WINNIPEG (Sun Media) - It was a different kind of golf hazard that fortunately didn't lead to a handicap. And luckily for the woman involved, she was given a good drop.
Several golfers at a Steinbach course found their game disrupted yesterday when a woman fell, literally, from seemingly out of nowhere onto the 10th fairway -- hooked up to a parachute.
The Winnipeg skydiver found Steinbach Fly-In Golf Club the most convenient and safe landing space after failing to hit her targeted drop zone because of a malfunction with her parachute following her leap from a Cessna 182 plane at 12,500 feet.
Landing roughly, she tumbled and suffered a shoulder injury which required an ambulance ride for treatment at Steinbach's Bethesda Memorial Hospital, said Tim Eason of Adventure Skydiving.
FAILURE OF MAIN CHUTE
The forceful noon-hour landing was a result of a failure of her main chute when she tried to activate it, Eason said, adding she came down about a kilometre from the skydiving group's drop site. Using a reserve chute, she had little choice but to try to find her feet while coming down unsteadily on a sloping surface -- not an easy feat.
"While all this is happening, you're dropping altitude. And because you're lower than you normally would be, your ability to glide and land in open fields might be limited. You have got to make your best choice, and she saw a nice, big open green," said Eason, Adventure's drop-zone operator.
"She tumbled on the landing, and it was a no-wind day. And when there's no wind, people kind of land a bit faster than normal. It's like you're running as fast as you could, and you trip."
Word among golf course staff is the skydiver -- whose name was not disclosed -- had minor injuries.
"We had to hold up play for about 20 or 25 minutes," said pro shop employee Sid Barkman. "A couple of golfers had just played through. The next people had to wait.
"Nobody seemed to mind. They understood because, obviously, it was a freak thing."
They sound surprised that people were "courteous" and didn't mid the hold-up. Was somebody actually going to get PO'ed that a lady had to emergency land on the golf course?
Sheesh, people must be too stressed out these days.
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by sox 06 » Sat May 19, 2007 9:24 am 
