Excitement prevails but weather has other ideas
Cloudy conditions wreck rare chance to do tandem skydive with Skyhawks
After living in Saskatchewan for 20 years, I don’t even want to begin to count how many times I’ve been let down by the weather.
But this time, heavy cloud cover wrecked what may have been my only chance at a rare opportunity — a tandem skydive with the Skyhawks, the Canadian Armed Forces parachute team.
Three weather conditions dictate whether a jump will happen: cloud cover, wind, and rain. On Tuesday, the Skyhawks were supposed to do a tandem jump around 11 a.m., landing in Dr. Gerhard Herzberg Park before a crowd of veterans and other spectators at the Sherbrooke Community Centre.
However, because of the clouds, even the backup plan of just the Skyhawks jumping, while the two other tandem jumpers and I would watch from inside the plane, also couldn’t happen, and they had to cancel.
The jump would have been a kickoff for the NASCAR Pinty’s Series, but depending on the weather, the Skyhawks will also perform today around 7 p.m., between races at the Wyant Group Raceway.
We were only able to get up to around 1,600 feet above ground level (AGL).
For the Skyhawks to jump, they need about 3,000 feet AGL, and a tandem jump needs to be much higher, about 8,000 feet AGL.
In the 12 hours before heading out with the Skyhawks, I kept going back and forth between excitement and absolute terror.
The one thing I was wary about wasn’t the jumping-from-a-plane part, but what it would feel like on the way down.
If it was similar to that fair ride that looks like a boat swinging back and forth, I didn’t think I’d be really interested.
However, in the brief training session, my instructor, Sgt. Daniel Jenkins, assured me it’s nothing like the feeling of fair rides or bungee jumping. In skydiving, when you start falling at a fairly high speed, it’s less of a shock because you were already going fast in the plane, he said.
During the training, even though at that point it was pretty clear I wouldn’t be able to jump, Jenkins made fear almost impossible. He made sure I was prepared and really excited to jump if the weather cleared.
As we took off, I started really hoping the clouds would suddenly clear. Even just sitting in the plane with the door open was exhilarating.
It was disappointing to get psyched up and then not be able to jump, but it was great to have a glimpse of what the Skyhawks do every day.
Now I’m dying to actually jump out of a plane ... and I’m not really sure if that’s a good or bad thing.
It was disappointing to get psyched up and then not be able to jump, but it was great to have a glimpse of what the Skyhawks do every day.