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STERLING, Ohio — A first-time skydiver slipped from her harness during a jump Saturday and fell to her death, authorities said. The 44-year-old woman from West Chester, Pa., was participating in a tandem jump, her first with the AerOhio Skydiving school near Sterling, about 40 miles south of Cleveland, according to the Wayne County Sheriff's office. The victim's name was withheld pending notification of her family. During tandem jumps, a novice skydiver is harnessed to the chest of an experienced jumper. When the parachute is deployed, the experienced skydiver guides the team to the ground. A preliminary investigation by the...

Several recent incidents, including the April 27 arrest of Jeb Ray Corliss IV, who was caught by police as he prepared to skydive off the Empire State Building’s observation deck during rush hour, have called attention to BASE jumping, a fringe sport that’s been around since the early 1980s. The “BASE” in BASE jumping is an acronym that stands for the four locations a skydiver must leap from before he can call himself a BASE jumper: Building, Antenna, Span (in other words, a bridge) and Earth (i.e., a cliff). And the action isn't limited to New York City. On May...

I was just now saw someone in a wing parachute falling very fast from my backyard in Deer valley. Looks like he was falling way to fast to have survived and went down on Union Hills and 7th ave. Can not hear any aircraft that he may have come from. No one would be out skydiving at 8:35PM over a major city? If anyone hears anything on this let me know!

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla., May 7, 2006 – Hitting the mark as they always do, members of the U.S. Army Golden Knights parachute team jumped into the middle of the 2006 McDonald's Air and Sea Show here yesterday. Preparations for a jump into the 2006 McDonald's Air and Sea Show at Fort Lauderdale Beach continue as the Army's Golden Knights parachute team waits to reach the jump zone. Sgt. 1st Class Paul Sach, left, the Black Demonstration Team leader, prepares the streamers that will help determine wind direction. Cpl. Joshua Coleman, center, puts his gloves on while Sgt. Hector Ceja,...

45 year old D.B. Cooper enters Portland International Airport. Cooper uses the name Dan Cooper to buy a one-way ticket to Sea-Tac International Airport on November 24, 1971, a Wednesday before Thanksgiving. He boards Northwest Flight 305, a Boeing 727-100. He boards the airplane and attracts no attention. He is wearing suit with a pearl tie and wearing a homburg hat. The airplane starts to taxi and take off from the runway. Flight attendant Flo Schaffner walks by and he hands her a note. Men traveling alone handed nots to flight attendants as a way to pass hotel and phone...

Posted: Friday, 28 April 2006 7:03AM Fla. Man Arrested in Empire State Building Stunt NEW YORK (1010 WINS) --  A man who tried to parachute from the Empire State Building after passing through security wearing a rubber mask and a foam fat suit was arrested in a struggle on the 86th-floor observation deck and handcuffed to a railing, authorities said. "He was fighting with us to get off,'' recalled building official Timothy Donahue, who said he grabbed the man's leg. "He wanted to jump off in the worst way.'' The man, J. Ray Corliss IV, a Discovery Channel host who is slim...

4/27/2006 - POPE AIR FORCE BASE, N.C. (AFPN) -- An emergency parachute jettison device was used for the first time during a Joint Forcible Entry Exercise here April 25. Loadmasters from Little Rock Air Force Base, Ark., and Dyess AFB, Texas, participated in the exercise. Chief Master Sgt. Steven Pyszka and Master Sgt. Lee McDaniel, loadmaster training instructors from Air Mobility Command, came to ensure the device was properly set up and operated. The new jettison device has been in development since 1997. It was created to quickly and safely jettison malfunctioning parachutes during an airdrop delivery of heavy equipment....

No human being has fallen farther than Joe Kittinger, but people keep trying. On Aug. 16, 1960, the U.S. Air Force test pilot floated in his 20-story-tall helium balloon to the edge of space, more than 19 miles up, higher than any man had ever gone. Clad in a space suit, he stood at the edge of his open-air gondola and said to himself: "Lord, take care of me now." Then he jumped. He quickly accelerated to 714 miles an hour -- becoming the first person to break the sound barrier without a vehicle -- before a small parachute opened...

UDON THANI, Thailand (AP) - Skydivers from 31 countries have claimed a world record of 400 people holding hands in a mid-air free-fall formation. The record was certified by judges from the Switzerland-based Federation Aeronautique Internationale at the scene, announced the World Team '06, the informal association of international skydivers who made the attempt over an airfield in northeastern Thailand. "It was beautiful. It was one of my absolute favourite dives of my life," said World Team skydive director B.J. Worth. He said in order to set the record, "100 per cent of the people in the air have to...

Today: December 13, 2005 at 6:19:11 PST Pregnant Skydiver Survives Face-First Fall ASSOCIATED PRESS SILOAM SPRINGS, Ark. (AP) - Shayna Richardson was making her first solo skydiving jump when she had trouble with her parachutes and, while falling at about 50 mph, hit face first in a parking lot. Although badly hurt, she survived - and doctors treating her injuries discovered she was pregnant. Four surgeries and two months later, Richardson said she and the fetus are doing fine. "Just this last week we went and saw the doctor and we've got arms, we've got legs. We've got a full...

