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PARACHUTIST FALLS TO DEATH
Monday, August 21st, 2006 -- 2:05 pm
Posted by Riley Hebert-News Director
Authorities in Lincoln County say a veteran skydiver died Sunday morning after his parachute failed to open.
Richard John Symonds, 42, of Wisconsin Rapids is believed to have died on impact. Deputies say he and a skydiving partner jumped from a plane near Tomahawk Regional Airport during a fly-in event.
The two reportedly jumped from a height of six-thousand feet.
Symonds had a reserve chute that authorities found partially out, with the rip cord torn off. Sheriff's spokesman Mike Caylor says it's not clear whether Symonds pulled his rip cord or whether it got shorn off when he landed in trees.
A crowd watched the horrific event and recovered his body in a wooded area a quarter-mile north of the airport.
Symonds was an experienced parachutist who had recorded nearly 400 jumps. Symonds, a 1991 graduate of Marquette Law School, was an attorney at a Wisconsin Rapids legal firm.
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