# So how many skydiving deaths are normal? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 15, 2018, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980 "2018-10-15T14:25:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![DinoR](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dinor/32/2821_2.png) [@DinoR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DinoR)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2018, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/41 "2018-10-16T23:51:20Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > I’ve never jumped with a static line, but if it is unhooked, does it mean that your parachute simply fails to open? or what happens? The static line deploys the main chute without jumper intervention. It’s the norm for most conventional military jumps and how the jumps made as US Airborne school are made. When you’re already jumping from low altitudes with a chute that doesn’t slow a jumper as much as the typical civilian chutes do once deployed, waiting because you just expect the chute to open can be “suboptimal.” Combat jumps can be dicey if the main chute doesn’t deploy even if you react quickly. That’s what the cadence refers to. I was not airborne; I believe Bear\_Nenno is if you want someone who’s actually eperienced. Creighton Abrams turned down a perfectly good Airborne school slot. I saw absolutely no need to ignore his superb leadership example. > [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > The worst part of skydiving isn’t the jump, but the ride up. The ride up still sounds much nicer. I have plenty of experience packed into the back of military aircraft like sardines. The ride up sounds like a perfectly good oppportunity for a nap. It’s the post-nap part that I prefer to avoid. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/42 "2018-10-17T00:56:56Z")
> [@DinoR](#): > > The ride up still sounds much nicer. I have plenty of experience packed into the back of military aircraft like sardines. The ride up sounds like a perfectly good oppportunity for a nap. It’s the post-nap part that I prefer to avoid. Realize that the guy on your left is probably going to reek of skunk weed, the one on the right is trying not to vomit from low level turbulence, and the guy in the bench facing you is giving you the “THIS IS MY FIRST JUMP EVER AND I’M SURE WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE!” eyes that make me hope I’m ahead of him in the chain instead of trapped behind him. The reason I didn’t want to do tandem, other than not wanting to be strapped onto the front of some guy like a giant papoose baby, was that I didn’t want to be trapped in the front of the plane (the joke on the first jump was I got stuck there anyway because of weight distribution). After the claustrophobic flight up it was a relief to climb out, hang onto the side of the aircraft like James Bond doing some kind of crazy stunt, and then let off, even if the first time I did tumble like three full turns before I stabilized and one of the jumpmasters was trying like crazy to move back over to me and ended up crashing with us, nearly knocking the other one loose. Good fun, but I just can’t hang around all of the stoners who won’t stop talking about their next formation jump. They aren’t quite as bad about talking of nothing other than their hobby as climbers are, but I’d rather spend time with scuba divers, who at least tend to nap or drink quietly on the ride back from the dive site. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![DinoR](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dinor/32/2821_2.png) [@DinoR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DinoR)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/43 "2018-10-17T01:25:56Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > Realize The only part that sounds like it would interfere with a nap is the exit plan. We’ve all got out fears. I spent too much time packed like sardines into vehicles with smelly people to have that part interfere with sleep. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/44 "2018-10-17T02:15:30Z")
> [@Xema](#): > > Which means that around one jump in 142,000 is fatal. Considering that a lifetime total of several thousand jumps is a lot, this tends to imply the sport is reasonably safe. > > And it should be noted that fatal accident are rarely random events - as is true of essentially all branches of aviation (and indeed much of human activity), most involve multiple failures to adhere to known safe procedures. So a jumper who makes a habit of respecting those procedures can expect a far lower than average chance of a fatal accident. > [@snowthx](#): > > Right. But, skydiving (and scuba diving) have nearly no margin for error. If something goes wrong, the chances of being killed are pretty high (as opposed to just being maimed). Skydivers have a fatality rate of .7 per 100,000 per jump. That appears to be a little worse than scuba diving by a certified recreational diver. > **[Scuba diving fatalities](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scuba_diving_fatalities)** > > Scuba