TIKRIT, Iraq, Nov. 2, 2005 – Task Force Band of Brothers and the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) officially took command of military operations in north-central Iraq in a ceremony at Forward Operating Base Danger here Nov. 1. The ceremony marked the transfer of authority from Task Force Liberty and the 42nd Infantry Division, a National Guard unit from New York that has been deployed in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom for a year, to TF Band of Brothers. TF Band of Brothers is composed of two brigade combat teams and a combat aviation brigade of the 101st Airborne Division,...

Like the exploits of 21st-century special operators – including U.S. Navy SEALs, Army Delta soldiers, Force Recon Marines, Air Force commandos, and CIA paramilitary operatives – stories of men like Ortiz are rarely gleaned from books, newspapers, and magazines. Their incredibly dangerous work often goes unseen and is thankless.

EVERYONE who lives or works above the 13th floor in Melbourne should consider buying an escape parachute in case of a terror attack, Victoria's former top cop says. Former chief commissioner Kel Glare said yesterday a parachute could make the difference between life and death in a terrorist attack or fire. "I think it's a serious consideration for people above the 13th floor to equip themselves with a personal parachute," he said. "The fire ladders will only reach to the 13th floor. "If you're above that and you have something like we had in New York, there were people there...

When pilots are in an aircraft, the Marines of Aviation Life Support Systems personnel watch over them like guardian angels, working behind the scenes of the flight line to maintain aircraft emergency gear at the station Parachute Loft. ALSS personnel are responsible for providing and maintaining aircraft emergency gear pilots may use as a last resort. They rarely make an appearance on the flight line, so their contributions to pilot safety are seldom recognized, said Staff Sgt. Ryan Schmidt, Marine Aviation Logistics Squadron 13 ALSS flight equipment technician. “That's the strange thing about this job,” said Schmidt, a Schenectady, N.Y.,...

WASHINGTON (Army News Service, May 20, 2005) – As a prelude to this weekend’s Armed Forces Day events, the U.S. Army Parachute Team, “Golden Knights,” jumped in on Walter Reed Army Medical Center May 19. Patients, staff and neighbors cheered on the Golden Knights’ Black Team, who do their best work at 12,500 feet above the earth’s surface, racing to the ground at speeds in excess of 120 miles per hour. About 200 people were at the noon performance. The Golden Knights are in Washington this weekend for the Joint Service Open House at Andrews Air Force Base where they...

(AP) A Norwegian man was killed after jumping from the Eiffel Tower when a parachute he was wearing got stuck on an upper deck of the monument, officials said Tuesday. Preliminary investigations indicated that the man planned to film his jump as part of publicity for a Norwegian clothing brand, police said. The man, 31, entered the tower with a hidden parachute and a helmet that had a small video camera attached to it, said the official at Paris' police headquarters, speaking on customary condition of anonymity. Upon reaching the tower's 380-foot second deck, the man jumped. Investigators believe his...

DELAND, Fla. -- A skydiving cinematographer died Saturday after his legs were severed in a midair collision with an airplane as both descended over a Central Florida airport, authorities said. Witnesses say the sky diver had deployed his parachute when he struck the left wing of the plane at about 600 feet. Albert "Gus" Wing III of Longwood had jumped from the DHC-6 Twin Otter propeller plane during a jump organized by Skydive DeLand, said Commander Randel Henderson, of the DeLand Police Department. According to a witness on the ground, Wing had deployed his parachute when he struck the left...

Dropping Everything KONA NATIVE FINISHES THIRD TOUR OF IRAQ IN AIR DELIVERY PLATOON (Freeper Note: Kona is a town on the West coast of the Big island of Hawaii.)BY KIM EATON WEST HAWAII TODAY Lorrin Bush and two of his four daughters Kayla, left, and Malia. KIM EATON | WEST HAWAII TODAY Lorrin K. Bush is no stranger to Iraq. Over the last two years, he's seen more of the barren country than he has of his wife and four daughters. A gunnery sergeant with the Marine Corps, the 35-year-old Kailua-Kona native leads a group of 12 men and women...

AMERICAN DREAM Recently I participated in a parade and ceremony at a large Veteran’s Hospital. The event was planned to honor those veterans confined to the hospital. Some who had been wounded so severely that they would spend their entire lives in the hospital. We also planned to attend a barbecue after the parade, put on by a local veteran’s organization for the veterans. The parade consisted of approximately 200 motorcycles and other vehicles plus several marching units. I was driving my fancy SUV with 2 full sized flags, the American and POW/MIA, mounted on a rack on the rear....

United States Special forces and aircraft are engaged in a massive offensive in Southeast Afghanistan in a bid to kill or capture senior Taliban leaders.Aljazeera's Afghanistan correspondant said a United States offficer was 100% sure that Taliban leaders Mullah Omar and Mullah Qahar were both surrounded in the villiage of Sarang with about 1000 Taliban fighters.The special forces have joined a major week long operation against suspected Taliban and Al Qaeda bases in the mountains of Daychopan district of Zabul province, 300 kilometeres Southwest of Kabul. Aljazeera.net has learned that the Afghan Government infantry was order to withdraw in anticipation...