Kevin wanted to go skydiving for his birthday so we
bought him a tandem jump. Kevin and his
friend Hunter decided on a day so we were off to watch.
Pam, Megan, Matt, and I met Kevin and Hunter at the airport. They registered and we waited a bit. They watched a 40 minute video which gave
them instructions. Once finished they
met with their respective tandem jump masters.
They put on their gear and went over some instructions with the jump
master. Then we waited for their rotation
on the plane.
I
have taken high altitude pictures from the ground in the past. Here are a couple pictures I took of multiple people jumping
from the plane at 13,000 feet and making a ring. Tandem teams jump from the plane around 10,000 feet and deploy
their parachutes at around 6,000 feet. Single jumpers in training jump around 5,000 feet and immediately pull
their parachute cord to practice
turning, etc. as part of their training. You can see these tandems (unfortunately not Kevin) and the videographer falling from the sky.
The trick is to try to see the tandem jump from the plane
and keep the tandem in your frame when they are falling. The drogue makes the tracking easier but it’s
still hard to follow something falling with a zoom.
Kevin and Hunter were called so they had a gear check and
headed for the plane with their jump masters. They had a second gear check just before boarding. Once
loaded they were “up-up-and-away” … 
The plane usually makes 3 passes over the
jump point at the altitudes I talked about earlier. 
The goal is to land in the airport field so wind speed
and wind direction dictate the planes location when the skydivers leave the
plane. Because of these factors I was
looking almost directly into the sun so I couldn’t see them leave the
plane. As they fell I spotted them but wasn’t
able to zoom in on them with my camera until they deployed their
parachute again because of the sun. 
It looked like fun.
Kevin had a great landing and said he would do it again. Great … another expensive sport with a huge adrenaline rush. I told Kevin to stick with motocross bikes
and Jeep 4 wheeling that are a bit safer … Go to: "Search This Blog" at the top of my page and type in "skydiving" to see past skydiving posts.
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