The Skydiving Fatality List (SFL) is a worldwide record of skydiving fatalities, kept for safety education and remembrance.
Why this list exists
BASE jumpers have had a public fatality list for many years. Skydivers have excellent national reports, but no single place where individual accidents from every country can be searched, filtered and learned from. SFL tries to fill that gap.
Most skydiving fatalities repeat mistakes that have happened before. Seeing the pattern – a low turn on a small canopy, a cutaway that came too late, a collision at breakoff – is how the rest of us learn to recognise the chain of events early and break it.
How records are written
- No names. Like the USPA annual fatality summaries, we do not publish the names of the people who died. A name is shown only when family or close friends ask for it.
- Facts, not speculation. Each record states what the sources report, in our own words. Where the cause is not known, the record says “Under review”.
- Lessons, not drama. Where we can, a record ends with what the rest of us can take from it. We leave out graphic detail.
- Sources wherever we have them. Most records link to at least one source so readers can check them. Some older records come only from a community-compiled list and have no public source yet. They are marked “Unconfirmed” and say so on the record page. We publish them so the list is as complete as possible – if you know a news report or an official statement, please send it to us.
What the labels mean
- Unconfirmed – reported by media, by a single source or only by the community, sometimes without a public source yet. Date, place or cause may still change.
- Partially verified – supported by an official or federation source, such as a national air accident report, a federation investigation or a USPA fatality summary.
- Verified – confirmed by an official investigation or by the drop zone or federation concerned.
Causes follow the categories used by the United States Parachute Association (USPA) – for example landing problems, collisions, equipment problems, low cutaways and medical problems – so that records can be compared with national statistics. “Under review” means the cause has not been established yet; “Other” is used when none of the categories fits. Each record has a permanent number, such as SFL-2025-052. Numbers of records that were merged or removed are never reused.
What is included
Fatalities on parachute jumps from aircraft anywhere in the world: sport, student, tandem, work, demonstration and military jumps, including wingsuit jumps from helicopters. Crashes of jump aircraft with skydivers on board are included as one record per accident, showing the number of skydivers who died (pilots are not listed). In rare cases we also list a person on the ground killed during a jump operation. Indoor wind tunnel, paragliding and mountain or BASE jumps are not included. BASE jumps are covered by the BASE Fatality List.
Sources and thanks
Records are compiled from public sources: USPA annual fatality summaries, national air accident investigation bodies (for example in Poland and the Czech Republic), federation investigation reports, coroners, drop zone statements and news media. Many early records started from the list kept by the community at r/SkydiveFatalityList – thank you for years of careful work.
Who runs SFL
SFL is an independent, non-commercial project run by a skydiver. It is not affiliated with USPA, FAI or any national federation. Contact: info@skydivingfatalitylist.org
If you knew someone on this list and something is wrong, or you would like a record changed or anonymised further, please tell us.