Jeannie Bartholomew is a dedicated professional canopy pilot who (along with her husband, Curt Bartholomew) has put everything she has into the sport of skydiving. She is a member of Team Alter Ego Fastrax and travels the globe to teach canopy piloting skills and compete in events. Prior to skydiving she was a competitive cheerleader, and jumpers feel her positive attitude and energy wherever she goes.

“One Temporary Escape”  
Watercolor

Kayla Perron | B-47722
Winter Park, Florida

Melinda Ray was a 35-year-old wife and mother of three who was suffering from a disease that was quickly destroying her liver. She didn’t score high on the transplant list to qualify for a liver from a deceased donor; she had to find a living donor. She was desperate. 

From February 10-20, Tsunami Skydivers Exotic Boogies treated 127 participants from around the world to an experience they’ll never forget: the Boogie in Belize. The event included accommodations and nightly parties on Ambergris Caye, four days of jumping on a nearby private island and four days of intentional water landings into the Great Blue Hole (a large submarine sinkhole in the Caribbean Sea near Belize City).

The action calls worked and it now appears that the needed FAA funding bill will pass without changes to the structure of air traffic control. “Once again, we thank our members who made the calls in defense of skydiving’s airspace needs,” said USPA Executive Director Ed Scott.

This proposal would pull ATC out of the FAA and move it to the U.S. Department of Transportation, where a new Management Advisory Council, populated with airline interests, would serve as the ATC board of directors.

Advanced Aerospace Designs has released a Public Service Bulletin PSB-01-2018, regarding certain Vigil II and Vigil 2+ Automatic Activation Devices. The bulletin provides instructions for updating the firmware of affected units that can generate an error code during high-altitude jumps above 27,000 feet. Compliance is mandatory before any jump made from 27,000 feet, or higher, or by no later than May, 2020 for those with affected units who are not making any high altitude jumps.

A celebration of life for Larry K. Bagley has been scheduled for June 1 in Salt Lake City, Utah.

In 2017, almost half of the 24 jumpers who died in the U.S. faced malfunctions. Unfortunately, the failure to safely land a canopy (a quarter of the mishaps) and other causes remain, but failure to handle a main-canopy malfunction was the biggest killer in 2017. Learning from the circumstances that surround the deaths that occurred in 2017 can help us all have a safer 2018.

Thankfully, no skydivers or jump pilots died in skydiving-related aircraft accidents in the U.S. during 2017. But there is room for improvement with regard to decision making by jump pilots. 

Brought to you by Niklas Daniel and Brianne Thompson of AXIS Flight School at Skydive Arizona in Eloy. Photos by David Cherry. Information about AXIS’ coaching and instructional services is available at axisflightschool.com.

If you ever need a quick and easy way to make every coach and instructor in the hangar run away and hide, just yell, “I need someone to handle the student radio!”

For skydivers, springtime weather can be both tricky and frustrating. After freezing all winter, many jumpers head to the drop zone at the first sign of a reasonably warm day, and they may be tempted to jump even if the winds are high or there are lots of clouds. But as the old saying goes, “It’s better to be on the ground wishing you were in the air than in the air wishing you were on the ground.” 

Videographer Lauren Piscatelli shoots her mother making a skydive with tandem instructor Dan Hammond at Skydive Carolina in Chester, South Carolina.

Photo by Terry Hopkins | D-24503

When I talked to Ari Perelman at Skydive Arizona in Eloy, he was having the first weather-hold day of his Arizona Airspeed career—which was, on that date, just about a year old. That’s Arizona for you.

It started when Weter, who enjoys painting animals, visualized a zebra losing its stripes in freefall.

Skydiving Makes a Difference—A Parachutist series on nonprofit organizations that give back to their communities.

In future years we will all look back proudly on this time as one where we joined together and successfully preserved the future of this sport we love. 

If you are considering an RDS, you need to determine whether the use of such a system is necessary and appropriate for the activities you plan to engage in.