More Skydiving

I had many experiences while jumping both good and bad. Before I made that first jump I watched a girl jump. The parachute didn't open properly and she hit the ground before she could get her reserve chute open. But like the dummy I am I continued on anyway. I made numerous attempts to land on a four inch disc target from an altitude 12,500 feet. It's amazing how accurate you can be. We would also practice hooking up with each other trying get as many jumpers connected before you had to pull the rip chord.
The most we ever got was five. I've seen as many as twenty two get hooked up. We made water jump in the summer to cool off.
The golden rule for water jumps is if you wanted to make more than one jump you had to bag your reserve chute with a plastic bag to keep the reserve from getting wet. The process was to take one of the straps that hold the reserve to the parachute off and attach it to one of the strap on the end of the reserve. Then let the reserve go. It would drop about three feet. Get the plastic bag and ties. pull the reserve up, place into bag, use ties to seal the bag, then let it go. Now the reserve will stay nice and dry. Well on my first water jump I left one step out. After I unhooked the reserve on one side I forgot to hook it to the handle of the reserve and guess what happened as I let go of the reserve to grab my plastic bag the reserve was just like the energizing bunny. It kept going and going and going until it made a big splash in the water. My only thought was I won't be able to jump again today and the second thought was I just lost a hundred fifty dollar reserve. Fortunately it floated and I got it back. The funny part was all the people in the boats thought I fell out of my harness. That was the last time I made that stupid mistake.

I made seventy five jumps in all. I don't know if thats a lot of jumps or not, but it was my last and for good reason I think, you decide. It was a day to jump. Weather was perfect with no wind or no smog. Got into the airplane and while climbing to 12,500 feet I was thinking about what I was going to do during the free fall. It was my turn to go and as I left the airplane I looked up to see if someone else climb out and get ready to go. I did a few turns to the left and then right. Made a few forward 360's. Funny thing when I tried to stop I just kept tumbling. I tried to get stable but just kept tumbling. Time to pull the rip chord still tumbling. I tumbled through the lines as they came out. I felt something wrap around my left leg. I turned my head to see what it was. that stopped the tumbling but put me falling head first. What I saw was the lines wrapping around my leg. I kicked and kicked and they finally came loose. The parachute popped open but the lines were tangled up because I tumbled through them, therefore i could not steer it. I landed way off target and down wind. That hurt! A few minutes later I was talking with another jumper who was watching me through field glass. He said I don't know how you got that those line loose form your leg. They should have continued to wrap and pull tighter around your leg. If that happened you should have cut your main shute away and deployed the reserve shute, but the main shute would not have gone completely away because it was wrapped around your leg, then the reserve shute would have tangled with the main and Kelly would end up doing about 90 miles an hour until he hit the ground. This is the first time I heard "its not the fall that kills you it the sudden stop" Well I packed up my gear, tossed it in the trunk of my car and never jumped again.