Skydiving Powerlines Crash 11-6-11

I copied and pasted a couple descriptions (that were originally e-mailed) below. See the existing comments for more information. There should be enough info to cover most of the details and provide a good understanding of what lead up to this happening.

Main learning points:
Don't exit the airplane unless 100% sure you see the LZ. Always pull much higher if told about an offset. Be extra vigilant about power lines and REALLY look for towers when descending. Don't land between ANY towers which look like they could be electrical. Just because you don't see electrical wires it doesn't mean that they're not there. Realize that a bright flash is probably an electrical explosion.

"Our last jump was really far from the dropzone because I guess the pilot had to find a hole in the clouds. We knew we were going to be far from the LZ but we didn't know how far we actually were. We pulled at 4k and D's canopy took longer than normal to open. There was no way we were getting back. It was a completely unfamiliar area but we had a large field right below. I stayed high above D not killing any altitude, and just waiting to see where he'd land (just like I did the last time we landed out). We were on our downwind approach when I see a bright flash followed by him and his canopy collapsing to the ground. I didn't realize that he hit power lines, and just wanted to get to him ASAP. As I'm getting close to him (about 50 feet away) I hear him screaming and all of a sudden the power lines come into focus. I had about a second to react and my instinct told me that wires were as bad as it gets and that I needed to turn. I pulled hard on my left toggle and did a 90 degree turn and immediately pulled on my right to try to straighten it out. My foot hit one of the wires but either my shoe wasn't conductive or the wires had burned out when D hit them. I hit the ground really hard. By pulling on my right toggle after my left I think I prevented my canopy from continuing to turn and slam me into the ground at higher than freefall speeds and you can see in the video that the canopy went kind of limp and I just dropped (and hit the ground at freefall speed). It took about 15 seconds for me to tell that I hadn't broken anything. The only reason I was able to get up and walk is because there was a THICK layer of soft mud (the kind that cakes a thick 1-inch layer on your shoes when you walk on it). Some locals had already called an ambulance and J was actually just coming in for her landing but she was lucky and landed much closer than we did (she saw the flash but also didn't realize it was because of power lines). D was fine except for a large burn that stretched from his hand to his elbow. The paramedics radioed a helicopter just in case, but when it landed D was already standing up and walking around. We went back to the DZ, packed up, and I drove him to Valley Medical which is fortunately right next to where he lives. They ran all their post electrocution tests and they didn't find anything bad. One of the doctors said some of his burns looked close to 3rd degree but the pain had gone away and there weren't any blisters. His arm is all bandaged up but it looks like it'll heal up just fine. My lower back is tweaked but it'll be fine."

"So on our second jump of the day the pilot told us we'd be offset a couple of miles and to pull high. We did pull high, however, we were actually right on top of the LZ (without ANY offset). So on the next jump, when he said the same thing, we had NO idea we'd be that far out. D and I both spotted but there was a lot of cloud cover with sparse holes in between. I didn't actually see the LZ myself, but he gave me a nod and said afterward that he did. He has the same jump numbers as I do, and always does a great job at spotting. It's very likely he saw something that looked just like our LZ through the clouds and assumed that was it. We pulled a little higher than usual but we were still miles away from the LZ. D said he saw the power line poles but didn't see any power lines running across (they were impossible to see until we were a few feet away). The power line poles themselves were sitting on the sides of the field and were obscured by trees and buildings. I saw the flash but I didn't understand what had happened. I was more concerned for D and just getting down to him quickly. If I hadn't heard D screaming from below I probably would have just laid myself out on the wires. I made out the word "wires" and just like in a movie they came into focus. When focusing on the ground 50 feet away small gray wires aren't really visible, which is why D didn't actually see them until he hit. I was about 10 feet and a second away from hitting them and the thoughts I had were power lines is bad as it gets, I need to get away from them, and even a low turn would probably be better than running into them."

Category:

Sports

Tags:

• skydiving
• crash
• accident
• power
• lines
• powerlines

[tribecalledquestlove]

every single thing in this video could have been prevented. its not like people weren't watching out for you(including on the airplane prior to this jump) or trying to give good useful info to you either. i know both of you personally. why, at that damn drop zone, do people not listen, and it take an incident such as this, where both of you could have lost your lives, for people to wake up. i love both of you, and dont want to see any more of my friends dead. god i hope you learned something

[contract25]

@tribecalledquestlove I know you mean well, but there's only so much you can see of what happened in the video, and it's easy to talk about it after the fact. We did listen to the warning about the spot on the airplane, but by no means were we expecting to be THAT far from our LZ. D and I are both new to the sport, but given our limited knowledge and experience we reacted to the situations thrown at us in the best ways we could have. We did learn a lot, and we're grateful to still be here.

[tbone3939]

@tribecalledquestlove

if I found a place around where I was to land. I did see power lines go up along the sides of the field but did not see any going along the middle of the field. I did not see anything until the point that I actually made contact with the lines and then I completely knew. The main mistake here that will keep this from happening again is being 100% positive that I could make it back to the dropzone...and not relying on landing out

[tbone3939]

@tribecalledquestlove

issue #1 bad spot

I knew the spot we had and knew exactly where the drop zone was when exiting the aircraft. I assumed if I pulled a great deal higher I would be able to make it back. I did pull higher but because of a long deployment process...almost cut away...I was farther away from the drop zone than i hoped. I might have been able to make it back but I have learned from skydiving that you don't want to force anything and I would have been better off

[contract25]

@tribecalledquestlove I could have flared, but I don't have enough experience to know whether I'd actually fly over the lines or not. Another option would have been to cutaway, but then I'd still have dropped the 30ft. What would you have done?

[contract25]

@tribecalledquestlove I didn't see the lines until I heard D yelling and they were 10 feet in front of me . D didn't see the lines until he actually hit them. They were thin gray lines that were almost impossible to see from a distance, especially when we're focused on the ground 50 feet in front. I literally had a second to react, and my instinct told me that even a low turn is better than laying myself out on top of several power lines.

[contract25]

@tribecalledquestlove Whether it was from inexperience or ignorance, I didn't realize D had hit powerlines. I just saw him collapse to the ground and wanted to get to him ASAP. Jean, who also saw the flash, also didn't make the connection. It's easy to look back on it now and ask myself what I was thinking, but my mind just didn't realize what it was, and at that moment I was more concerned for D and making sure he was ok.

[tribecalledquestlove]

that all leads up to the knee jerk reaction of toggle whipping at the end which alone should have killed you, and isn't anything close to what you should do if you ever encounter powerlines.

[tribecalledquestlove]

@contract25

thats fine to a point. there is such a thing as staying in the airplane, despite the spotter, you do have eyes and can judge for yourself. getting out of the airplane was only issue #1.

if you are landing out, you need to constantly be looking for hazards, looking for power poles is a huge one. even if you missed seeing them, how about once D hit the lines? why didnt you make any alteration in your course? you had a ridiculous amount of time to change.

[contract25]

@tribecalledquestlove Even Jean, who pulled higher than we did, had to land in the same field we did (she also didn't see the powerlines but luckily landed closer than we did and avoided them). Our biggest mistake was not seeing the powerlines, and me not realizing that that's what D had hit. There'll always be times when something will go wrong (malfunction, etc.) and it'll be necessary to land out, but we now know to avoid landing between ANY kind of towers (even if we don't see the lines).