| Date | Location | Category | Age | # Jumps | AAD?/RSL? | Dropzone.com Report | Dropzone.com Discussion | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 13/10/2005 | Ogden Skydiving Center, UT | LAND | 44 | 1 | Y/Y | 139 | #1778867 | |
| DropZone.com Description: On landing the tandem encountered turblence near a building and dropped onto pavement below. The Tandem student suffered fatal injuries with severe head and chest injuries. The tandem instructor suffered serious injuries including head trama and multiple fractures. | ||||||||
| Lessons: | ||||||||
| USPA Description: After an uneventful tandem freefall, the instructor deployed the main canopy at approximately 5,000 feet. As the main canopy inflated, the student slipped out of the harness. She died on impact. | ||||||||
| USPA Conclusions:While the main canopy inflated, the student’s legs swung forward and up, placing her in a pike body position. She fell backward out of the harness through the gap above the horizontal back strap and below the diagonal back straps. Soon after the accident, the tandem equipment manufacturer issued a service bulletin reminding tandem instructors to properly adjust student harnesses. Each tandem equipment manufacturer provides specific procedures for student harness adjustments to ensure correct fit. As a result of this accident and the similar one above, USPA and the Parachute Industry Association released a joint statement reminding skydiving schools to ensure each harness is properly adjusted in accordance with established guidelines. In addition, each tandem manufacturer was requested to review passenger harness designs to ensure that each student, regardless of body shape, is securely held in the harness through the entire skydive. | ||||||||
| Name | Julia Bond | |||||||