my silver reserve ripcord handle opposite it on the left main web.
Anyway, the skydive went as planned and we broke off at about 4,500 feet, tracked in opposite directions to deployed our main canopies. When I saddled out I took off my gloves and stowed them inside my jumpsuit and released my brakes. All modern "ram-air" canopies are packed with the brakes stowed in a medium flight position. The brakes are also the left and right steering lines (they are sort like rudder pedals on aeroplanes in that way). Since my canopy was new I was still wringing it out. I put it through a series of turns, dives and stalls. At the time I was working for Skydiving magazine and recently we had reported on two experienced jumpers who had been killed on the same type of canopy when they spun into the ground at low altitude for unknown reasons. Aware of this, I performed my aggressive manoeuvres above 2,000 feet.
With ram air parachutes we fly traffic patterns to landing just like aeroplanes; There are Downwind, Base & Final legs although the turns are are not so squared off as they are in an aircraft traffic pattern, they are more like a racetrack. When I was at about 1,100 feet I decided that I would execute a 360 degree turn to the right and then a 180 degree to the left which would put me on my Downwind leg. I checked for traffic and started the right turn. I put a lot into it and could feel the Gs which is always fun. When I rolled out on heading I immediately initiated the left turn without letting the canopy completely recover from the right turn. That was the big mistake. I was suddenly kicked around violently and laid out on my back. I tried to let up on the left toggle but it was just limp in my hand with the slack line floating lazily by my face. I had given myself severe line twists which had cinched down on steering line, locking in the control input. I couldn't see the ground or my canopy because my suspension lines were knotted tightly behind my head, pushing my chin into my chest. After one quick revolution I tried to separate my risers in an effort to get rid of the twist. That action took up a second revolution. Witnesses on the ground reported that it appeared that my canopy just "went away" and I lost at least 500-600 feet in those two turns. After the second turn I was still on my back and knew I was getting low and that I would have to chop it, so grabbed my cutaway handle located on the right main lift web of my harness and jettisoned my main canopy. Centrifugal force slung me out horizontally. Still on my back I flipped over to my belly and reached for my reserve ripcord handle which is located on the left main lift web of my harness (directly opposite the cutaway handle). It wasn't there! That’s because my harness had shifted after I chopped my main canopy. This is normal and I had told many of my students to expect it so it was no big surprise. It was just that I was a bit in a bind for time and could not afford to be groping around. I followed the main lift web up and found the handle up near my shoulder and pulled it with one hand but I had a "hard pull" it did not clear so I came across with my right hand and punched it out for all I was worth and it cleared. I watched the pilot chute launch off my back and felt the free bag containing my reserve go so there was nothing left for me to do except let nature take its course and hope that I had enough altitude for it to deploy. Geographically I was just off runway 9 in the vicinity of the NDB tower. I was way down “inside the bowl” and looked down at a gigantic number 9 and directly below me a little patch of what looked like grass but was actually palmettos filled my vision.
All this was happening across the runway from the DZ so about a 30 or so people or so had a perfect view of what was going on while I was high but there was a line of trees that went down alongside runway 30 between me and them. They later told me that just before I went behind the pine trees all I had out was my pilot chute. Then after my body disappeared behind the trees they saw a little flash of pink. My reserve canopy (also a ram-air) was pink in those days.
With ram air parachutes we fly traffic patterns to landing just like aeroplanes; There are Downwind, Base & Final legs although the turns are are not so squared off as they are in an aircraft traffic pattern, they are more like a racetrack. When I was at about 1,100 feet I decided that I would execute a 360 degree turn to the right and then a 180 degree to the left which would put me on my Downwind leg. I checked for traffic and started the right turn. I put a lot into it and could feel the Gs which is always fun. When I rolled out on heading I immediately initiated the left turn without letting the canopy completely recover from the right turn. That was the big mistake. I was suddenly kicked around violently and laid out on my back. I tried to let up on the left toggle but it was just limp in my hand with the slack line floating lazily by my face. I had given myself severe line twists which had cinched down on steering line, locking in the control input. I couldn't see the ground or my canopy because my suspension lines were knotted tightly behind my head, pushing my chin into my chest. After one quick revolution I tried to separate my risers in an effort to get rid of the twist. That action took up a second revolution. Witnesses on the ground reported that it appeared that my canopy just "went away" and I lost at least 500-600 feet in those two turns. After the second turn I was still on my back and knew I was getting low and that I would have to chop it, so grabbed my cutaway handle located on the right main lift web of my harness and jettisoned my main canopy. Centrifugal force slung me out horizontally. Still on my back I flipped over to my belly and reached for my reserve ripcord handle which is located on the left main lift web of my harness (directly opposite the cutaway handle). It wasn't there! That’s because my harness had shifted after I chopped my main canopy. This is normal and I had told many of my students to expect it so it was no big surprise. It was just that I was a bit in a bind for time and could not afford to be groping around. I followed the main lift web up and found the handle up near my shoulder and pulled it with one hand but I had a "hard pull" it did not clear so I came across with my right hand and punched it out for all I was worth and it cleared. I watched the pilot chute launch off my back and felt the free bag containing my reserve go so there was nothing left for me to do except let nature take its course and hope that I had enough altitude for it to deploy. Geographically I was just off runway 9 in the vicinity of the NDB tower. I was way down “inside the bowl” and looked down at a gigantic number 9 and directly below me a little patch of what looked like grass but was actually palmettos filled my vision.
