Married skydiver Luke Aikins become the first to jump 25,000 feet into a net without a parachute
- Aikins jumped 25,000 into a net Saturday evening in Simi Valley, California
- Found out he had to wear a parachute just hours before - but did not use it
- The skydiver, 42, has done more than 18,000 jumps and stunts in Ironman 3
- His four-year-old son and his wife both watched his record-breaking jump
An American skydiver has become the first of his trade to jump 25,000 feet into a net - without a parachute.
Luke Aikins, 42, completed the record-breaking stunt on Saturday evening in Simi Valley, California.
He hit the 100-by-100-foot net perfectly, quickly climbed out of it and walked over to hug his wife, who had been watching with other family members.
Just before climbing into a plane to make the jump, Aikins said he had been ordered to wear a parachute but indicated he wouldn't open it.
As the plane was climbing to 25,000 feet above the drop zone he said the requirement had been lifted and he took off the chute.
He fell for about two minutes, then flipped onto his back at the last second and landed perfectly to cheers from those gathered to watch.
Aikins had rehearsed the jump earlier in the week, aiming to land in a trawler-like fishing net 20 stories above the ground and about a third the size of a football field.
He has completed more than 18,000 jumps in the past and did stunts for the Ironman 3 movie.
Aikins said he found out about an hour before he was scheduled to jump on Saturday that the Screen Actors Guilt required him to wear a parachute.
He didn't elaborate but the jump was broadcast on Fox television as part of a one-hour TV special.
Aikins said wearing a chute would actually make it harder for him to properly put himself over the 100-foot-by-100-foot net.
He argued wearing a parachute would in fact make the jump more dangerous because he would have its canister on his back when he hit the net at about 120 miles per hour.
Aikins did however need an oxygen tank for the first 10,000 feet of the fall. He jumped with three other skydivers, one of whom was in charge to collect the discarded tank.
His jump was shown on television with a delay and a warning to viewers not to try this themselves.
'If I wasn't nervous, I would be stupid,' Aikins said before his jump.
He spoke with a grin as he sat near his landing spot earlier this week following a day of practice jumps — all made with a parachute.
Aikins planned to jump with three other skydivers: one carrying a camera, another trailing smoke so people on the ground can follow his descent, the third ready to collect the oxygen tank.
The other three were to open their chutes at 5,000 feet, leaving Aikins alone with no one to hand him a chute in midair as has been done before.
When his friend Chris Talley came up with the idea two years ago, Aikins turned it down cold.
'I kind of laugh and I say, "Ok, that's great. I'll help you find somebody to do it. But it's not for me. I've got a wife and son, and it's really not for me.'''
A couple of weeks later he changed his mind.
Talley, who'd worked with Aikins on other projects and was helping Amusement Park Entertainment pitch a show to Fox, said Aikins is the only skydiver he's confident can actually pull this off.
Aikins made his first tandem jump when he was 12, following with his first solo leap four years later. He's been racking them up at several hundred a year ever since.
His father and grandfather were skydivers, and his wife, Monica, has made 2,000 jumps. His family owns Skydive Kapowsin near Tacoma, Washington.
His father, two brothers, his sister, his wife and their four-year-old son all planned to watch him jump Saturday at an old movie ranch on the outskirts of Simi Valley. His mother won't be there.
'My mom supports me. She doesn't support this project,' he said with a sheepish smile.
'To me, I'm proving that we can do stuff that we don't think we can do if we approach it the right way.'
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