diving fatalities are deaths occurring while scuba diving or as a consequence of scuba diving. The risks of dying during recreational, scientific or commercial diving are small, and on scuba, deaths are usually associated with poor gas management, poor buoyancy control, equipment misuse, entrapment, rough water conditions and pre-existing health problems. Some fatalities are inevitable and caused by unforeseeable situations escalating out of control, though the majority of diving fatalities... Scuba divers experience : “…fatality rate per dive is a better measure of exposure risk, A mean annual fatality rate of 0.48 deaths per 100,000 student dives per year and 0.54 deaths per 100,000 BSAC dives per year and 1.03 deaths per 100,000 non-BSAC dives per year during 2007.” I don’t buy, “No margin for error” in scuba diving. Certified scuba divers are trained to “Buddy-breathe”, as well as handling a sudden cutoff of air. But then again, resorts often permit folks to scuba dive without instruction. Here are some stats from wiki based on diver fatality data: 90% died with their weight belt on. (relevance not specified - ditching the weight belt may have been helpful in many of the cases, but not necessarily all.). 86% were alone when they died (either diving solo or separated from their buddy). 50% did not inflate their buoyancy compensator. Number 2 and 3 sounds like the divers weren’t trying very hard to follow proper procedure. Number 1 is interesting - taking off your weight belt will bring you to the surface (though the diver must be careful to breathe out slowly all the way up). The point: skydiving looks fairly dangerous to me, comparable to (but also more dangerous than) scuba diving without training. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/45 "2018-10-17T02:40:34Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > I don’t buy, “No margin for error” in scuba diving. Certified scuba divers are trained to “Buddy-breathe”, as well as handling a sudden cutoff of air. But then again, resorts often permit folks to scuba dive without instruction. Here are some stats from wiki based on diver fatality data: 90% died with their weight belt on. (relevance not specified - ditching the weight belt may have been helpful in many of the cases, but not necessarily all.). > 86% were alone when they died (either diving solo or separated from their buddy). > 50% did not inflate their buoyancy compensator. Number 2 and 3 sounds like the divers weren’t trying very hard to follow proper procedure. Number 1 is interesting - taking off your weight belt will bring you to the surface (though the diver must be careful to breathe out slowly all the way up). I don’t buy that resorts let people dive unsupervised without training (at least, none that I’ve every heard of) but many resorts will provide a very abbreviated scuba diving course that meets the minimum requirements without doing any real evaluation of diver confidence under pressure. Also, ditching a weight belt or weight pouches pretty much guarantees a rapid ascent; there is no controlling the ascent rate without them, at least from 40 feet or so, so dumping weights is a last ditch save that will likely end you up in a decompression chamber if done at any depth. But the vast majority of scuba diving accidents and fatalities are due to three things; either completely ignoring safety procedures and the buddy rule (especially in overhead environments), getting plowed over on the surface by some inattentive boater, or an injury after getting on the boat but still encumbered with gear and weights, which is why I make a habit of coming up right underneath the dive boat and ascending just beneath the stern. I also leave a healthy amount of air for decompression (even in a no-deco dive) and wait for a gap between crowds so I’m not gang pressed into rushing onto the boat. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/46 "2018-10-17T03:07:04Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > I don’t buy that resorts let people dive unsupervised without training (at least, none that I’ve every heard of) but many resorts will provide a very abbreviated scuba diving course that meets the minimum requirements without doing any real evaluation of diver confidence under pressure. I dived at a couple of resorts where they didn’t ask for my PADI card. This was back in the 1980s though. Also, recollection is vague. > [@](#): > > Also, ditching a weight belt or weight pouches pretty much guarantees a rapid ascent; there is no controlling the ascent rate without them, at least from 40 feet or so, so dumping weights is a last ditch save that will likely end you up in a decompression chamber if done at any depth. I was imagining a 25-50 foot sport dive, for under 40 minutes. IIRC no decompression stops would be necessary, though the tables assume fairly slow ascent. There’s certainly a risk of air embolism with rapid ascent; do you believe decompression sickness is likely under the scenario I sketched? It’s been a while since I’ve scuba dived. