A thrill-seeker at heart: Bell looks back on skydiving career, record-breaking jump

World skydiving day is just around the corner, and parachutists across the globe are prepping their gear to mark the July 11 occasion. 

The sport is widely popular in Georgia, with an annual festival, The Fitz Boogie, held in Fitzgerald every spring. The event draws hundreds of skydivers, novice and competitive, to south Georgia for four days of adrenaline-pumping, free-falling action. 

One Laurens County resident, Lisa Bell, has a deep connection to the skydiving community. And though her days of jumping from airplanes are behind her, she remains an important part of the sport, having taken part in a record-breaking jump that still stands after more than a decade. 

“It’s a tight-knit community,” said Bell said of skydivers. “I may go to Paris, California and I’ll see people from Georgia I know, or people from Florida or Arizona.”

In 2012, a large group of divers gathered, 66 to be exact, in Fitzgerald no less, for a group formation dive. It remains the state record for the largest formation jump. 

Most people are familiar with single jumping or tandem jumps, where a trained skydiver is attached to a novice thrill-seeker. Formation jumps bring dozens, even hundreds of divers together, who jump at similar times and coordinate their movements and midair speed to fall together, linking their arms together in formations before deploying their parachutes. 

The world record formation jump belongs to 400 skydivers for a 2006 jump in Thailand. 

Such jumps can be difficult to organize. The scene of the jump, or drop zone, needs to have space to allow the parachutists to land safely and ample air space for the aircraft to circle. The 2012 Georgia record jump employed three planes to accommodate the skydivers.  

Preparation for such a feat begins safely on the ground. The divers perform what is called dirt dives, practicing the motions of the jump while walking. 

“Think about driving a car. You don’t get in your car and think about moving your foot from the gas to the brake. It’s muscle memory,” Bell said. “For the big formations, you practice on the ground.”

Bell is a teacher by trade.

As an education coordinator with Georgia Power, she spends much of the school year on the road. She visits classrooms across a 17-county area teaching classes, doing career presentations and highlighting techniques to be energy efficient.  

“We have team of coordinators all over the state of Georgia,” Bell said. “We go into school systems and do STEM lessons. They are standards-based, so we’re not taking time away from teachers.” 

Summer months are spent prepping for the next school year, training new education coordinators and learning more about Georgia Power by touring plants and meeting with other employees. 

“Where we make the electricity is like a little city,” she said. “There’s food, there’s housekeeping, there’s electrical. Anything you could possibly want is at those generating facilities.” 

She’s a self-described introvert, but Bell is also a thrill seeker at heart.

“I’m happy sitting at the house where it’s quiet, but at the same time, I’ll do anything once. Twice, if I like it.” 

Bell began skydiving in 2000. She fell in love with the sport after her first tandem dive and quickly earned her solo certification. She’s performed jumps all over the country. The largest formation she’s been a part of is a group of 120 skydivers in Arizona. 

A car wreck ended her skydiving career, shortly after the record-breaking jump. 

She has other ways of getting her kicks, though. She also rides horses and scuba dives, sometimes with sharks. 

“Some people say ‘One of these days I’m going to do this’ or ‘one of these days I’m going to do that,'” Bell said. “I don’t want to be that person. You only get one chance and I want to arrive in heaven saying ‘man what a ride.'”