Skydiving instructor tried to save student, Pasco detective says: Skydive City - Zephyrhills Municipal Airport (KZPH), Florida

ZEPHYRHILLS — The camera mounted atop the instructor's helmet captured the last 60 seconds or so of the skydivers' lives. And it gives investigators their best clues as two why two Icelandic skydivers fell to their deaths Saturday from Skydive City.

The video indicates that the student, Andrimar Pordarson, 25, was unable to yank the pull cord on his parachute, said Pasco sheriff's Detective William Lindsey. It's unclear whether Pordarson was unconscious, or why he was unable to activate his parachute, Lindsey said.

But the instructor, Orvar Arnarson, 40, tried to save him. He tried to pull the cord, Lindsey said, but he couldn't open the chute in time.

There was no dialogue in the short video, taken from a camera mounted to Arnarson's helmet. It was meant to be an instructional video.

"They were falling at 120 mph," Lindsey said. "All you can hear is wind."

The men were visiting Florida on a skydiving trip from Iceland and jumped about 10 a.m. Saturday morning from Skydive City in Zephyrhills. After Pasco deputies and Zephyrhills police spent several hours searching, deputies in a helicopter spotted the bodies at 7:30 p.m. Saturday off Yonkers Road, south of the Zephyrhills Municipal Airport.

The Pasco County Sheriff's Office has received numerous requests from local media for the videotape from the jump. They also heard from the skydivers' family members, who begged for the video not to be released, Lindsey said.

At a press conference Tuesday, the Sheriff's Office described the clues gleaned from the videotape, but said they would not release it. The agency cited an exemption under Florida's public records law for recordings depicting the killing of a person.

"It's a very sad ending to two people's lives who were going out there for enjoyment," said Pasco Sheriff Chris Nocco.

While the main parachutes were never activated, both packs had backup chutes that should have deployed. The Federal Aviation Administration will send investigators later this week to look at the equipment, the Sheriff's Office said.

Investigators may never have a full picture of what went wrong, but the video shows the instructor, Arnarson, did everything he could to try to save the student and himself.

"He was a hero. He died a hero," Lindsey said.