Bail at 5,000 feet

So your sitting there in the plane.  You are half way through your climb to altitude.  There are no hop-n-pops.  The pilot alerts the skydivers, its hop-n-pop time.  The plane is having serious mechanical issues.  He descends down to 5,000 feet.

That is what happened last weekend with these 14 skydivers.

I don’t know exactly how it happened on the plane.  But I can imagine based on the successful outcome everyone remained calm and exited in an orderly fashion.  It is good to have options.  And 5,000 feet is a safe altitude to exit the plane from.  It surely beats 1500 feet on reserve alone!