You are now entering the drop zone
Oakville’s iFly Toronto is a $10-million wind tunnel bringing skydiving indoors
“Ready?”
I watch my skydiving instructor Adrian say the word but I can’t hear a thing.
He’s standing on the mesh in iFLY Toronto’s wind tunnel, surrounded by deafening noise, motioning for me to fall forward.
It’s a 20-metre drop from the mesh to the floor and air is swirling around the tall chamber at 160 kilometres an hour. That’s stronger than some hurricaneforce winds. So no, Adrian. I’m not ready. But when it comes to indoor skydiving — and real skydiving, of course — you have to make that leap. I pull my arms close to my chest, tilt forward, and let gravity do the rest. And then, sure enough, I’m flying. Did I mention I’m afraid of heights? Thousands have flown in iFLY Toronto’s wind tunnel since its opening in May, including thrill-seekers training for outdoor skydives and people like me who would never jump out of a plane.
The $10-million facility in east Oakville is only six months old, but the hobby’s Canuck connection goes back decades.
Now popular around the world, indoor recreational skydiving was actually invented by a Canadian. Quebec inventor Jean Saint-Germain patented his “Levitationarium for air flotation of humans,” or vertical wind tunnel, in 1984.
So how does this technology actually allow people to fly?
At iFLY Toronto, the wind tunnels use powerful fans to produce an upward air flow capable of levitating human beings.
The wind is actually generated from above, not below, the air chamber. The fans are mounted in the upper leg of the tunnel, and wind is funnelled down the sides, where it flows underneath the chamber, then up again through the mesh floor — which then lifts you into the air.
This creates an ongoing cycle of air flow, referred to by iFLY as a “recirculating” wind tunnel.
The sensation of being inside the cylindrical flight chamber isn’t the lurch you feel going down a rollercoaster, because the “recirculating” air means there’s pressure on your body from all sides.
That means you never feel like you’re falling, which was welcome news to me — I hate that stomach-lurch sensation. It’s definitely a rush, though, especially when you figure out the subtle movements that start lifting you higher and higher.
“I’m not a thrill seeker at all,” said Joady Guyot as she suited up for her first flight one morning in September. “I don’t usually get a lot of adrenalin out of those things, but this is something I wanted to try.”
That didn’t stop the 42-year-old Toronto resident from being nervous about the whole thing.
“I think I’m going to bounce around like a ping-pong ball,” she said with a laugh.
Her friend Gillian Stovel Rivers, 37, was all over it when Guyot suggested the idea.
“I’m excited,” said the Burlington resident. “I’m only worried that I’m not worried.”
Safety is paramount at iFLY, staff members note. An operator controls the wind speed, which is based on someone’s weight and skill level, while an instructor works with the flyer inside the chamber.
“All the instructors have a skydiving background,” said Terri de Wit, general manager for iFLY Toronto.
Those instructors stay with you for the entire flight and give you hand signals to help you correct your flight posture.
It’s almost impossible to hear inside the wind tunnel, plus you’re wearing earplugs, so those hand signals are the only way to communicate. People get to learn those basics at a training session prior to suiting up for their time in the tunnel. Training is part of the introductory iFLY package that features two flights for $72.
Instructor Adrian Uracz has been skydiving for two years and has done around 200 outdoor dives. He went through a month-long training process before starting his role at iFLY.
Since then, he’s taught flyers aged 4 to 97, including people with Down syndrome, cerebral palsy and other disabilities. “There’s a guy who is paraplegic from the legs down, and he flew,” he said. “(That) was one of my coolest ones.” Both Guyot and Stovel Rivers enjoyed their thrilling first skydiving experiences. “There were a couple times where I kept going higher and I was like, this is it — I’m going to the roof,” said Guyot. At the end of my session, one of the instructors asked me if I really would like to go to the roof. Still not feeling ready, I stammered out an unsure yes. Then up we went, spinning through the air all the way to the top of the wind tunnel and back down again. It was as close to skydiving as I’ll ever get — no plane necessary.