Skydiving is dangerously unregulated and there’s no room for error
RTÉ presenter calls for aviation chiefs to protect public from risks
A SKYDIVER who had a neardeath experience when his parachute failed to open believes Ireland needs to regulate the sector to prevent ‘cowboy operators’ and potential deaths.
Former Mister World Kamal Ibrahim, who presents the National Lottery on RTÉ, told the Irish Mail on Sunday: ‘There is no margin for error’ in the sport.
‘It would probably stop any cowboys opening’
Current legislation stipulates that you need authorisation to dive but that is not enforced, something Kamal wants to see changed.
‘It wouldn’t affect the clubs that are already standing, it would probably stop any cowboys opening up clubs,’ the Limerick man insisted.
A licensed skydiver, Kamal has gone through all the necessary training, and practises regularly.
‘Skydiving is a very close-knit community; they look after each other,’ he said. ‘Nobody tolerates messing around because you’re messing around with people’s lives.’ The MoS can reveal there have been no rules around skydiving in Ireland for nearly four years.
The act of skydiving – or parachuting – was regulated between 2007 and 2014, when ‘parachute permissions’ were granted to individuals or centres.
Although aircraft used for skydiving are regulated by the Irish Aviation Authority (IAA), there is no requirement on the fitness or competency of instructors, or their equipment, and the act of jumping out of a plane.
David Byrnes, managing director of Skydive Ireland who campaigned for the introduction of the regulations in 2007, told the MoS that Ireland is a ‘total outlier’ in terms of skydiving regulations, as countries such as the UK, France, and Germany have robust rules and guidelines.
He insisted that it is the IAA’s job to regulate the industry and added: ‘Parachuting is an aviation-based activity. This is not good enough.’
In 2014, the EU implemented the Standardised Rules of the Air, which states that parachuting should be regulated by ‘national legislation’, around the time the IAA stopped giving permissions. Seven-year-old Kacper Kacprzak and a pilot were killed in a plane crash after a skydiving session in Co. Offaly in May.
The tragedy is currently being investigated by the Air Accident Investigation Unit.
A spokesman for the Irish Skydiving Club in Kilkenny said the lack of regulations has had ‘a profound effect on the reputation of our sport and consequently a negative knock-on effect for our club’.
The club still adheres to pre-2014 standards and described the IAA’s lack of regulation as ‘a grotesque breach of statutory duty’.
Pressed for comment, the IAA said: ‘The IAA continues to conduct operational and airworthiness inspections within the scope of the applicable EU Regulations.’
But in a letter provided to the MoS, the IAA’s Director of Safety Regulation said that it stopped issuing permissions in 2015.
‘The change in practice should not be misconstrued as meaning there are no longer any rules as regards the operation of aircraft in support of parachute dropping and the IAA continues to conduct operational and airworthiness inspections within the scope of the applicable EU Regulations,’ he added.