Low cutaway from malfunction by Ron Hill
Video by Tony Hathaway
The situation… 8-way exit where the rear had my right lift web on exit. The exit funneled and – unknown to me – my cutaway handle managed to flip under the lift web. I tracked off from the 8-way, pitched my Stiletto 107 and it opened in a dive with lots of line twists, that were so low that they had my head pinned back.
I went to go cut it away… And to my surprise, there was no handle. So I split my risers and looked down to see nothing but lift web. I tried to dig the handle out, but this was back when I was 140 pounds and weight ‘vests’ were the rage. The handle was neatly tucked under the lift web and between two weights.
As I was spinning, I decided that around 500-600 feet I was going to pull the reserve into the main. I was afraid that any lower it might not inflate, and any higher that it would have longer to double mal. That, or that I would just have longer to know I was a dead man. (I’m not saying that is the best course of action, but it was what went through my head at the time!)
I pretty much knew I was dead
I looked at my alti and saw I was about 1,200 feet. I noticed my gloves and thought, “If it weren’t for these fu*king gloves, I might be able to get the handle… Oh hell, I have time.”
So I took off my right glove, dug between the lift web and the vest and managed to pop the handle out… a quick look at the ground told me it was now or never, so I chopped and tried to roll into the relative wind while pulling the silver handle.
I have no idea what height I was when I chopped. I’d guess maybe 600-700 feet. My reserve opened with one half twist and then I managed to find a firebreak to land on (really it was what was below me). I had about a 6-8 second canopy ride.
The things that run through your mind at a time like this are pretty strange. I pretty much knew I was dead. I figured the main and reserve would entangle and I would hit hard enough to be wounded bad enough that I would not survive. Heck I even imagined the fatality report stating that no-one knew why a guy that had had mals before didn’t cutaway before dumping his reserve.
I started walking to the road and found my main and freebag entangled together. When I got to the road some jumpers on the way to Z Hills stopped and picked me up.
I decided that around 500-600 feet I was going to pull the reserve into the main
As I walked past the bunker, Mike Truffer, Derek Thomas, and Ron Andre were all standing there.
Truffer: “I think you could have kicked out of it.”
Thomas: “It wasn’t a hard cutaway was it?”
Andre: “Damn, we thought you were dead”
The guys from the 8-way team were all huddled around the monitor with a bunch of other folks and they were debriefing the malfunction. I said, “I’d like to thank each of you for coming to get me – jerks!” Someone piped up, “Suck it up, we saw you landed fine.” They asked me what the heck happened and I told them about the glove. They asked if I had kept my handles and I showed them the handles and the glove.
Never never never give up
We had one more jump to do that camp. So I borrowed a rig from Paul Meagher and headed out to the plane.
Funny story about the video… So I am sitting at the bar with my girlfriend and this video comes on. She is watching this in horror just knowing the guy is gonna die. She asks Paul, “Did this guy die?” Paul stares right at me and says, “Oh, I think he makes it out okay.”
