Skydiver explains how she survived terrifying 10,000ft plummet without an open parachute
A skydiver has revealed exactly how she survived plummeting toward the earth at 150 mph after being knocked out mid-air.
Holly Wiffen was enjoying an ordinary day - or at least as ordinary as jumping out of the sky is to humans - at her local drop zone last month, having completed three jumps previously with her friends.
However, things went dreadfully wrong during the 35-year-old's fourth jump after she completely misjudged the speed at which she was falling - 2,000 feet into her 12,000-foot skydive - and collided with another jumper during her descent.
Wiffen was instantly knocked unconscious, sending her rapidly plummeting toward the ground with a closed parachute.
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Now, appearing on the UK's This Morning show, she's opened up about her near-death experience, explaining exactly what went through her mind as she hurtled toward the earth.
"Yeah, it was instant - it would just went black, I don't even kind of remember leaving the plane," she told the hosts.
"And then I just was dreaming of falling - it was just really surreal. I just thought, 'I'm falling and I'm dreaming about falling', it was really like kind of peaceful.
"But then I kind of felt like I was a bit unstable, and then in my kind of mind, I was thinking back to my like training - I was thinking, 'Right, if I'm falling and I'm unstable, I should be arching and trying to reach my parachute' - and obviously, you can see in the clip that's what's kind of happening. But I was out, I was asleep."
Fortunately for Wiffen, a mandatory safety device automatically kicked in as she rapidly approached the ground - the emergency technology deployed her reserve canopy just seconds before she brutally crashed directly into a large conifer tree.
I mean, talk about luck, wow! For those that aren't aware of the conifer tree, t's quite thick with its leaves and is arguably the most cushioned species of tree around!
Anyway, when she finally woke up suspended high in the branches, Wiffen was completely numb to any pain due to sheer shock.
Instead of panicking about what had just happened, she was actually more worried about her skydiving gear.
Wiffen hilariously explained: "But I just looked down and thought right so there's my reserve canopy - I must have been skydiving. I've still got my kit on.
"Right, get my kit off because if I've done something bad you know the paramedics are going to cut my stuff off me and it's very expensive.
"And I looked down and I thought right let's do a full body check. So I checked everything - no pain. I saw my kind of leg to one side and I saw the brake and thought well that's broken, let's ignore that."
She ultimately suffered a nasty broken left leg and a tiny fracture in her spine, but somehow avoided tragedy.
Despite the absolute horror of her 12,000-foot freefall, she is remarkably already planning her grand return to the skies.
Topics: This Morning, UK News
Joe Yates