George H.W. Bush Celebrated His 90th Birthday by Jumping Out of a Helicopter
At 90, Bush is still a decade short of being the world’s oldest skydiver
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This morning, former President George H.W. Bush jumped out of a helicopter, coasted towards the ground via parachute, and set down near Kennebunkport, Maine. Much as he did in 1999, 2004 and 2009, Bush Sr. was celebrating his birthday.
Bush Sr. is celebrating after a hard landing, says Jim McGrath, his spokesman.
41 in mid jump pic.twitter.com/Syy3gei7aJ
— Jim McGrath (@jgm41) June 12, 201441 doing "great, exhilarated" following his skydive and a "hot" landing.
— Jim McGrath (@jgm41) June 12, 2014The jump, made with his skydiving partner Mike Elliott, marks the fourth time the former President has celebrated his birthday by skydiving and is his eighth jump in all, says CNN.
“Despite suffering from a form of Parkinson's disease that restricts him to a wheelchair, Bush was committed to jump. He had pledged five years ago to do a jump on his 90th birthday.”
That Bush Sr. is still jumping at 90 may seem surprising, but seniors skydiving is actually a bit of a thing. In 2012, a team from the group Skydivers Over Sixty set a world record for... 60 skydivers over the age of 60 jumping in tandem. That group, says World Record Academy, represents 1,640 members from 26 countries.
Even at 90, though, Bush Sr. is nowhere near taking the record for the world's oldest skydiver. That record goes to Frank Moody, an Australian man who set the record in 2004 by jumping from 9,900 feet at the age of 101.
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