What starts as a normal and exciting day of adventure and fun, turned into a near death experience for an unsuspecting sky diving student. Free falling at 9,000 feet is a terrible place to have a seizure.
According to the Youtube description, the seizure victim was a skydiving student on stage five of his Accelerated Free Fall program. The jumpmaster, who earned his pay that day, was able to pull the chute at 4,000 feet after nearly 30 seconds of free falling while unconscious. The student regained consciousness at 3,000 feet and was able to perform a safe landing.
Many skydivers use an automatic activation device (AAD) that opens the reserve parachute should the fall below a safe altitude. Its unknown if this was the case during this incident, but the haste at which the jumpmaster attempted to reach and deploy his student's chute seems to indicate a dire situation. Even with an AAD, free falling during a medical emergency would be quite dangerous and the effort on behalf of the dive instructor could very well have saved a life and no doubt serious injury.
h/t ttyymmnn
Chris is a pilot who loves airplanes and cars and his writing has been seen on Jalopnik. Contact him with questions or comments via twitter or email.