So this came up on my Twitter feed. This is scary AF, some real “Band of Brothers jumping over Normandy in heavy flak” type skydiving craziness:
I can’t actually find a cite for what happened other than loads of “Woah WTF scary!??!” tweets. Is this footage even real (it looks pretty real) was everyone (including the pilots) OK?
It’s an old incident from 2013. All pilots and skydivers survived without injury, although one of the planes crashed after everyone had bailed out.
Fortuitous of the pilot to wear a chute. I wonder if that’s standard practice.
I never worked as a jump pilot. I think @Richard_Pearse did at one point. He may know for sure.
My impression is yes they do. Or at least the smart ones do. AFAIK there’s no US regulatory requirement for jump pilots to do it, but I’ll check the regs later and report back if I’m wrong.
The special risk of piloting jump planes is if somebody’s chute hangs up on the airplane, or they jump wrongly and bodily crash into the tail and damage it. In either case the airplane may become instantly unflyable. At that point your choices are reduced to: parachute out or die on ground impact. I’ll take Door #1, ThankYouVeryMuch.
I never did either but I did work on an airfield with a busy jump business. It was definitely standard practice to wear a chute, but I’m not sure if it is codified in the aviation rules. This FAA safety document implies that the requirement to wear parachutes may be stipulated in the door modification approvals for the actual aircraft.
Aircraft Modifications
Common examples of aircraft modifications include:
• Removal of a cabin door and a jump door installed or air deflector installed.
• Seat belts added (every skydiver is required to use a seat belt).
• Steps installed or handholds for jumper climbout.
• Door removal or modification approvals often have provisions that require all
occupants, including the pilots, to wear a parachute if the door is opened.
• Airspeed limitations related to door use, which must be placarded. Speed
limitations for Cessnas are usually between 80-110 mph for door opening or
flight with the door open.
This seems like as good a place as any to post this slacks-soiler I caught the other day:
Yes, it is. I don’t know if it’s officially required or not, but the jump pilots I’ve noticed all wore one even if they weren’t intending to jump. Very much a “just in case” measure.
We had a crazy skydiving not-quite-disaster a few years ago at Byron (CA) airport. As the plane was slowing down for the jumpers to jump, a substantial chunk of the horizontal stabilizer broke off.
The jumpers were all able to scramble out of the plane.
The pilot was not wearing a chute. I think it was not their regular practice to wear chutes. I don’t know if they’ve made it a rule since. Anyway, the pilot was somehow able to wrestle the plane down to a landing back on the airport. IIRC the plane took even more damage when that happened. But the pilot wasn’t injured.
I’m not sure whether he should’ve gone straight to the nearest convenience market and bought a Powerball ticket because he’s proven that’s the luckiest day of his life, or he ought to never gamble a penny ever again since he already spent a lifetime’s luck in those 10 minutes.
Yowza!
Or he may have borrowed stolen all of someone else’s luck. At that same airport, we fly gliders too. About two years ago our tow plane crashed, killing the tow pilot who was one of our most revered members.
Scroll down for a pic of the wreckage.
The comment section (all anonymous) seems to include many remarks from people who were familiar with the activities there. Many of them are likely people I knew.
One of my co-workers / best long-term friends ever was crippled in a jump plane accident. He was an airline captain and jump instructor until the fateful day. Then, after 6 months in ICU he was an unemployed paraplegic. 6 months later he committed suicide.
The jump plane was a Twin Otter with 1 pilot and IIRC 10 jumpers aboard. They had an engine failure after takeoff and stalled/spun in from about 400 feet AGL. No chance for anyone to jump out. Only two people were alive when the paramedics got there. One died 12 hours later & my friend was then the sole survivor with most of his skeleton shattered.
Nasty business.
Back when I was active in sport parachuting (a good while ago now) it was definitely standard practice for jump pilots to wear a parachute. Jumpers are hard on aircraft, and the aircraft in question are disproportionately old, well-used, somewhat tired examples of their type.