At 100, the sky’s not the limit: It’s just where the birthday party gets started

By John Toth

The Bulletin

I noticed the other day that some adventurous 100-year-olds are celebrating their birthdays by skydiving.

It makes sense, really; what have they got to lose? If you’ve managed to orbit the sun a full 100 times, you might as well enjoy the view on the way down.

Take Ruby McNally, for instance. She celebrated her 100th birthday this past August by leaping from an airplane in California. What started as a cheeky 80th-birthday dare from her grandson has blossomed into a once-in-a-decade tradition.

Then there’s Jimmy Hernandez, a WWII veteran, also based in California. He made his first jump at 100 and enjoyed it so much he went up for a second round a year later.

There are two distinct hurdles to clear here - reaching the century mark and actually being willing to take the leap.

The odds aren’t exactly in our favor from the start. At birth, females have a 1.66% chance of reaching 100, while males face a slimmer 0.48% chance.

However, your cumulative odds improve the closer you get to the finish line. For example, a 99-year-old has a 67% chance of making it to the big 1-0-0. The real trick, of course, is getting to 99 in the first place.

Centenarians currently make up roughly 0.03% of the U.S. population, which is about one person in 5,000, but that number is growing rapidly. There is hope, even if the eye of the needle is small.

We are simply healthier than our ancestors. To put it in perspective, a person born in the U.S. in 1900, the year my grandmother was born, had an average life expectancy of just 47 to 48 years.

Globally, that number was even more startling; the average life expectancy was only 32 years at the dawn of the 20th century.

While we have certainly come a long way, the desire to live even longer remains a universal human ambition. So, how exactly does one improve the odds of being fit enough to jump out of an airplane at 100?

If you want to increase your chances of a centenarian skydive, the recipe is familiar: Avoid chronic illness, eat well, don’t smoke, limit the booze and maintain good healthcare access.

 And, if you can manage it, choose parents and grandparents with high-mileage genetics.

Personally, I’ve never jumped out of a plane. But the more I think about it, the more I might reconsider once I hit 99. After all, what’s the worst that could happen? If things go south, at least I’d go out with a bang at 100, or at least, that’s what someone else would say at my service.

Ironically, once you reach 100 and decide to go for it, your chances of landing safely are much higher than your original chances of reaching 100 were at birth.

The odds of a main parachute malfunction are about 1 in 1,000, and a double failure – both main and reserve – is estimated at a staggering 1 in 5 million.

Compare that to the NHTSA and National Safety Council estimates, which put the odds of dying on any average car trip at about 1 in 8,300. The lifetime odds of a fatal car crash are roughly 1 in 100.

Suddenly, that 1-in-5-million skydiving risk starts to look like the safest bet in town.

You know what? I think I’ve talked myself into it. When I hit 100, I’m jumping out of that perfectly good airplane. See you at the drop zone.

(Have you ever been skydiving? How was it? Send your experience to john.bulletin@gmail.com, and we’ll share it with our readers.)