OCEANSIDE, Calif. — A skydiver continues to recover after he fell from the sky, hitting a home last week in Oceanside.
“It felt like forever, just looking at him … We stood there in like shock just going, ‘he has to be dead,'” said Amber Sweet-Smith, who saw the injured skydiver in her yard moments after he fell.
The skydiver was on a jump with GoJump Oceanside from the nearby airport.
He plummeted to the ground as his parachute failed to completely open.
Sweet-Smith says her husband was outside at the time.
“We usually hear the screaming or, you know, people laughing — just in the air and he heard like an unusual scream, looked up, saw the guy and went, probably in his head, oh ****, he’s going to hit our house,” said Sweet-Smith.
Sweet-Smith says the skydiver first hit her neighbor’s roof, then fell into their yard.
“It felt like the whole wall shook … it was scary,” said Sweet-Smith.
As she and her husband went to help the skydiver, she said a GoJump instructor promptly landed in the street.
“One of the other parachuter guys said he saw him and knew he was in trouble and landed in the street. So he was pretty helpful back there too,” said Sweet-Smith.
First responders arrived in minutes and got the man to a hospital with serious, but non-life-threatening injuries.
“We’re just grateful that he’s fine, you know, a few broken bones. I mean, looking at him when he moaned, did the first moan and everything, it was like, ‘oh my gosh, this is a miracle,'” said Sweet-Smith.
Sweet-Smith told FOX 5 she was notified the skydiver was released Monday from the hospital.