Fearless pensioner celebrates turning 80 by skydiving from 10,000ft
Fearless pensioner celebrates turning 80 by skydiving from 10,000ft

A fearless octogenarian celebrated turning 80 by skydiving at 10,000ft – justmonths after an earlier attempt resulted in her making an emergency jumpfollowing a mayday call.

Known for marking landmark birthdays with bigadventures, widow Ann Maskell, travelled solo to Australia and took a hot airballoon ride on her 55th, went to Cuba on her 75th and was determined that her80th in November 2019 would be unforgettable.

But the retired restaurateur, ofBude, north Cornwall, had not bargained for quite the degree of excitement instore, when she set off from nearby Perranporth – only for the plane, a Cessna206 – to start losing power at 4,000ft.

She said: “I heard the pilot shouting,‘Mayday, mayday,’ then my instructor tapped me on the shoulder and explainedthat the plane was losing power and, to conserve fuel, so it could be safelylanded, we would need to evacuate.

“It was losing height, so we had to jumpout at 4,000ft instead of 10,000ft.

“It all happened so quickly that therewasn’t much time to think about what was going on.

I didn’t feel frightened orworried, I was just excited!”