Dropped the wife off Sunday morning.....

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From 13,500' for her first ever jump...to celebrate her 51st birthday. Unfortunately I believe the little missus is now hooked.

With over 11k hours in the air flying, I'll still never jump out of an airplane.

Why? Was the plane broke

Who is that in the mirror on the right side of the second picture? Wow, your wife has balls.

Airplane wasn't broke Rick, maybe she's getting ready for a bailout?

Randy the guy in the mirror is the pilot, looked like he was 15 years old and I couldn't get him to roll the Otter on the way down...said he didn't have *that* much time in it.

Jumping out of a perfectly good airplane is a karmic debit.

I'm delighted that she enjoyed it, though

I'd do it. At least, I think I would.

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Jumping out of a perfectly good airplane is a karmic debit.

Heh heh! What about a not so good airplane?
My first jump was with a small outfit from The Valley in Nova Scotia. They flew over to PEI as the first ever to offer skydiving lessons. After being two hours late, all the crew jumped out except the pilot upon approach. We thought it was just a cool way to get us all psyched up. We found out later that day it was because they all refused to land in this particular plane.

As the lessons began, we noticed an engine access panel held down with duct tape, the tachometer was 'missing' and my Buddy noticed gas leaking out of one wing. We mentioned the gas to the pilot and he said, "Oh no problem! It's gravity fed and if the top fuel cap is loose it leaks from the bottom" Didn't sound right.... Especially when it continued to leak after the 'tightening' and he had us push the plane over onto a hill so that wing was in the air to stop the leak. I think it just leaked less.

Finally!!! Did you know you can actually start a modern plane with the old WWI, spin the prop, method? Yup, the starter was gone and this is how he started it! Explains why his nickname was "The Spinmiester". We had previously assumed it was because of some aerial acrobatics he must be famous for.

I don't know why I ever got in that plane. Young and foolish I guess, but at least I had a parachute!

Honest, true story! In any case, my congratulations to your wife. It's the ultimate adrenaline rush but it's a true test of character to make that leap of faith. If she was like me, she was on a high for 24 sleepless hours afterwards.

My wife and I made the mistake of taking a flight with a small plane over the Hoover Dam and the Grand Canyon with a pilot who had been drinking. We never noticed it until we were up. We kept saying to each other during the flight how thankful we were that we created wills just prior to that trip. We had two other passengers with us on that flight who could not speak english and also could not hold in their stomach contents. The combination of the small aircraft (which we had never experienced before), the pilot's condition and the fetid stench of stomach stew created a very harrowing flight indeed.

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I believe the little missus is now hooked.

Well, detach her then...

Bren R.

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With over 11k hours in the air flying, I'll still never jump out of an airplane.

Everyone should skydive at least once in their life. There is no other experience that even comes close (bungee jumping is a kick, but just not the same).

Definitely do it Richard. My first jump was off static line with the ‘assistance’ of some very persuasive jump masters out the back of a C130. After that was tandem and then on my own…..

I've always liked the C130. Would be awesome to jump from the ass-end of one of those.

OOH. That's a great airplane, Peter. I spent a LOT of time in them in Nam (Flew all over the place with a motion picture crew). Had my 2nd scariest moment over there in one. Wind sheer trying to land in Saigon.

I'm sitting in the row down the center or the plane looking toward the windows.

The wind was giving us all kinds of problems, and we were being bounced around in our seats pretty good. We had to go around the flight pattern several times before we could get the thing on the ground.

At one point, about 100 feet off the ground (just a guess, but we were close), we were rolled 90 degrees and I found myself hanging in my straps looking out the window straight down at the ground (can you say barf bag?

). But, thanks to a great airplane, and an even greater pilot we got down safely. Very scary.

One time, a hairy spider crawled right across my bare foot and I shrieked like a girl.

Jack, I have enormous respect for what you and others went through in serving this country.

Really, the spider wasn't even all that hairy. All the more.