Skydiving

Skydiving, also known as parachuting, is a sport in which a person jumps from an aircraft or other tall structure, experiencing a freefall before returning to the ground with the help of a deployable parachute on his or her back.

There are several ways to go skydiving including the tandem jump, the static line, the accelerated freefall, base jumping, skysurfing and in a indoor skydiving.

Tandem skydiving involves a first-time or novice skydiver being attached to an experienced skydiver with a harness.

Static line skydiving involves a line attached to the skydiver that is connected to the plane in order to ensure the parachute opens. This is usually the next step up from tandem skydiving.

Accelerated freefall involves an instructor holding onto a novice skydiver until their parachute is deployed.

BASE (buildings, antennae, spans, earth) jumping involves diving from the top of tall buildings, antennae bridges and cliffs.

Skysurfing involves skydiving with a board attached to the diver's feet.

Indoor skydiving involves a vertical wind tunnel that allows diver's to float in mid-air, but close to the ground for added safety. 

Due to a risk of injury involved in skydiving, participants must be at least 18 years old to go. Some companies offer skydiving for those as young as 16 years of age, but only with parental consent.

Nevertheless, it's worthwhile to note that fatalities are rare in skydiving. About 30 skydivers are killed annually in the United States, equating to one death per 100,000 jumps.

Precautions such as carrying two parachutes are required in most places. All parachutes are inspected and re-packed by certified parachute riggers. Some skydivers also use automatic activation devices that open their reserve parachute at a safe altitude in case they fail to activate it themselves.

Most injuries and fatalities occur due to a diver performing unsafe maneuvers, sometimes resulting in high speed impacts with the ground. Changing wind conditions, canopy collisions with other divers and equipment failure are other risk factors. This being the case, do not skydive in uncertain and inclement weather, dive with experienced divers when you start out and make sure your equipment has been double and/or triple checked before jumping.

If you are interested in skydiving, visit the United States Parachute Association's website to find an official dropzone in your area. You will then be able to schedule a jump at your convenience.

For your first jump, your preferred method will probably be a tandem jump with an experienced instructor. This type of jump relieves first-time anxiety of jumping alone and puts most, if not all, the control in the instructor's hands. A static line or accelerated freefall might be attempted for the second or third jump.

A typical jump has the diver exiting an aircraft anywhere from 3,000 to 13,000 feet in the air. Jumping at lower altitudes requires the parachute to be deployed immediately after jumping; jumping at higher altitudes, however, allows the diver to freefall for five to seven minutes before releasing the parachute.

Once the chute is deployed, the diver can control the direction and speed with toggles on their steering lines attached to the parachute's trailing edge. Using these toggles, they can aim for the landing site and come to a gentle stop.

Andre-Jacques Gernerin made the first successful parachute jump from a hot-air ballon in 1797. Thereafter, militaries began developing parachute technology to save aircrews from emergencies and, later, to deliver soldiers to battlefields. 

Parachuting competitions date back to the 1930s, though it did not become an international sport until 1952.