A Skydive: The 60 Minutes Before 60 Seconds of Eternity! – Part 2
A Skydive: The 60 Minutes Before 60 Seconds of Eternity! – Part 2
Estimated reading time: 12 minutes
Did you read the first part? Start by reading the preparation for a skydive!
“(…) At that moment, there are 50,000 things running through my head. My heart starts to beat very fast. I feel a mix of fear and excitement. I can’t wait, but at the same time, I don’t want it to happen. My thoughts are conflicting!”
To calm myself a bit, I look outside through the window; the landscapes are magnificent! At 2,500 feet above the ground, you hear the click of seat belts being unfastened. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the instructors attaching the first part of the harness to their tandem client’s parachute. On my end, I spot the drop zone and try not to lose sight of it…
During the ascent, I practice relaxation techniques (yeah right!) and visualize my jump again. From time to time, I look at my altimeter to see how high we are. Around 8,000 feet, a certified coach checks my parachute for the third time… I check my handles again in order.
The stress starts to build up in the plane, and to release it, people scream with joy… The instructors talk with their passengers, I hear them reassuring them and repeating the steps of their jump. They finish attaching and tightening the harnesses securely. I always have a particular affection for tandem jumpers, those who are about to experience their first skydive… I like to exchange a few words with them during this suspended moment in time.
The excitement of the last seconds before the jump Between 11,000 and 12,000 feet, it’s ritual time… The handshake exchanged between skydivers to wish each other a good jump! I feel a great pride in being “part” of the gang!
Then comes (finally? Hmmm…) the fateful moment! The pilot shouts “2 minutes!”… Oh boy. This is the point of no return! Everything happens very quickly and very slowly at the same time. The red light turns on, which means “Open the door”… Now, I hear the sound of the wind and the engines taking over, the plane moves a bit from side to side, I feel the cold, and I can’t stay still. My turn is coming, and I will have to exit the plane: I want to do it, and I don’t want to do it anymore… What the heck am I doing here? Why am I doing this?
Then, it’s the green light’s turn to come on… This is it, it’s time to go out! I see the first skydiver jump out of the door. My heart does three flips in my chest! Today, we must jump at 7-second intervals between each person (or group). No more fooling around! No time to turn back.
After them, it’s MY turn! I get up while staying crouched, my legs all wobbly, and move to the door. Strangely, I’m afraid of falling out of the plane… Well, yes! Apparently, it’s normal for a baby bird!
I exchange a knowing glance with the tandem passenger next to me. I smile at her with all my teeth and try to give her a bit of courage! I look down, I search for the landing zone that now looks like the size of an ant, all while counting (one thousand and one, one thousand and two, one thousand and three… one thousand and seven)… READY… SET… GO!!!!!!!
Freefall: Finally freed from fear! That’s it! It’s at this precise moment that I launch myself! I’m in the void between the sky and the earth! I watch the plane slowly move away.
It creates in its wake a hill of wind in which I take my position, (“Arch, arch, arch!” I repeat to myself). Then? I relax. Yes, yes, I swear! The fear stayed in the plane: really (really!), all that is written above is the worst… Once in the air, I float and have a blast. Indeed, at that point, adrenaline controls everything! I have fun: I make turns, I look at the clouds on the horizon… It’s an incredible sensation!
After each maneuver, I check my altimeter because I’m falling at nearly 230 km/h (120 mph). So, after about 1 minute, it’s time to open my parachute … another rush of adrenaline. I can’t wait to see that everything is okay … the deployment takes a few seconds.
Once the parachute is fully open, it’s happiness in a disorienting silence. I have fun again in the sky, but in a different way than in freefall: turns, spins. I keep my focus on the landing zone where I will start my pattern while also paying attention to the other parachutes enjoying the sky. Somewhere above my head, the tandem passengers are also floating in the wind and their emotions!
I start my landing pattern and land gently on the grass, with a big smile on my face and letting out a loud scream of joy!!!
WHAT PRIDE!!!!!
I pick up my parachute and, while walking through the field, I see the lady I smiled at in the plane jumping into her boyfriend’s arms. Other passengers land gently on their butts around them (as planned in tandem). I leave my canopy to the packers, fill out and sign my jump log … then I go back to celebrate!!
It’s hard to describe what happens inside me … it’s the perfect balance where I feel in harmony with my little self. A moment where the sensations experienced are a perfect sample of the entire range of emotions a human can feel!
Thinking about it and while answering my friend Lizanne’s question, I concluded that it’s adrenaline that does all the work. Once you learn to overcome fear, you discover resources within yourself that you didn’t know were there. Once you’ve succeeded, once you’ve landed … you just want to feel the sky again and again …
