Principal Doll skydiving with a U.S. Army Golden Knight. She jumped with 12 principals and assistant principals from both Broward and Miami-Dade Schools. Photo Courtesy Of CTV
BY BEATRICE DUPUY
Cooper City High School Principal Wendy Doll participated in tandem skydiving during the U.S. Army’s Golden Knight’s Principals Day Event on Jan. 10, 2011.
Doll was nominated to go skydiving with the Golden Knights by Cooper City Mayor Debby Eisinger. Eisinger, along with other Florida mayors, also went tandem skydiving with the Golden Knights last year on Feb. 26.
“This was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up,” Doll said. “It’s with the Golden Knights, who wouldn’t want to do that?”
Doll skydived with a group of 12 principals and assistant principals from both the Broward and Miami-Dade Public School Districts.
Doll began training for the dive at 8:30 a.m. The training consisted of a video demonstration of the dive and the three positions Doll would perform during her dive. The positions demonstrated were the position leaving the plane, the position during freefall, and the landing position. Her official jump with the Golden Knights took place around 10 a.m. Doll boarded the plane at the Homestead Air Reserve Base in a group with three other principals and assistant principals.
“I was relatively calm until I stepped out onto the ledge,” Doll said. “I made the mistake of looking down and we were at 12,000 feet. That initial drop is a heart stopper.”
Doll was attached by a harness to her Golden Knight tandem instructor. The Golden Knight instructed Doll throughout the jump until the parachute was deployed at around an altitude of 7,500 feet. This was Doll’s first time skydiving.
“This was something that wasn’t even on my bucket list,” Doll said.
Doll said she hopes to go skydiving again in the future.
“I hope I have another opportunity,” Doll said. “It was just an extraordinary feeling.”
