Take a leap of faith.
It takes a special kind of person to voluntarily to jump out of a plane, one who craves the adrenaline rush of free falling through the air. Although your personal preference may be to stay inside of the plane, or just on solid ground, it takes a lot of guts to jump out of a plane chasing a parachute.
Banzai skydiving is arguably the most dangerous sport ever created because the participant first throws the parachute out of the plane then jumps out after it attempting to catch it before they hit the ground.
“I wouldn’t do it,” said senior Kate Haynes. “I don’t trust my hand eye coordination and I would fall to my death.”
The death sentence that is associated with skydiving is also incorrectly placed onto banzai skydiving. In fact, there have been no recorded deaths that are attributed to banzai skydiving, meaning that, in theory, it is the safest form of skydiving.
Experts in the sport believe that there are a few different reasons why there are no deaths attributed to the sport. The first is that so few people attempt the feat that the likelihood of people dying decreases. Another theory is that, in order to be eligible to attempt Banzai skydiving you have to have a lot experience skydiving.
“If there was someone else with a parachute to catch me, like a safety net, I would do it,” said senior Matt Race.
It wouldn’t make sense to have instructors just throw you off the plane without preparation so, of course, there is intensive training that a participant has to go through before they even board the plane. There is a banzai skydiving online magazine that discusses the types of training necessary to be eligible to jump out of a plane without a parachute. A candidate for this extreme sport would first have to find a certification center; which could be difficult because the number of people who want to try Banzai skydiving doesn’t really constitute a need for a lot them.
“That sounds scary, I’d have to do training first but I would [try it],” said junior Travis Elder. “I’ve gone skydiving before [but] I wouldn’t just go into it [without training].”
Although this is probably the most dangerous sport in the world, it is growing in popularity. Locations to get certified for traditional forms of skydiving are popping up all over the United States while there are still no locations to learn how to be a banzai diver.
“I guess it would be thrilling,” said sophomore Emily Keast, “but I still wouldn’t do it because of the chance that I wouldn’t catch the parachute.”