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/47 "2018-10-17T03:26:06Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > I dived at a couple of resorts where they didn’t ask for my PADI card. This was back in the 1980s though. Also, recollection is vague. I was imagining a 25-50 foot sport dive, for under 40 minutes. IIRC no decompression stops would be necessary, though the tables assume fairly slow ascent. There’s certainly a risk of air embolism with rapid ascent; do you believe decompression sickness is likely under the scenario I sketched? It’s been a while since I’ve scuba dived. Back in the 'Eighties when dive certification was less of an issue I can believe that. Today, I would expect any place promoting itself as a resort would at a minimum at least look for a C-card or would provide a divemaster to any non-cert diver and limit the dive depth to ~30 feet. I don’t have a PADI dive table in front of me but looking at a US Navy Air Decompression Table, at 50 feet you have 100 minutes of no decompression diving. The general rule of thumb is that above 60 feet the likelihood that you’ll injure yourself in a dive from decompression illness or rapid ascent is almost negligible, though if you have previous dives (especially to a greater depth or for a long duration with a short surface interval) then the chance of problems increases. I have seen so many people–even experienced divers–do so many really stupid things and not suffer consequences that I know there is a lot of conservatism built into those tables and models. The fact that the vast majority of divers don’t even bother planning a dive or remember how to read a dive table is evidence that there is a lot of margins built into diving limits. (The last time I was on a dive boat and pulled out a standard dive table just to double check the deco stops the divemaster literally asked me, “What is that?” and did not remember using the table in his training.) You really have to work or be spectacularly unlucky to get injured under the water, and be inattentive to the environment during ascent to get injured coming out (run over by a skiff, have weights dropped on you from above, ascent into a cloud of jellyfish). Skydiving, however, doesn’t enjoy such luxuries. You have a backup chute and an MPAAD or CYPRESS, but there are still plenty of ways for things to fail that you cannot fix in descent. And you are really reliant on the person packing the parachute to do things right; packing a parachute isn’t difficult but it does require attention to detail. Taking a chute that someone else packed was always the scariest thing about doing a dive, especially _after_ I learned about all the things that can be done wrong in the packing. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![popomomo\_cocoyoyo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3da27b/32.png) [@popomomo\_cocoyoyo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/popomomo_cocoyoyo)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/48 "2018-10-17T04:18:19Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > The worst part of skydiving isn’t the jump, but the ride up. I did my one and only jump 30 years ago but I still remember everything about that day, except for the ride up. From the moment they told me to get on board, I was just too petrified to notice anything except the voices in my head going “don’t jump you fool,” “don’t be a chicken, you must jump,” then I stepped out of the plane and suddenly it became one of the most memorable days of my life. It’s so quiet up there. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/49 "2018-10-17T12:53:36Z")
> [@Melbourne](#): > > He jumped into the icy blast his static line unhooked, > > AND HE AIN’T GONNA JUMP NO MORE. > > Gory, Gory, what a helluva way to die, > Gory, Gory, what a helluva way to die, > Gory, Gory, what a helluva way to die, > > He ain’t gonna jump no more. In the Canadian army it went like this; The sergeant was the last to jump, the first to hit the ground The sergeant was the last to jump, the first to hit the ground The sergeant was the last to jump, the first to hit the ground And he ain’t gonna jump no more, And the Lord said, Glory, Glory, what a hell of a way to die With your rifle up your ass and a bullet in your eye Glory, Glory, what a hell of a way to go When your balls hang lower than your paratrooper boots! ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/50 "2018-10-17T13:08:29Z")
