I’m falling towards the Jersey shore at 120 mph. Wind thrashes at my body, like some possessed invisible force.<\/p>\n
At 9,000 feet the jump master gives the thumbs up and I do the first parachute check test. Anything that changes the angle of deflection of air over my body will affect the stability and direction of the freefall. So to complete a practice reach for the ripcord without causing a wild turn, I pivot my left hand towards my temple at the same time I reach down and to the right. My left wrist locks 2 inches above my head, while my right hand touches the orange plastic knob.<\/p>\n
All clear. Returning to a full arch, my arms assume the Jesus Christ pose again.<\/p>\n
“Altimeter – 8,000!” I yell, loud enough that it pierces the din.<\/p>\n
“Heading!” The second PCT check passes without a hitch. “7,500!”<\/p>\n
Locking on a heading in the distance, I turn right, and then back to center.<\/p>\n
“Arch – Heading – 7,000!”I start the left turn, locking on another object. This maneuver is bit choppier, but under control and soon enough I’m back at center.<\/p>\n
Textbook so far, but I’m about to make a mistake that could have been fatal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I’m falling towards the Jersey shore at 120 mph. Wind thrashes at my body, like some possessed invisible force. At 9,000 feet the jump master gives the thumbs up and I do the first parachute check test. Anything that changes the angle of deflection of air over my body will affect the stability and direction […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10857","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-skydiving"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.samhilliard.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10857","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.samhilliard.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.samhilliard.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.samhilliard.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.samhilliard.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10857"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.samhilliard.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10857\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.samhilliard.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.samhilliard.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.samhilliard.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}