I flew out to New Jersey for the weekend to help my mom and Roger w/ the administrative side (invitations, paperwork, money, etc.) of a skydiving event called Project Extreme-Way. The idea was to bring together 80 or so high-level skydivers and attempt complicated sequential formations. We had bad weather the first two days (which was a huge bummer, but gave us time to have a kick-ass house party and spend the next day recovering). The gods were obviously pleased with the tequila sacrifices and we had beautiful weather come Saturday morning (at least on the ground, which was sunny and warm, but there was frost when they opened the doors at 17,500′). The group split up and did four 40-ways, and then came back together for six attempts at multi-point 76-ways.*

Cranking out 10 jumps in a day and a half is a lot for this type of event (the formations are complicated to organize and debrief and they go to a higher altitude which requires an oxygen setup). It would have been nice to do all 18 jumps they had planned, things were really starting to come together towards the end, but what can you do? Weather is weather.

It’s hard to say this w/out sounding mothering or condescending, but I’m really PROUD of this group. We had bad weather, but when the time came they all stepped up, worked really hard, didn’t complain (much) about the heat on the ground or the freezing temperatures at altitude, and looked to be having a good time in between. I feel really lucky to have been a part of it.

I was totally camera crazy, so it’s hard to narrow down my favorites. Here are a FEW highlights. More are here. Even MORE are here.

Dirtdiving - planning the skydive on the ground beforehand

Loading up. They used four planes for each 76-way

Canopies

Packing

Me n’ Mom

Screaming drunk-dials

Our friend Liz… taking a break before a jump

Sharing the shade of a bi-plane wing

* Definitions:

Formation = A group of skydivers joined together in freefall.

Sequential formation = A formation that changes it’s pattern one or more times (i.e. a sequence) during freefall.

Way = Number of skydivers in one formation. 20 people would yield a 20-way.

Point = A change to the formation during freefall. The skydivers release their grip and create a new formation, thus creating another ‘point.’

Putting it all together, if the group of 20 people changes their formation 3 times, that is a 3-point 20-way.