Skydiving

Yep. I jumped out of an airplane. And I lived to tell the tale. But, before you go thinking I’m some thrill-seeking adrenaline-junkie daredevil, let me tell you that I followed my 60-year-old mom and my 86-year-old grandpa! They’re the crazy ones.

You see, my mom has always wanted to go skydiving. It’s been on her bucket list for as long as I can remember. So, for her 60th birthday we decided to skydive with her. She wanted to jump with her dad, and any others who wanted to join in were a bonus.

Manina did most of the research and coordination and found Skydive the Wasatch. We scheduled it for my mom’s birthday, but had to move it up a couple days due to a forecast calling for a very windy jump day. So very last-minute, we switched it to Saturday. After the scheduling change, we had six jumpers: my mom and grandpa would be the first pair to jump. I would jump with my brother, Eli. Then my brother Jesse and his fiancée Mikaela would be the final flight.

Because of the last-minute schedule change, I didn’t have the opportunity to get nervous. It wasn’t until about halfway into our drive down to the Nephi Municipal Airport that I began to get a little uncertain. But, I knew this was probably one of those once-in-a-lifetime moments so I wasn’t going to back out.

Skydive the Wasatch has a pretty nice little hangar. When walked in, all the other jumpers (and supporting family) were there getting signed in. I filled out the paperwork—quite literally signing my life away—and then went through some very quick instructions on what to do.

Since Mom and Grandpa were first, I got to sit around for a while to watch. The plane took about 25 minutes to get to altitude, then it was another 5-7 minutes for them to get float back to earth. So, I had plenty of time to get anxious again. Everyone sat on the pavement outside the hangar and watched the sky, but we had a hard time spotting the plane since it was so high up. I tracked the plane carefully and could see tiny specks leaving the plane—someone had just jumped. The parachute didn’t open for a long time, but once it was out they became much more visible. It was hard to imagine me going next and being one of those tiny specks falling through the air.

Both my mom and grandpa made it to the ground just fine, and seemed to be in good spirits. So, nothing to be nervous about, right?

Now it was my turn. Eli and I met our instructors. I got paired with Jordan, who told me he had 700+ jumps and would be taking good care of me. Eli got Brandon who claimed more than 7000. Should that make me worried? I’m sure I’ll be just fine. I got in my jump suit, and Jordan got me all harnessed up. I was ready. And not really too terribly nervous.

But then the airplane had some mechanical issues. We heard something about a battery. The staff was running around with a bunch of different toolboxes and there was nothing to do wait. And get more nervous. We waited for probably 45 minutes to an hour. I didn’t want to eat or drink anything (didn’t want anything to come back up), but I was getting hungry having not eaten since breakfast. It was about 2:30pm when we were finally led outside to an already running plane (they didn’t want to risk it not starting back up again).

The plane ride up was nice and cozy. Only the pilot had a chair, the rest of were on the padded floor. The ascent was a little bumpy, but the views were spectacular. Eli and I asked a few stupid questions to our instructors, but were mainly just taking in the scenery. It was cool to look down onto Mount Nebo. We were up there. It started to get really cold. Then Jordan had me scoot back and onto his lap where he handed me my goggles, checked my harness, and then strapped my harness into his. We were ready.

The pilot gave the OK to open the door at about 15,500 ft. above sea level. We had more than 10,000 ft. to the valley floor below. The door opened and Jordan put his left foot out. He told me to step onto the platform. It was a little tough squeezing my knees in tight enough to get my feet out onto the platform. Or maybe it was just nerves. Either way, I got both feet onto the platform, grabbed the front of my harness, and took a deep breath. Then we started falling.

The free-fall wasn’t my favorite part of the jump, to be honest. It was cold. My ears immediately started hurting from the cold wind (they say you approach 120 mph when in free-fall). The wind noise is extremely loud, and my face started hurting too after a few seconds. It was difficult to breathe. But it was amazing to see the plane disappear and the ground start rapidly approaching. I put my arms out and started to get the feel of falling.

When Jordan pulled the parachute and it “caught” it was a pretty forceful event. But more than the force of suddenly slowing, the change in noise was even more dramatic. It was immediately very quiet. Very calm. The chaos of free-fall was gone and I was simply floating. That was my favorite part. Still a long way up, I could look at the distant Lone Peak near my home. I could see much of the valley, the airport where we would be landing, Utah Lake, lots of farmland, the Mona reservoir, and even flocks birds flying below me. It was beautiful.

Jordan had me take the controls and I spotted Eli’s parachute below me. “That’s weird,” I thought. I had jumped first, so I wasn’t expecting to see him below me. Jordan explained that we had caught several thermal updrafts and weren’t descending very quickly. He took back the controls and did a couple spin maneuvers. This is when I started to get lightheaded. I tried to focus on the horizon and concentrate on breathing. The harness was tight, so I was finding it difficult to take a full, deep breath. We seemed stuck for a while, Jordan did a couple more spins and I had to really concentrate. I started to get a little nauseous, but held it together. We eventually made it down, and by that time I was ready to land.

At about 20 feet off the ground, Jordan instructed me to lift my legs up. We came in for a nice and soft seated landing. We were down. Jordan said that was the longest time he’d ever stayed aloft. My kids ran over to me, which was awesome, and when Manina came over she could tell that I’d had a bit of a rough ride. But, nothing that a few high fives and hugs couldn’t immediately cure.

Certainly something I won’t be forgetting any time soon. What a great experience. And happy birthday, Mom—I wouldn’t jump out of an airplane for just anybody, you know!