Dramatic footage shows the moment an experienced skydiver was forced to cut himself loose from his parachute after it became tangled on a plane’s wing. The parachutist was the first of 17 jumping from a Cessna Caravan at 15,000 feet, when the handle of his reserve chute snagged onto the aircraft, dragging him from the plane and leaving him suspended in mid-air. While dangling from the wing, the skydiver managed to use a hook knife to sever his lines, sending him into freefall before he was able to deploy his backup chute and land safely with only minor injuries. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau released the video as part of its findings into what went wrong over Mission Beach, about 90 miles from Cairns, on Sept. 20. The disruption also caused another jumper to fall prematurely from the aircraft, although they also landed unharmed. “This type of situation, where a reserve parachute is entangled with the aircraft, is unique and extreme,” said Australian Parachute Federation (APF) chief executive Stephen Porter. “Fortunately, in this case, the parachutist had a functioning main parachute as an option.” Porter praised the skydiver’s “calmness and ability to assess the situation” for the good outcome, and credited the pilot’s ability to “calmly assess the situation and make quick decisions under pressure.”
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