We were excited about being at Skydive Perris!  It’s a well-known drop zone.  Lots of records are broken at Perris and it’s the place people from Hollywood come to skydive.  In fact, Miley Cyrus was there earlier in the year! After we filled out the waivers, we got an experienced jumper briefing.  For such a huge drop zone, their grass landing area leaves alot to be desired!

After our briefing, we checked out the grass landing area.  It was small, but doable.  Once we were geared up, we went to the loading area to wait for the plane and watched as others landed.  Most of the jumpers were not standing up their landings.  We saw face plants, butt slides and tumbles.  With the lower density altitude, our canopies would fly faster than they do at our home.  This was the first DZ of our trip - so I planned to do a butt slide just to be safe. 

Then it happened...a low turn.  "Call 911!" We've seen it before and when it happens, I get this sick feeling immediately.  A few experienced skydivers ran out to help and someone called 911.  From our point of view, the landing looked like it would be fatal.  It was very hard to get on the plane, but Perris NEVER shuts down.  Once we were on the plane, we were instructed to land in the dirt in lieu of the grass.  The ambulance arrived while we were on the plane.  You can see in it at the end of the field.

Prior to our jump, I hadn't really looked very carefully at the dirt area where we would now be landing.  When I came in for my landing, I prepared to do a butt slide.  As my feet came to the ground, instead of sliding, they caught in the tilled up dirt and I ended up going head of heels.  The landing was completely painless, but I was covered from head to toe in dirt.  Back at the hangar, I asked for a broom and a scrub brush so I could get the dirt off my rig.  It took me more than an hour to clean it off.

After the ambulance left the drop zone, I was expecting to hear a page for the experienced jumpers so we'd have an update on how the jumper was doing.

Jason Granger, a 29 year old U.S. Army military skydiving instructor and father of 3, died shortly after he arrived at the hospital.  We were both upset that the drop zone did nothing to honor this man.  There was no shut down and no moment of silence.  It was like they stepped over his dead body to get to their next dollar....Very disappointing.

While we were at Skydive Perris, we had lunch with John Carlson (a friend from Suffolk) and ran into Rich Webb, another skydiver/BASE jumper we hadn't seen in a long time.  Given the chain of events, we had no interest in continuing to skydive at Perris.  This opened up a world of possibilities.  Where would we stop on the way to Eloy?