How Safe is Tandem Skydiving? – Before the Jump

You’ll be jumping off of a plane that’s 14,000 feet high off the ground, so it’s normal if you’re nervous about skydiving. Skydiving, as an extreme sport, has become so easily accessible that anyone without experience and just a little bit of courage can try it. First timers though, due to their lack of diving experience, have to piggyback with a qualified instructor (who’s done at least 500 jumps). Which makes sense – the beauty and appeal of being a daredevil is to live to do it all over again. With that said, with tandem skydiving, your instructor tags along and is basically your guide through the first few minutes of free fall. You’ll be exiting the plane together, while the instructor will be in charge ensuring that the parachute opens up at the right time and makes sure that you land safely. But with every sport – particularly an extreme one like skydiving, there are risks. So, how safe is tandem skydiving? This article will go over the risks and reasons why you shouldn’t be worried the next time you’re taking that big leap.

Risks Of Tandem Skydiving

People have been jumping off planes “for fun” since the 1980s, and as with every other sport, safety techniques have improved. Therefore, right now is the safest time in the history of skydiving to jump.

The United States Parachute Associate (USPA), the body which licenses and regulates skydiving, has kept a safety track record of each accident – plus how fatal they were. As of 2014, USPA recorded only 24 fatal skydiving accidents out of 3.2 million jumps!

To put this into terms, you have a higher chance of getting hit by a car (whether you’re driving or walking down the street) than having a skydiving accident. That’s just the stats for solo skydiving. Tandems are more than twice as safe compared to solo skydiving when it comes to risks!

Safety Of Tandem Skydiving Equipment

Increasingly more and more people are getting interested in skydiving. This means that more safety measures have been implemented in the equipment used. One of the improvements is the reserve parachute. It’s like the backup, in case of a failure. Note that skydiving equipment are rigorously tested before being used, so the chance your primary parachute will be faulty is extremely low. Even if it fails, there’s a backup. Once the first parachute fails, the backup takes over due to a built in FAA-certified trigger.

Instructor’s Expertise

Anyone would panic if they had an inexperienced pilot at the cockpit of an extremely advanced and well equipped air craft. The same applies to tandem skydiving. Which is why instructors have a ridiculously long list of requirements before they can pilot your jump.

The easiest criteria is that they must have completed at least 500 jumps within the last three years. After which, they’d then have series of exams and evaluations.

So, How Safe is Tandem Skydiving?

This is for the next time you’re thinking about going on an adventure and potentially skydiving and are wondering – how safe is tandem skydiving? Keep these pointers in mind to ease your nerves before you take the big jump while engaging in your next adventurous activity.