The sky is falling?
Last week's death of two skydivers at Freefall Adventures Skydiving School in Cross Keys, New Jersey has the airport's neighbors crying foul faster than the terminal velocity of freefall. These are just the latest in a string of deaths over the past few years at the skydiving school, where packing your parachute should come only after signing your Last Will and Testament.
Truth be told, the deaths at Freefall Adventures don't appear to be statistically out of line from what you would expect at any other skydiving school. That's small consolation to the human projectiles themselves when they realize that they're about to play smashmouth with the earth at 120 miles per hour, and the earth's gonna win.
Now, consider that the area surrounding the skydiving school was mostly rural when it first began operating decades ago. Since then, suburban sprawl has replaced the lush green landing pads which surrounded the school, which makes it much more likely that an errant skydiver could be crashing into a nearby home.
Already they've come close. Last week's death ended with the skydivers' broken bodies laying in an 8-inch deep impact hole of the front yard of an abandoned home. A few years back, a skydiver fell to his death and landed in the driveway of a home as the home's family watched in horror from their front porch just feet away. Ironically, this jumper hit the driveway's basketball hoop on the way down. It didn't break his fall, but hey, two points.
So it seems like the local residents may have a point. Right?
Wrong. Sure, noone wants a human missile to throttle itself through their roof and land in their living room. Or worse, imagine a falling skydiver landing on a child. But, frankly speaking, the chances are much more likely that you'll be killed driving to your lawyer's office on the way to sue the skydiving school.
Especially if you drive the way I do.
In a world where everybody seems to have their own cause celeb, it doesn't surprise me that there are those who now want to ban skydiving in suburban areas. It also doesn't surprise me that families would be concerned about the potential for a hazardous situation. But what does surprise me is that anybody takes this seriously.
At least in this area, no skydiver has hit or hurt a person. Or even damaged property (basketball hoop excluded). I'm pretty confident that the world-wide statistics are similar. So, from a cost-benefit perspective, what really is the cost to local residents if skydiving continues? I've heard of the "emotional trauma" that witnesses to skydiving deaths experience. Well, I've got an idea to give them, which is the same thing I would say to someone who is against pornography - if you don't want to see it, then don't watch. That's how things work in America, the land of the free, and the home of the brave.
I can assure you that the sky is in fact not falling, even if the public's support for skydiving is.
And that's from someone who lives just a mile from Freefall Adventures.
Truth be told, the deaths at Freefall Adventures don't appear to be statistically out of line from what you would expect at any other skydiving school. That's small consolation to the human projectiles themselves when they realize that they're about to play smashmouth with the earth at 120 miles per hour, and the earth's gonna win.
Now, consider that the area surrounding the skydiving school was mostly rural when it first began operating decades ago. Since then, suburban sprawl has replaced the lush green landing pads which surrounded the school, which makes it much more likely that an errant skydiver could be crashing into a nearby home.
Already they've come close. Last week's death ended with the skydivers' broken bodies laying in an 8-inch deep impact hole of the front yard of an abandoned home. A few years back, a skydiver fell to his death and landed in the driveway of a home as the home's family watched in horror from their front porch just feet away. Ironically, this jumper hit the driveway's basketball hoop on the way down. It didn't break his fall, but hey, two points.
So it seems like the local residents may have a point. Right?
Wrong. Sure, noone wants a human missile to throttle itself through their roof and land in their living room. Or worse, imagine a falling skydiver landing on a child. But, frankly speaking, the chances are much more likely that you'll be killed driving to your lawyer's office on the way to sue the skydiving school.
Especially if you drive the way I do.
In a world where everybody seems to have their own cause celeb, it doesn't surprise me that there are those who now want to ban skydiving in suburban areas. It also doesn't surprise me that families would be concerned about the potential for a hazardous situation. But what does surprise me is that anybody takes this seriously.
At least in this area, no skydiver has hit or hurt a person. Or even damaged property (basketball hoop excluded). I'm pretty confident that the world-wide statistics are similar. So, from a cost-benefit perspective, what really is the cost to local residents if skydiving continues? I've heard of the "emotional trauma" that witnesses to skydiving deaths experience. Well, I've got an idea to give them, which is the same thing I would say to someone who is against pornography - if you don't want to see it, then don't watch. That's how things work in America, the land of the free, and the home of the brave.
I can assure you that the sky is in fact not falling, even if the public's support for skydiving is.
And that's from someone who lives just a mile from Freefall Adventures.
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