Flying visit to Freshers' Fair

Iain Firkins a member of staff from ITS, recently dropped into Freshers Fair - literally! - in a demo jump for the University's skydiving club (more commonly known as SkydiveUWE). Iain has been an active member of the club for nearly six years. Having joined as a student he then came to work at UWE after graduating and was able to pursue his interest. He has jumped in many places around the world and has had some amazing experiences, most notably being in freefall above Florida during the launch of a rocket from Kennedy Space Center - but jumping into Freshers Fair and landing on the Frenchay Campus is the fulfilment of a long-held ambition.

Iain says, "In the club we'd spoken about it for years, but for one reason or another had never managed to do it ourselves. We got a team to do a demo jump two years ago, and the reception was brilliant. This year, we decided to go for it ourselves. "We had to prove we could land accurately, so we spent a few weekends at the dropzone landing on a small gym mat in the middle of the dropzone. Once we had satisfied our demo team leader, the jump was on!
"On the day of the jump itself, the weather was perfect and the wind just right.

When we finally jumped, I remember looking down and thinking 'wow, that's Sainsburys! And there's Big W!'.

Under canopy, it was a brilliant view of the Freshers' Fair, the entire Campus, and the surrounding area. I was wearing a video camera and took some amazing footage from the air. Everyone landed safely in the small gully at the bottom of campus by the main road.
"In effect, this was the culmination of six years of jumping and after talking about it for so long, we had finally jumped into Campus. Many a day has been spent looking out of the office window into the sky wondering what it would be like, and now I know!"

Iain finished his training programme and became a qualified skydiver in Florida in July 1999. Today, he holds a C license and has made over 630 jumps, with more than eight and a half hours of freefall. He has jumped in Florida, California, Holland, Spain, Switzerland and all around the UK. In July 2003, Iain became the Chairman of the British Collegiate Parachute Association and took over running the BCPA for 12 months.