Last night, there were reports on the Anne Arundel 1st Alert Facebook page about a plane crash in Annapolis. It seems that some people had spotted several people “bailing out” of a plane in trouble. Well, the reports were partially correct–four people did jump out of a plane last night; but the plane was fine. And about those four people, three were US Navy SEALs and one was Midshipman 1st Class Ryan Hill from the US Naval Academy.
The jump was a demonstration for attendees at the Academy’s Summer Seminar, the third and final one of the summer. Summer Seminar is held for rising high school seniors who are interested in attending a service academy. It is a week-long camp program highlighting life on the Yard–well, at least the good life! Their days are full with activities, events, demonstrations, marching, and more; but the rigors of Plebe Summer (which will begin on July 1 this year) are left to their imaginations.
The Leap Frogs, the US Navy’s elite SEAL parachute team, were performing at the Ocean City Air Show this weekend and were able to drop in (literally) at the Academy last night about 715pm and talk to the seminar attendees and a handful of observers.
MIDN 1st Class Ryan Hill is president of the Academy Parachute Club and was offered the chance to jump with the SEAL team. After a brief flight from the Bay Bridge Airport on Kent Island, the four men jumped from an altitude of 6,000 feet onto a marker on Worden Field. During the actual jump, smoke was deployed for visibility (perhaps leading to the assumption of a plane crash) and several aerial maneuvers were demonstrated at speeds of up to 60 MPH.
After the jump, the team and MIDN Hill spoke with the seminar attendees, posed for photos and signed autographs.
All photos © 2014 Kevin Carroll, A Digital Cure Photography for Eye On Annapolis
