Indoor Skydiving in a Wind Tunnel

Thought wind tunnels were used to test the aerodynamics of vehicles? Well think again. The latest craze to sweep the UK is indoor skydiving, also known as ‘body flying’. Originating from the US, the basic premise is to take a wind tunnel, turn it upright and then get people to jump into it (after turning it on of course).

Ideal for individuals who want to experience the sensation of free fall without having to actually jump out of a plane, indoor skydiving is also a Godsend for professional skydivers, who use it as a vital part of their training programmes.

On arriving for your first ‘flight’, you will be given a briefing from an experienced instructor. This might involve you balancing ‘belly-down’ on a chair, in an attempt to create the perfect ‘flying shape’. Following this, you will change into your (usually psychedelic) flight suit, helmet, goggles and ear plugs (you will understand why you need these later) and you are then ready.

When it’s your turn to fly, you will stand at the doorway of the wind tunnel and, on your instructor’s say so, lean forward and fall into the airflow. You are now flying. The noise will be deafening and so your instructor will give you direction via some pre-determined hand signals (not dissimilar to those used in diving). You can control your flying by increasing or diminishing the drag of your body and by using your arms and legs as rudders. The best way to learn is to experiment and to think of yourself as an aeroplane (I was a B2 Bomber - slow and stealth-like).

You will usually get two one-minute sessions of flying, which might seem measly until you consider that a ‘real’ skydive, from a height of 10,000 feet, would only provide you with about 30 seconds of free fall. Hence you are getting the equivalent of four skydives.

Indoor skydiving is suitable for everyone. The instructors will consider your age, shape and ability level and set the wind speed accordingly. On average, the wind speed is just over 120 miles per hour. This matches the terminal velocity of a normal-sized human being falling from high above. With indoor skydiving it is necessary to create that same speed, but blowing air upwards.

If you catch the skydiving ‘bug’ you can sign up for further classes and learn how to do turns, rolls, formation flying and pretty much any acrobatic maneuver that you can think of. And all this at just a few feet from the ground.