A Texas skydiving instructor whose parachute failed to open during a tandem jump has died.
The Skydive Houston skydiving center in Waller, Texas, in a statement confirmed the incident.
"Skydive Houston, along with the greater skydiving community at large, is deeply saddened by the loss of our tandem instructor and friend," the statement reads. "Our sincerest condolences are extended to his friends and family. We continue to pray for a full recovery for the injured tandem student."
Waller County Sheriff Troy Guidry told CNN that the male instructor and a female customer, whose identities have not been released, were doing a tandem jump near the city of Waller, northwest of Houston, when "the parachute failed to open."
"The primary and secondary [parachutes] both just kind of swirled down," he said.
Both were airlifted to a nearby hospital where they were listed in critical condition. However, the New York Post on Monday reported that the woman was expected to survive.
A witness to the event recounted the air struggle to KPRC.
"He let off his primary and then the secondary chute like opened halfway up so he didn’t fall like a straight fall, he was like 50 percent chute, like a corkscrew," Alex Arias, who lives nearby, told the outlet, adding that the male instructor was unconscious on the ground while the female customer was alert and calling for help.
"Skydive Houston has an excellent safety record, and significant injuries associated with tandem skydiving are extremely rare. Over the past 10 years, the United States Parachute Association has recorded one student fatality per 500,000 jumps, on average," Skydive Houston noted.
According to additional data that was recently made available by the USPA, 2.8 million jumps took place in 2020 with 11 fatal skydiving accidents being reported.
"Each fatality is a heartbreak for the skydiving community, which has collectively taken steps each year to learn from these events and improve the sport. Consequently, better technology, improvements to equipment, and advancements in skydiver-training programs have made the sport safer than ever before," the association stated.
Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
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