Due to numerous requests, USPA has decided to email Foreign Affiliate renewal packets rather than send them via the postal service as it has in previous years.

Cheryl Stearns celebrates her 64th birthday by making her 21,000th jump at friend Gene Stoughton’s property in South Carolina.

The Lost Prairie Boogie is a time to tune out from the daily hustle and bustle of email and social media and tune in to yourself and those around you. It’s a time when 300-plus close friends journey to a small prairie in Montana for 10 days of adult summer camp, skydiving included.

The Maytown Sport Parachute Club held its annual Fun Meet on August 17, about two months later than usual due to poor weather in June.

In August, Matt Fry and Melissa Nelson Lowe hosted a Vertical Sequential Camp at Skydive Chicago in Ottawa, Illinois.

Each year for well over a decade, Larry Henderson has invited two plane loads of his friends to come to Whitewright, Texas, for his Big-Way Invitationals event.

In July, the U.S. Army announced the retirement of Specialist First Class Matthew Davidson.

• John Ward took the photo on the top of page 47 in “Diving Into Summer” in the September issue.
• The photo of the 84-way head-up world record on page 51 of the September issue shows the formation just as it began to break following completion. The completion photo, by Gustavo Cabana, is below.

At Start Skydiving in Middletown, Ohio, Cheryl Compton watches her husband, Larry Compton of Team Fastrax, bringing home a 7,800-square-foot flag during the life-celebration jump for Fastrax team member Larry Lemaster, who died in the June crash of a King Air in Hawaii.

USPA Central Regional Director Gary Peek, D-8884, passed away in his home in St. Charles, Missouri, on August 13. Authorities cited natural causes. He was 65.

Marylou Laughlin, D-12418, started skydiving in 1988 and soon became heavily involved in competition, first as a competitor, then as a judge.

Practicing cutaways in a hanging harness is a great exercise. However, it’s not perfect.

In “Incident Reports” in the August issue, the third incident states, “Both canopies fully deployed and went into a downplane. The student immediately cut away the main, which remained trailing behind him attached by the reserve static line.”

Thank you so much for your article, “Saluting the Heroes of D-Day” (August Parachutist). I come from a long line of military volunteers, as does my wife.

In the beginning, we all wanted to be great flyers. We can recall many jumps when we weren’t. We wanted to set state records, and we remember when they were hard or didn’t happen.

“Mike McGowan”
Airbrush

Rod Leisure | D-18726
Arcadia, Indiana

scratchart29@gmail.com

If you’re a skydiver, there is no better job than to work for the U.S. Parachute Association. It’s the ultimate way of giving back to a sport that has enhanced and shaped your life.

Photo by Terry Weatherford | D-22518

Marie Clark excitedly leaps from the gondola while making her first balloon jump at Skydive Perris in California.