All this was happening across the runway from the DZ so about a 30 or so people or so had a perfect view of what was going on while I was high but there was a line of trees that went down alongside runway 30 between me and them. They later told me that just before I went behind the pine trees all I had out was my pilot chute. Then after my body disappeared behind the trees they saw a little flash of pink. My reserve canopy (also a ram-air) was pink in those days.
I was still sporting a Mullet when this photo was taken at Skydive DeLand in 1993. That's the Jonathan I chopped way down inside the bowl on Father's Day 1993. You can see the trees behind my right shoulder that blocked the opening of my reserve canopy from the view of the spectators on the ground. They are not very tall. I lost the free bag and "Bart Death" pilot chute cap but six years later someone found it while looking for a another cutaway canopy. Also visible in this photo is the yellow steering toggle. I have already set the brakes in preparation for packing the canopy.
Meanwhile as I was waiting for my parachute to open I didn’t take my eyes off the ground. I saw my own shadow and it was big, coming towards me and getting bigger fast. I thought "I reckon I'm not going to make it out to see dad". And that was it. No panic, no images of my life flashing before me or anything like that, just a matter of fact… I wasn’t going to make it out to see my dad. Then I was jerked upright. I had saddled out at about 15-25 feet. I figure I had less than 1/100th of a second to spare -- if that. I didn't even have time to release my brakes. I just grabbed my rear risers and flared. Nice soft landing but sure enough I was in palmettos up to my thighs and I was wearing shorts and flip-flops! It took me a bit to gather up my canopy from the prickly palmettos and presently I could hear Scotty Carbone yelling for me. He had driven the DZ truck over to me. When I told him I was OK he told me I might want to stay in the bush for a while because my wife Mindy RIP, was going to kill me for giving her such a scare. Regardless of the danger still awaiting me, I made my way through the bush to the edge of the runway where the yellow DZ truck with Scotty and my somewhat upset but relieved wife were waiting for me.
When I got back to the hangar I dropped my canopy and stepped out of my harness. When I unzipped my jumpsuit, my webbed gloves fell out on the floor and I realised if I had not taken them off I probably would have died because it would have taken a bit longer to go through my emergency procedures. I started shaking like a leaf. Before that I had been cool as a cucumber. I went to the bar and ordered a Yoo-hoo chocolate milk drink to calm down. One of my fellow jumpers was a bit critical of how I had gotten into the emergency situation and why I didn’t have my hand on my reserve ripcord when I pulled the cutaway handle. Scotty heard him and came to my rescue saying "Don't listen to him. You did everything right. If you didn't you wouldn't be sitting here".
Now we knew what had killed those other jumpers. The next week when the canopy manufacturer heard of my lucky escape he gave me a call at the magazine. After what I reported, he made recommendations in the owner’s manual and in general tell people not to do what I had done. Since then I have had four subsequent cutaways. All of them have been up high but I have always had my left hand on my reserve ripcord before pulling my cutaway handle.
The rest of the story is that we made it out to my mom and dad’s house and my mom’s pot of sauce was indeed delicious and that meal of spaghetti and spicy Italian sausage was delicious. Later while we were having a couple of beers I told my dad I had a routine cutaway that morning and that it was no big deal. But I'm here to tell you I've really been enjoying these bonus days.
When I got back to the hangar I dropped my canopy and stepped out of my harness. When I unzipped my jumpsuit, my webbed gloves fell out on the floor and I realised if I had not taken them off I probably would have died because it would have taken a bit longer to go through my emergency procedures. I started shaking like a leaf. Before that I had been cool as a cucumber. I went to the bar and ordered a Yoo-hoo chocolate milk drink to calm down. One of my fellow jumpers was a bit critical of how I had gotten into the emergency situation and why I didn’t have my hand on my reserve ripcord when I pulled the cutaway handle. Scotty heard him and came to my rescue saying "Don't listen to him. You did everything right. If you didn't you wouldn't be sitting here".
Now we knew what had killed those other jumpers. The next week when the canopy manufacturer heard of my lucky escape he gave me a call at the magazine. After what I reported, he made recommendations in the owner’s manual and in general tell people not to do what I had done. Since then I have had four subsequent cutaways. All of them have been up high but I have always had my left hand on my reserve ripcord before pulling my cutaway handle.
The rest of the story is that we made it out to my mom and dad’s house and my mom’s pot of sauce was indeed delicious and that meal of spaghetti and spicy Italian sausage was delicious. Later while we were having a couple of beers I told my dad I had a routine cutaway that morning and that it was no big deal. But I'm here to tell you I've really been enjoying these bonus days.