> [@md2000](#): > > My impression was that this was about the troops who were jumping in but were not regular paratroopers. Obviously the real paratroop regiments, that would expect to jump many times during the war, actually trained. but I gathered that there were a number of regiments where the plan said - “these guys will get there by jumping” even though they were not trained paratroops. (Just like the glider troops). > > You die if your chute doesn’t open properly. If you don’t land properly or the landing zone is crap, you break a leg or ankle. Do you have a cite for guys who were not trained paratroopers jumping on D-Day? As far as I know that didn’t happen either - the US troops were all 101st or 82nd Airborne, the British & Canadian were all 6th Airborne. And it makes no sense. Are you saying that by sending untrained troops up, they would minimize injuries because there would be fewer injuries or deaths in training? A significant portion of paratrooper training is in how to land without injury - which is far more difficult when you’re carrying 70 lbs of gear as a combat infantryman than it is as an unencumbered recreational jumper. You’ll get a lot more combat effective troopers on the ground if you train them first. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/51 "2018-10-17T22:53:37Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > I’ve never jumped with a static line, but if it is unhooked, does it mean that your parachute simply fails to open? or what happens? They scraped him off the tarmac like a blob of strawberry jam (repeat) He ain’t gonna jump no more. Tangent: Tar Mac is a Macadamised (‘made’) surface that has been “sealed” with tar. Hence a ‘made’ road, and a ‘sealed’ road. Macadam was a (?) Scottish engineer who developed the process of using a road roller, water, gravel and sand in the correct proportions. Nowadays, the ‘tarmac’ at an airport is often concrete. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/52 "2018-10-17T23:08:27Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#): > > Do you have a cite for guys who were not trained paratroopers jumping on D-Day? As far as I know that didn’t happen either - the US troops were all 101st or 82nd Airborne, the British & Canadian were all 6th Airborne. > > And it makes no sense. Are you saying that by sending untrained troops up, they would minimize injuries because there would be fewer injuries or deaths in training? A significant portion of paratrooper training is in how to land without injury - which is far more difficult when you’re carrying 70 lbs of gear as a combat infantryman than it is as an unencumbered recreational jumper. You’ll get a lot more combat effective troopers on the ground if you train them first. One of my university lecturers did (WWII) jump training (that is, suiting up, clicking in, and landing training) without ever jumping out of an airplane. Once you’ve done the training, jumping out of the airplane (with a static line) should be just a formality 🙂 He said that, for him, once he got used to jumping off a tower without hurting himself, It gave him the (obviously false) instinctive feeling that he could jump from any height without hurting himself. ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2018, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/53 "2018-10-17T23:10:25Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > In the Canadian army it went like this; > > The sergeant was the last to jump, the first to hit the ground > The sergeant was the last to jump, the first to hit the ground > The sergeant was the last to jump, the first to hit the ground > And he ain’t gonna jump no more, > > And the Lord said, > > Glory, Glory, what a hell of a way to die > With your rifle up your ass and a bullet in your eye > Glory, Glory, what a hell of a way to go > When your balls hang lower than your paratrooper boots! In the Marines it went like this, I’d sing the cadence as we’re double-timing… **C-130 rolling down the strip** _(platoon echo singing - C-130 rolling down the strip)_ **Recon daddy gonna take a little trip** _(platoon echo singing - Recon daddy gonna take a little trip)_ – and continue echo each line below \*\*Stand up, buckle up, shuffle to the door Jump right out and count to four If that chute don’t open wide I’ve got another right by my side If that chute don’t open round I’ll be the first mother on the ground Singing lo righta left right…\*\* Except in our case we were artillery, so I’d change the verse from ‘Recon daddy’ to ‘Marine artillery’. And if we weren’t near BEQs or PXs and such, I’d also change ‘first mother’ to ‘first fucker’. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/54 "2018-10-18T12:53:53Z")
> [@Melbourne](#): > > One of my university lecturers did (WWII) jump training (that is, suiting up, clicking in, and landing training) without ever jumping out of an airplane. Once you’ve done the training, jumping out of the airplane (with a static line) should be just a formality 🙂 > He said that, for him, once he got used to jumping off a tower without hurting himself, It gave him the (obviously false) instinctive feeling that he could jump from any height without hurting himself. Did he actually do any combat jumps though? Or did he get that far in the training & get reassigned? ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_Door](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Bill\_Door](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_Door)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/55 "2018-10-18T13:15:01Z")
