DeKalb County native Jim Judkins learned to jump before he learned to walk.

And, yes, there’s a huge difference between jumping from a sofa cushion to the carpeted floor and jumping from an airplane into puffy, white clouds.

For him, “I’d rather jump out of a plane than to ride a motorcycle or to ride in an automobile.  It’s safer and statistics prove it.”  He’s continued this adage since beginning his weekly skydiving jump in 2023.  He knows the dangers and triumphs.  Like with most anything in life, chances are meant to be taken – not ignored.  The young attorney/farmer has learned to embrace his fears, feel them and do it anyway.   He has learned to try new things, rather than to sit idly by.

I know.  I’m his mother and I’ve closed my eyes and held my breath more than a thousand times since his 1978 birth.  Yet – maybe his willingness to develop and to try new adventures was embedded into his mindset at an early age.  After all, he rode alone in commercial airplanes as a youth.  After all, he piloted private aircrafts as a 17-year-old teenager.  After all, he jumped from an airplane as a 44-year-old adult with my blessings.  It seems to make him happy, fulfilled, and content.

On Sunday afternoon, June 8, 2025 in Tullahoma, Tennessee, the earth moved for the skydiving team.  It was a day when the wind kept Judkins alive.

His skydiving plane had crashed upon take-off from the Tullahoma Regional Airport around 12:30 p.m.  When something dangerously unexpected happens to one diver, it happens to all the divers.  Their bones are grafted into each other.

“I had returned from church and was about to drive to the Tullahoma airport.  Beforehand, I checked the high wind speed and decided to take a nap instead,” remembered Judkins.  “The Lord definitely was looking out for me. “Any other day, I would have been on that plane.”  Many were seriously injured.  None died.  All were terrified.

The jump and cargo plane was a twin-engine DeHavilland DH-6 Twin Otter.  If fully loaded and occupied, it is capable of holding 28-29 persons, depending on “lots of factors,” said Judkins.

He continued, “Each jumper is highly trained and has to be licensed by the United States Parachute Association.”   In only two years, Judkins has passed all state requirements for his “B” license, representing 85 jumps, while being certified in night, helicopter, and hot air balloon jumps.  Again, the training is meticulous, somewhat obscure, safely focused and precisely difficult.

Judkins added, “The average jumper is 18-70 years old.  Contrary to popular thought, jumpers are not risk averse, but are willing to take a calculated risk.”

Continuing, “There’s a close bond among the skydivers,” Judkins continued. “And, there’s just something about jumping out of a plane.  It brings you together like nothing else.  Everyone is safety checking each other’s equipment, etc.”

As the recent jump plane “Was not very high off the ground (several hundred feet), we’re not trained for a crash like that,” recalled Judkins.  “Yes, we are trained for numerous air emergencies, but to jump out of a plane, you have to have altitude – something, it appears, they lacked.   If the plane had been traveling higher, they could jump (off the plane).”  As it was, there were no jumps on that load – only grateful survivors.

“Think about how many skydives are made every day in the United States,” Judkins continued.  “Rarely do you hear of a plane crashing or a jumper dying.”

Last Monday, June 9, 2025 in a prepared statement from Skydive Tennessee’s management and media relations to Judkins and his other peer skydivers, it reads, in part, “The incident occurred following an aborted takeoff.  The aircraft was current on all required maintenance inspections at the time of the flight.”

Any day, Jim again will be on another twin-engine plane, jumping and not knowing what lies before him.  But – isn’t that what life is all about?

In conclusion, I pray, hope, and know Jim again will skydive soon.  Again, he will climb to almost three-miles above the airport’s grounds and fall through uncharted spaces above the clouds because he’s not finished touching the face of God.

UPDATE:  On Thursday, June 12, 2025 and only four days following the catastrophic airplane crash, Jim informed me that he was headed to Tullahoma to skydive again.  The Tullahoma airport had reopened and I began holding my breath and praying again and again and again.