Tandem Skydiving Instructor Drops from Harness, Nashville, 10/4/25

I always thought that for tandem jumps, the parachutes were worn by the instructor, and the “passenger” was attached to his harness…
AV8R_87 said:
For the skydivers among us - how could this happen?
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The only way I could imagine it happening would be if the instructor's leg straps failed, and he fell out of his harness, leaving the passenger harness attached to the instructor's. Not a skydiver, but I had to wear parachutes in the Navy, and ours had quick-donning harnesses with leg straps that clipped together. Most of the civilian harnesses that I see now have non-detachable leg straps for safety...
 
The article says they got stuck on the outside of the aircraft, so were hung up in some fashion. It also says the passenger had an emergency chute that auto deployed. Very interesting sequence of events in this one.
 
I'd like to know what aircraft they jumped from. From what I can find this outfit mostly does tandems, so their website doesn't mention what they jump from. They're advertising jumping from 14,000 feet, has to be turbine powered.
 
midwestpa24 said:
The article says they got stuck on the outside of the aircraft, so were hung up in some fashion. It also says the passenger had an emergency chute that auto deployed. Very interesting sequence of events in this one.
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The tandem rig has the reserve as well. The student doesn't have a separate chute. @NavAir has it likely right. The student was still in the combined rig and likely an AAd fired which released the reserve after he fell from the ship.

Conjecture on the skydive forums is that the instructor didn't have his legstraps done up.
 
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Stupid question do you have to arm automatic chutes and disarm if landing inside aircraft?
 
bonefishpete said:
Stupid question do you have to arm automatic chutes and disarm if landing inside aircraft?
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Same way they don't deploy when you're under the main canopy descending... rate of descent. Jump pilots are warned not to exceed 3500 fpm in descents when below the AAD deployment set point (2000' or so).

Note, these things aren't like a Cirrus BRS. They just cut the loop holding the reserve bag closed like you had pulled the pin manually. While there's some spring loading to get the reserve out, it won't get very far unless you have some relative wind to deploy it. Of course, if you have door off or open that can definitely cause problems.
 
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flyingron said:
The tandem rig has the reserve as well. The student doesn't have a separate chute. @NavAir has it likely right. The student was still in the combined rig and likely an AAd fired which released the reserve after he fell from the ship.

Conjecture on the skydive forums is that the instructor didn't have his legstraps done up.
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Last time I did a tandem, about five years ago, I was wearing a webbing harness that attached me to the instructor, no parachute attached. What I'm not getting here is what they could have gotten hung up on outside of the aircraft. All the turbine jump planes I can find pictures of don't have a step outside of the airplane.
 
FormerHangie said:
I'd like to know what aircraft they jumped from. From what I can find this outfit mostly does tandems, so their website doesn't mention what they jump from. They're advertising jumping from 14,000 feet, has to be turbine powered.
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I did a tandem jump out of a Cessna 206 from 14,000 some 30 years ago, so it's possible. And it was a rickety-ass POS being hot-lapped. I was watching my personal altimeter with trepidation until we were above the jump minimum. Sadly, not long after, it caught fire and crashed upon landing attempt and killed everyone aboard. But the 206 to 14k was possible.
 
I’ve dropped tandems A LOT. Agree the most likely is simply some issue with the instructor leg straps.

Doesn’t have to be a turbine to do the advertised 14, but likely.

I mostly flew a turbine and I beat the tandems to the ground. The rare occasion I bring a jumper down with me, yes, I moderated my descent to prevent tripping the AAD.
 
There are now posts calling the instructor a hero, and that he intentionally dropped out of his harness to save the student after entanglement on the step.
I'm not currently buying that, without further evidence.
 
I did a tandem jump years ago (b'day present from kids). From what I recall, there was no effective way to disentangle us if the it was done up correctly; I recall it was multiple sets of straps holding us together. They also had two people do safety checks. One on the ground before we boarded, and a second in flight before we "jumped" (more like hobbled off the plane).

So I am confused by two things, how they could have separated and what is there to get caught on when leaving the plane? Has the pilot said anything?

Tim
 
Holy smokes. Imagine how terrifying that was for the "student". I've never done it, but I've heard that the student isn't told how to deploy the chute because sometimes they panic and try to pull it at the wrong time.
 
tspear said:
I did a tandem jump years ago (b'day present from kids). From what I recall, there was no effective way to disentangle us if the it was done up correctly; I recall it was multiple sets of straps holding us together. They also had two people do safety checks. One on the ground before we boarded, and a second in flight before we "jumped" (more like hobbled off the plane).

So I am confused by two things, how they could have separated and what is there to get caught on when leaving the plane? Has the pilot said anything?

Tim
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I watched the video on the Go Skydive Nashville's home page a number of times, and they are jumping from a 182 with a top hinged door STC. I was thinking that they were using turbine equipment since they advertise jumping from 14,000 feet. It appears that the instructor got snagged on the step, and most likely pulled out his hook knife and cut a strap to get them free of the airplane. Unfortunately, he was unable to stay in the rig and fell to his death.