I met a man whose brother died in a skydiving accident. I was kind of a jerk about it. My son turned 21 and I turned 50 in the same month. To celebrate he and I traveled to Alabama (state motto: Where life is cheap) to a place that offered accelerated free fall allowing patrons to jump from 13,500 feet on their first day. Everything went well for us, and later on I was telling this story to someone I met at a Christmas party and he told me about his brother who died in a skydiving accident. The guy’s brother was skydiving and became disoriented in cloud cover and ended up landing in Lake Michigan where he drowned. So I, like a jerk, defending the sport say; “Technically, that was a swimming accident.” ---
**Author:** ![K2500](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f6c823/32.png) [@K2500](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/K2500)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/56 "2018-10-18T13:50:10Z")
> [@popomomo\_cocoyoyo](#): > > I did my one and only jump 30 years ago but I still remember everything about that day, except for the ride up. From the moment they told me to get on board, I was just too petrified to notice anything except the voices in my head going “don’t jump you fool,” “don’t be a chicken, you must jump,” then I stepped out of the plane and suddenly it became one of the most memorable days of my life. It’s so quiet up there. A few years ago I made probably four or five static line jumps. I remember the ride up and decent just fine, but the few moments between the jumpmaster yelling “Go” and seeing that sweet, sweet fabric above my head are missing forever. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/57 "2018-10-18T14:17:02Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#): > > Do you have a cite for guys who were not trained paratroopers jumping on D-Day? As far as I know that didn’t happen either - the US troops were all 101st or 82nd Airborne, the British & Canadian were all 6th Airborne. > > And it makes no sense. Are you saying that by sending untrained troops up, they would minimize injuries because there would be fewer injuries or deaths in training? A significant portion of paratrooper training is in how to land without injury - which is far more difficult when you’re carrying 70 lbs of gear as a combat infantryman than it is as an unencumbered recreational jumper. You’ll get a lot more combat effective troopers on the ground if you train them first. The idea seemed to be that there would be far more accidents from putting everyone through repeated training than from a single cold first attempt. I don’t know. It sticks in my mind as a relatively callous military calculation, but a very Army thing to do. Maybe true, maybe not. Those were the days before Snopes. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/58 "2018-10-18T14:47:18Z")
For what it’s worth, the first verse we sang when I was in Boy Scouts was “_He jumped from twenty thousand feet and didn’t pull the cord_”, repeated three times and followed with “And he ain’t gonna jump no more!”. ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_Door](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Bill\_Door](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_Door)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/59 "2018-10-18T22:17:07Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#): > > (snip)And it makes no sense. Are you saying that by sending untrained troops up, they would minimize injuries because there would be fewer injuries or deaths in training? A significant portion of paratrooper training is in how to land without injury - which is far more difficult when you’re carrying 70 lbs of gear as a combat infantryman than it is as an unencumbered recreational jumper. You’ll get a lot more combat effective troopers on the ground if you train them first. This came up in a work of fiction. In _The Bridge on the Rive Kwai_ William Holden’s character; an untrained soldier was expected to parachute into Burma on a mission to destroy the bridge. The officer in charge of the mission says: > [@Major Warden](#): > > Sir, it’s most annoying. They say, in view of the time element, they don’t think a few practice jumps would be worthwhile… No, they say if you make one jump, you’ve only got 50% chance of injury, two jumps, 80%, and three jumps, you’re bound to catch a packet. The consensus of opinion is that the most sensible thing for Major Shears to do is to go ahead and jump, and hope for the best. ---
**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2018, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980/60 "2018-10-18T22:45:40Z")
> [@Bill\_Door](#): > > The guy’s brother was skydiving and became disoriented in cloud cover and ended up landing in Lake Michigan where he drowned. In an [infamous 1967 disaster](http://www.sanduskyregister.com/story/201708030031), 18 jumpers exited a B-25 over cloud cover to find they were miles from where they’d planned, and over Lake Erie. 16 of them drowned. (Could this have been the incident you heard about?) It was subsequently made a rule that you must be able to see the ground. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-many-skydiving-deaths-are-normal/822980.md?page=4)