Skydiver Plane Pilot Has Close Call After Aircraft Damaged In Jump

After a bizarre incident with a skydiver, a plane pilot had to make an emergency jump from the aircraft. Though the plane was completely destroyed, nobody was injured in the incident.

CNN shared the details of the unusual excursion. Shawn Kinmartin was the pilot for the skydiving service and on Saturday he was taking his fourth group of the day up. As he was 11,500 feet high, he realized a skydiver had damaged a part of the plane’s tail during the jump.

The piece of the aircraft damaged the plane’s ability to descend and climb, and Kinmartin spent about 10 minutes after the skydiver’s jump trying to maneuver the plane back to the airport. However, he soon had to acknowledge that he wasn’t able to properly control the plane given the damage. Kinmartin shifted course to head toward some farm field and he made preparations to jump.

The Cessna 182 was down to about 2,000 feet when the skydiver plane pilot jumped, and moments later the plane crashed. Kinmartin landed safely nearby. Though he’s used to flying the planes for Fly Free Skydiving, this was Kinmartin’s first skydive himself. He says that once he knew he wouldn’t be crashing into any buildings or hurting anybody else, he got a bit of a rush out of the experience.

KSDK shares that the skydiver plane pilot has been on the job for about four years, and it seems he’s never encountered anything quite like this. Luckily for Kinmartin, it is company policy that he be wearing a parachute, but this incident was his first time using it. He happens to be a flight simulation student as well so he has practiced emergency situations, but the real-life experience definitely jarred him a bit.

The flight initially had four skydivers along with the pilot, and luckily nobody ended up injured in the accident. Though it may have been a bit of a close call, the pilot’s quick thinking seems to have ensured that he landed safely and nobody was hurt in the process.

As a previous Inquisitr report shared, that is not always the case when something goes wrong during a skydiving flight. Luckily in this case with the skydiver plane, the pilot managed to do exactly what he needed to do to escape unharmed. The plane didn’t make it out unscathed, but having nobody injured is certainly impressive.

[Image: KMOU]