I did two tandems a few years ago. One of the tasks the student was expected to do was to deploy the main parachute starting at 7000 feet, with the goal to have a fully open main by 5000 feet. In this case, it sounds like the AAD deployed the reserve parachute.
 
It’s not uncommon to not be shown how to deploy. I HATE the step on 182s for tandems and have had near CATASTROPHIC hang ups.

I don’t think our jumpers had a cutter, I did…. No matter, if he was fumbling trying WHATEVER to get unhooked, can see this happening pretty easily.

Horrifying.
 
FormerHangie said:
Last time I did a tandem, about five years ago, I was wearing a webbing harness that attached me to the instructor, no parachute attached. What I'm not getting here is what they could have gotten hung up on outside of the aircraft. All the turbine jump planes I can find pictures of don't have a step outside of the airplane.
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It wasn't a turbine. It was a 182.

Latest conjecture is that maybe the instructor somehow released himself when trying to unnsag things. That's someone's wildass guess. Of course, they'll see that because they have recovered all the parts of the rig.

Sharp eyes looking at the firemen rescuing the student from the tree say that the main and the drogue (a small chute that tandems use even while under "free fall" for stability, were not deployed, meaning that things went awry very early in the sequence (it was not the main deploying that caused the instructor to fall out).
 
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Tools said:
It’s not uncommon to not be shown how to deploy. I HATE the step on 182s for tandems and have had near CATASTROPHIC hang ups.

I don’t think our jumpers had a cutter, I did…. No matter, if he was fumbling trying WHATEVER to get unhooked, can see this happening pretty easily.

Horrifying.
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Many years ago, when I was in college and we shared the skies with pterodactyls, I did 7 static line jumps and a hop n' pop from a Cessna 180 with a top hinged door. That worked pretty well, for solo jumpers. Your left foot went on the entry step, you grabbed the strut, and the jumpmaster tapped you on the leg, and off you went. The main gear was well out of the way on a 180, so not much to go wrong. I've seen a couple of videos of tandem jumps from a 182, and it's not something I'd want to try or let one of my family members do.
 
I did my tandem jump in a 206 with no door. I just kind of sat on the door sill with my feet out in the slipstream and the instructor crouched behind me and just pushed us both out.
 
In the military, we taped the **** out of anything on the aircraft that might possibly cause a jumper hangup.
 
When the original story came about getting caught on the outside of the aircraft, I wondered if the instructor coming out of the harness would be connected, either intentionally or accidentally, with his attempts to free them. I know I've seen some social media already calling him out as a hero, sacrificing himself to free the student. I don't know if there are any statements to back that up, or is it like the pilot that turned towards the open field to avoid the school full of children.
 
That little drogue chute is deployed manually when clear. This all seems easily plausible.

Just hacking away at everything to get off the a/c seems plausible. At that point, it’s the lesser of evils. If you’re in an unsurvivable situation, uh… just really sucks he found another. In this case it did save the student.

Likely result would be both of them perishing with the a/c, whether pilot could get out is indeterminate.
 
Tools said:
Likely result would be both of them perishing with the a/c, whether pilot could get out is indeterminate.
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Why would the pilot leave a perfectly good (or at least as good as jump planes get) aircraft?
 
Two guys hanging off like that might not be landable.
 
flyingron said:
I did my tandem jump in a 206 with no door. I just kind of sat on the door sill with my feet out in the slipstream and the instructor crouched behind me and just pushed us both out.
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I'm looking at pictures of a 206 jump plane, it looks like the door is aft of the main gear. That would be better than a 182.

The side door on the turbine planes is the bee's knees. On my second tandem, I did the exit, and the instructor was right behind me.
 
I knew Justin personally. I still dont know what exactly happened up there. But it was a 182 and they were caught up on the step. So it would look like this: The student wears a full body harness that then has multi-point attachments to the TI's rig. The TI is the only one wearing a rig. They attach front to back with the TI in the back. The student and TI can either sit in the door and exit by superman jump toward the rear of the a/c, or climb onto the step student holding onto strut and then exit backwards facing the RW. Chances are with being caught on the step the TI chose for many reasons to sit in the door and jump out towards the rear of the plane thus causing them to be hung up on the step by most likely a leg strap. In that instance the TI Justin would have been hanging almost upside down with the student laying on top of him and probably hanging to the side. With a loose chest strap a jumper if hanging upside down by their harness could maneuver in such a way to slide right out of the entire rig through the shoulder straps. Given that all reports I have seen shows that the tandem rig harness was not cut in any way I suspect that this is the most likely scenario. Justin was maneuvering hanging from the step at 14k AGL and slipped right through his damn harness which then caused the leg strap to slide off dislodging the student from the step and sending him into free fall. The student was then saved by the AAD which deployed the reserve. Its a freak accident that could have been avoided a couple different ways but the easiest would be just to make your student step out and do an exit into the RW. But first time students are terrified and they will inch by inch it all the way if you let them. Chances are the student would not stand up on the step and Justin tried to force him forward causing him to turn into a slug sliding out of the damn a/c. These are all basically my most educated guesses and again I dont really know what happened up there and they were the last ones out so only Justin, the student, and possibly the pilot know what happened up there.

RIP Spidey Fuller Blue skies
 
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