Photo Gallery > Skydive
September 12, 2002 I did something that I've wanted to do for years: jump out of a perfectly good airplane. While most people are quite content to sit in a plane and look down at the ground, I wanted to know what it was like to fall towards the ground from 13,000 feet. This first jump was a tandem, meaning that someone was strapped to my back. He was the one with the parachute, and the one totally in control of our fate.
The experience was amazing, though I'm not sure that I'd do it again. Granted, it was a thrill, and I had a smile on my face the entire day afterwards.
What actually compelled me to finally take the plunge? I can blame it all on one of my customers. Tom Jones from DuPont is an avid skydiver. Having mentioned to him at some point that it was something I wanted to do, he eagerly invited me to join him and his wife as they spent the afternoon jumping in Kapowsin, about 90 minutes south of Seattle while we were attending a user group meeting out there.
In retrospect, I couldn't have asked for a more beautiful place for my introduction to skydiving. With the beautiful mountains (Mt. Rainier, Mt. Baker, Mt. Saint Helens, etc.) in the background, it was breathtaking. The view from that height was so beautiful, I hitched a ride on another flight with the jump plane just to take pictures of the scenery. Some of these pictures are from that ride-along, while others are frames from the video that documented the event. I also have a certificate to attest to this moment of temporary insanity.
