Beloved skydiving instructor Carl Daugherty was identified Tuesday as the man who died after a hard landing in DeLand Sunday morning.
Since his death, several dozen tributes to the 76-year-old, who worked as a safety and training advisor at Skydive DeLand, have poured in online from across the country and even outside the United States.
"Thanks for giving me all the knowledge to defend myself up there, you always will be the best skydiving instructor," wrote Francisco Vega, of Ecuador. "Blue skies Boss. RIP Genius."
Daugherty, a DeLand resident, and another skydiver collided mid-air Sunday morning at Skydive DeLand, according to the DeLand police report.
Both men had their parachutes open, but only David Henion was able to regain control of his parachute and land safely, a witness told police. Daugherty was unable to get his parachute reopened and landed in a parking lot off Flight Line Boulevard near the skydiving facility.
Witnesses rushed to Daugherty and tried to help him until emergency medical responders arrived, according to the report.
Orlando resident Henion told police he was coming in for a landing from the right while Daugherty was coming in from the left. The 56-year-old said he tried to steer away, but the men collided and their parachutes became tangled. Henion told police he didn't see Daugherty once they'd separated.
"We review everything as much as we possibly can, but this seems pretty straightforward," Bob Hallett, owner of Skydive DeLand, said regarding the incident. "We are a high-speed sport, and we are very well aware of the dangers, and we take every consideration to reduce those dangers, but occasionally, as big as the sky is up there, things happen."
Sunday's accident is the country's first fatality related to what's classified as a canopy collision since 2017, Ron Bell, the United States Parachute Association's director of safety and training, said.
"That's killed some of the best," Bob Lewis, a friend of Daugherty's and parachuting historian, said by phone Tuesday.
Lewis, who lives in Utah, met Daugherty at a freefall convention in Illinois, though he couldn't recall exactly when; it felt like they'd always been friends.
"He was as talented as they come," Lewis said. "It was easy to forget how good he was because he never showed off — he didn't have to."
Daugherty, who was born in Germany and moved to the U.S. as a child, made his first jump in 1971 out of a Cessna 182 at 2,000 feet.
Hallett said Daugherty, whom he described as "a total comedian," had just recently logged his 20,000th jump.
Just 3% of the United States Parachute Association's members have completed more than 10,000 jumps, according to the association's website.
While Sooji Oh, an employee at Skydive DeLand, had only known Daugherty for about a year, she said she enjoyed working with the longtime skydiver whom she described as sweet and funny.
"He could be grumpy at times, but in a really endearing way," Oh said Tuesday, the day before her 25th birthday, with a laugh. "He was a character for sure."
Before Daugherty, who had quite the head of hair, would go on jumps, Oh would braid his long, curly gray mane to help keep his hair out of his face.
Daugherty coached and participated on skydiving teams that have earned a dozen gold medals in the USPA Nationals, Hallett said.
The DeLand resident also holds eight large-formation skydiving world records and is one of six people who participated in all of the 100-way, 200-way, 300-way and 400-way teams.
As a longtime instructor, he also helped develop the accelerated freefall training method, which is where students jump from 13,500 feet with two certified instructors holding on to the student's harness.
In an interview with Brian Giboney for the October 2014 issue of Parachutist, the USPA magazine, Daugherty said his favorite thing was teaching accelerated freefall students.
"I teach theory of the ideal; I make them practice what is real and light the fire of desire, which is the exponential multiplier," Daugherty said.
Prior to Daugherty's death, the last skydiving-related death in DeLand occurred in 2017 when a man intentionally didn't deploy his parachute, according to News-Journal research.
No comments:
Post a Comment