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I Decided to Learn to Fly Last Friday

• June 2007
• Uncategorized

Tuolomne was great, but I missed Rifle too much. So I grabbed Fletch and drove east last Wednesday. A quick stop to mow the lawn in Moab, and then back on I-70 to Rifle. In the last few years, I’ve made a lot of new friends who are some of the best skydivers and base jumpers in the world. These people are not only amazing masters of their sport, but they are some of the nicest, craziest people I’ve ever met. Jumpers have a really strong sense of community, and get a huge kick out of being with their friends and helping each other. Several months ago, my brother Virgil and his wife Holly decided they wanted to learn to jump. My good friends Brendan McHugh and Jay Epstein insisted they come to the Mile Hi Dropzone in Longmont, Colorado, so they could take them under their wings. Now Virgil and Holly have done hundreds of jumps, and are starting to think about base…..they are obsessed, which is par for the course with Davises.

Jeez. Is learning how to skydive because you want to hang out more with your big brother a bad reason to throw yourself out of a plane? This is what I have been asking myself for the last month or so….

I was about a half hour outside of Rifle, planning to climb for two days and then head up to Rocky Mountain National Park for the weekend, to climb alone up in the Park. Suddenly I was on my cell phone calling Brendan. Brendan makes his living as a jumpmaster. He’s done over 11,000 skydives, and is one of the best skydivers in the world. Every time I call Brendan, he tries to talk me into doing a tandem skydive with him, where you don’t really have to learn or do anything yourself, you are just strapped onto a jumpmaster, and I say “NO!” So he nearly passed out when he answered his phone and I said, “Brendan, I want to do my AFF and go through ground school with you! Can you teach me? Now?” After he had recovered from his shock, he said, “Can you be here tomorrow morning?”

So I stopped in at Rifle, met some great guys who were just out of college and climbed a few pitches with them, and then kept on going to Boulder. Brendan taught me nonstop about every possible thing that could ever happen to anyone in skydiving, for approximately 9000 hours (well, 15) all day and all night on Friday. No jumping yet. Now, I did do one tandem skydive almost two years ago, and that made me NEVER EVER want to do it EVER again. I thought it was absolutely horrifying, everything about it. Leaving the airplane door, loud cold wind, free falling, landing hard on the ground. Never again, I swore. But then I thought about it, and realized that I’m a little teeny tiny bit of a control freak. Ironically enough, it seemed like I was more scared on the tandem jump BECAUSE I wasn’t doing anything myself. Although Brendan was sure it was because I didn’t do the tandem with him. After a lot of thought and speculation, I resolved that if I ever felt like trying again, I would have to go through jump school and do it all myself, and that would probably be WAY less scary.

But I was pretty darn scared, thinking of my first jump. Unlike climbing, you can’t rehearse it all on toprope before you do it. Two jumpmasters are beside you during free fall, to make sure you don’t tumble out of control through the air, and to make sure you pull your parachute, but then you’re by yourself, flying the parachute, steering it, and landing. That part you have to onsight! So I was really afraid, thinking I had to just do it, with no real practice before the first jump.

But luckily there is a way to practice at least the free falling part. Jay took me to a windtunnel in Denver on Saturday. It’s a glass room, with a highspeed wind generator below it. You go in there, and fly around inside it like a fish in a fishbowl, and get to learn how to control your body in the air. Ten minutes in the wind tunnel is the equivalent of making fifteen skydives. So I felt way more confident after flying around in the wind tunnel with Jay, learning how to make a stable body position and move around in the air. I knew what it felt like, and that it would work. It’s funny being a total beginner. I was trying as hard as I could to stay on my stomach and keep in one place. Jay was flying around upside down, flipping around in circles, and zooming straight up and down, like a cartoon superhero, which is called “free flying,” and is super advanced. So after the wind tunnel, I still figured I’d be terrified leaving the door of the airplane, but I knew what to expect as soon as I got out into free fall and would even be right next to two jumpmasters, and then I just had to not do anything stupid to fly the parachute and land it.

Sunday was my first jump. On the first plane ride, I had my good friends riding up with me–Brendan, Jay, Chris Pope, packed along the bench seats of the Otter with all the other jumpers as we flew up to 12,000 feet. I was SO SCARED, imagining going out the door. At the last minute, the wind reports were too strong, and I wasn’t allowed to jump since I’m a student. Everyone else popped out the door, and I felt sick watching them all fly out, with all the cold wind roaring into the plane body. We rode the plane back down, and I have to admit, I was kind of relieved!! But then we had to wait around for hours, for the wind to calm. I kind of started getting more impatient than scared, which was good. I went out to the parking lot and called Virgil. He said, “You’re going to be fine! I was completely terrified in the plane, for at least twenty jumps! Holly was so scared, she could barely pass her first level! It will get better, I promise, and then you are going to love it.” Then he got off the phone so he could start checking on plane tickets to come out here next week. When I was freeing the Salathe, I felt totally demoralized because I had fallen on the Headwall pitch three times, and was stuck on a ledge for days, not wanting to give up. I called my closest friends on my cell phone, desperate for pep talks. Virgil’s was the best. I can’t remember what exactly he said, but after I talked to him, I sent the headwall.

So on the next plane ride up, I was way less scared. As soon as we got out the door, it was great! Brendan and another jumpmaster were next to me, Chris was flying right in front of me taking pictures and laughing. The winds kicked up hard after I pulled my parachute, and I couldn’t fly back to the right landing spot, and had to land in a nearby field. I kept trying to stay calm and fly forward to the landing area beside the airport, but I kept staying in one place, because of the headwinds. I didn’t want to come down on the highway, or over the runway, or in any ditches or fences or buildings, so I was kind of worried that I couldn’t seem to get anywhere I wanted to go. So finally I just picked a field and tried to stay in the center of it, and had a feather soft landing, not at all like I had been fearing. Brendan was very proud and relieved! Me too. Today it’s back to the drop zone, a lot more excited and way less afraid….and then back to Rifle on Tuesday. Falling out of the sky definitely puts big whippers into perspective.
Brendan McHugh is very relieved