Prominent Kamloops skydiver remembered for his love of life and soaring after fatal accident | iNFOnews | Thompson-Okanagan's News Source
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Prominent Kamloops skydiver remembered for his love of life and soaring after fatal accident

Reginald C. Hurlbut died in a skydiving accident in Illinois on June 15, 2018.
Image Credit: CONTRIBUTED/Reg Hurlbut

KAMLOOPS - A world-renowned skydiver from Kamloops has died after an accident at a skydiving facility in Illinois.

A dispatcher with the LaSalle County Sheriff's department told iNFOnews.ca an accident occurred at Skydive Chicago on June 15, and 68-year-old Reginald C. Hurlbut from B.C. died. According to the Peoria Journal Star, sheriff's deputies found Hurlbut in a field adjacent to the skydiving facility.

Nicknamed "Veggie Reggie" or just "Reg", Hurlbut was a grandfather who taught many people in Kamloops what they know about wingsuit flying. He held numerous world records for the sport.

Nearly three years ago, back when Hurlbut was 66 years old, he and 60 other wingsuited skydivers jumped out of planes over Perris, Calif. and formed a diamond shape in the sky, setting a world record.

Don Campbell, a senior member of Kamloops Skydivers, says Hurlbut was a great man who taught most of the club how to wingsuit. Campbell knew Hurlbut for roughly 20 years.

"When wingsuiting first came out, which would have been about maybe 15 years ago, he started developing an interest in it, which at the time it was quite rare to find people that did any wingsuit skydiving," Campbell says. "He would just go off on his own, and he basically taught himself how to wingsuit, and he would just spend days while we were doing other skydives, he would be going from... over McArthur Park and flying across town on his wingsuit and developing his skills."

Hurlbut was an institution not only in the local skydiving community, but around the world, Campbell says, point to his many world records. Once Hurlbut began wingsuiting, he got some demo suits for members at Kamloops's drop zone and began teaching divers how it was done.

Campbell says Hurlbut used to work for a lumber mill and once he was unable to do that any longer, he became a home care-aide, until eventually retiring a couple of years ago.

"I think he, like all of us, enjoyed the freedom of being in the air in free fall, and wingsuiting seemed to suit him, and it’s a type of skydiving where you could actually be in the air a lot longer than a normal skydive," Campbell says.

Wingsuiting can take your minute-long free fall to more than two minutes of soaring in the sky. But it wasn't just skill that Hurlbut brought to the sport of skydiving.

"He had this sort of childlike appreciation for life, and I think part of what he represented to the sport wasn’t just the fact that he was a fountain of wisdom for wingsuiting, but he was also a big part of the social experience for skydivers," Campbell says. "He’s in his late 60s and he continued to be a very vibrant part of that whole thing... He was the sort of person that would be down for whatever craziness skydivers wanted to be involved in. He was right there, and he was just such an important part of the whole skydiving experience in Kamloops, and internationally as well."

Campbell says Hurlbut was in Chicago training for yet another world record attempt when the accident happened. Details of the accident have not yet been released, but Campbell says from what he understands, it was a quiet goodbye for Hurlbut.

"You’ve got to think, it's really a tragedy for the rest of us, his kids and his grandkids and his family, his skydiving family, but I don’t see it necessarily as a tragedy for him. He had a great life, he accomplished everything he could have accomplished in the world of skydiving, he was loved by everyone who knew him, and in the middle of doing something he loved he’s just gone, he’s just quietly gone," Campbell says. "I guess the essence of it is, he will continue to inspire us to be happy and to do what he did, which is live your passion, live what you love."

Campbell says Hurlbut will be sorely missed by the skydiving community, but he takes comfort in the fact that he died doing what he loved most.

"There was something on Facebook, people were talking about him, and I said 'you've got to know, Reg is crushing it right now waiting to lead us in another flocking dive as soon as we can catch up to him.'"


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