Skydiver becomes first person to jump and land without chute
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Skydiver Luke Aikins signaled to pilot Aaron Fitzgerald as he prepared to jump from a helicopter in Simi Valley, Calif., last week, as he practiced for today’s jump.
LOS ANGELES >> A 42-year-old skydiver with more than 18,000 jumps made history Saturday when he became the first person to leap without a parachute and land in a net instead.
After a two-minute freefall, Luke Aikins landed dead center in the 100-by-100-foot net at the Big Sky movie ranch on the outskirts of Simi Valley.
As cheers erupted, Aikins quickly climbed out, walked over and hugged his wife, Monica, who had been watching from the ground with their 4-year-old son, Logan, and other family members.
“I’m almost levitating, it’s incredible,” the jubilant skydiver said, raising his hands over his head as his wife held their son, who dozed in her arms.
“This thing just happened! I can’t even get the words out of my mouth,” he added as he thanked the dozens of crew members who spent two years helping him prepare for the jump, including those who assembled the fishing trawler-like net and made sure it really worked.
The stunt, broadcast live on the Fox network for the TV special “Stride Gum Presents Heaven Sent,” nearly didn’t come off as planned when Aikins revealed just before climbing into his plane that the Screen Actors Guild had ordered him to wear a parachute to ensure his safety.
Aikins didn’t say what prompted the original restriction, and representatives for the show and the Screen Actors Guild did not immediately respond to phone and email messages.
Aikins said he considered pulling out at that point because having the parachute canister on his back would make his landing in the net far more dangerous. If he had to wear it he said he wouldn’t bother to pull the ripcord anyway.
“I’m going all the way to the net, no question about it,” he said from the plane. “I’ll just have to deal with the consequences when I land of wearing the parachute on my back and what it’s going to do to my body.”
A few minutes before the jump one of the show’s hosts said the requirement had been lifted. Aikins left the plane without the chute.
He jumped with three other skydivers, each wearing parachutes. One had a camera, another trailed smoke so people on the ground could follow his descent and the third took an oxygen canister he handed off after they got to an altitude where it was no longer needed.
Then the others opened their parachutes and left him on his own.
Aikins admitted before the jump he was nervous and his mother said she was one family member who wouldn’t watch.
When his friend Chris Talley came up with the idea two years ago, Aikins acknowledged he turned it down cold.
“I kind of laugh and I say, ‘Ok, that’s great. I’ll help you find somebody to do it,’” he told The Associated Press as he trained for the jump last week.
A couple of weeks after Talley made his proposal Aikins called back and said he would do it. He’d been the backup jumper in 2012 when Felix Baumgartner became the first skydiver to break the speed of sound during a jump from 24 miles above Earth.
The 42-year-old daredevil made his first tandem jump when he was 12, following with his first solo leap four years later. He’s been racking them up at several hundred a year ever since.
His father and grandfather were skydivers, and his wife has made 2,000 jumps. His family owns Skydive Kapowsin near Tacoma, Washington.
Aikins is also a safety and training adviser for the United States Parachute Association and is certified to teach both students and skydiving instructors. His business Para Tactics provides skydiving training to Navy Seals and other members of elite fighting forces.
21 responses to “Skydiver becomes first person to jump and land without chute”
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Cojones of the year award.
Totally nuts. But good landing.
Will he do it again?
Watermellons for balls.
A total m*r*n!
I thought that was crazy…but he made it….can’t argue with success….
Wow! The comments here are much scarier than his daredevil performance! 🙂
Evil Kneivel of the air! Congrats, Brah!
He is obviously comfortable in guiding himself in the air while falling towards a target he can see. All his years of experience and know how give him confidence in this endeavor. Wonder the size and position of the bottom of the net from the ground.
The video is online. He jumped at 25,000 feet and there is no way at that height he could see his landing net which was 100 ft by 100 ft and elevated very high off the ground, guesing at least 100ft high. As soon as he hit the net, the arresting cables that supported the net slackened at a controlled rate to provide a gradual enough deceleration rate where he was not injured. The area surrounding the net was painted bright green creating a target which he could see when he reached a low enough elevation. This is a crazy stunt but it might have positive benefits in the future. In the Sept 11, 2001 attack many people where trapped high up in the Twin Towers and as the fires spread they were forced to jump to their death. If this guy can survive a 25,000 ft jump without a parachute, could those who were trapped in a high rise building in the range of 1,000 to 1,300 ft survive a similar jump with a portable net that can be set up quicky by firefighters? Was interesting to watch the video as many times during his descent the guy would flip himself face up to practice his landing as he had to land with his back to the ground.
Your 9-11 suggestion, is more valid than most people think. It might be the next generation of rescue equipment. There is much to work out though.
Naw…I’m pretty sure James Bond did it at least twice…maybe three times…
Don’t figure if I could do it, especially if you had a wife and 4 years old son? Selfish goals for grand standing? Heroics, questionable?
I think it’s great–an innovation, like the solar plane making it around the world–a small step for man, etc, etc. As someone pointed out, might come in handy in a skyscraper, I mean a larger version to rescue all.
He doesn’t possess brass balls.
He possesses kryptonite balls.
This headline is wrong.
Aikins wasn’t the first guy to jump without a chute. He’s just the first guy to survive without injury after jumping without a chute.
As they say, “Look to your right. You’ll never see another sight like that again”.
“They” are the same guys who say stuff like, “Can I have your GoPro if that net doesn’t work as advertised?”
Remember it’s not the fall that kills you….it’s the sudden stop…I remember an article in readers digest about a crewman who jumped out of a burning bomber in WW2..Nicholas Alkemade, an RAF crewman who jumped from his burning Lancaster Bomber at 18,000 feet over Germany without a working parachute and landed in soft snow with only a sprained leg…it was an amazing story of luck and survival……..
I can’t believe how accurately he guided himself from that height into the next! And I wonder how it felt when he landed in the net with that huge deceleration. Wow!
What a selfish and irresponsible stunt for someone with a wife and young son. This guy is totally self-centered. I wouldn’t feed his warped ego for a minute.
Apparently his wife supported his decision to jump without a chute because she was the first person to hug and kiss him……