‘My dive into the record books’

When Baqer Younus Baqer accepted a dare to throw himself out of an aeroplane at 5,000 feet, little did he realise that his sport would take him to a world record, make him an inspiration to generations of UAE skydivers and lead to him meeting Sheikh Zayed, Rym Ghazal writes

A 1975 stock image of skydiving during a special Eid skydive display specially organized for the Sheikh of Ajman. Courtesy Baqer Younus Baqer

It all started with a dare.

Baqer Younus Baqer was 18 years old and studying in Yorkshire when he saw a newspaper advertisement for a free-fall course at a parachuting club.

“My friends dared me to do it, as a joke I think, but I said, ‘OK, I will go jump’,” says the 62-year-old retired lieutenant colonel and pilot from Dubai.

He smiles as he recalls the moment his four friends, three Emiratis and a Saudi, stood by, safely on the ground, while he made his very first jump out of a plane, his parachute released by a rip cord attached to the aircraft.

“I was terrified, but then, as I floated, I felt so alive. I felt I was a falcon.”

He then made his first proper free-fall sky dive a few days later, on August 20, from more than 5,000 feet above ground. “I counted 1,000 to 5,000 and pulled,” he said. “Remarkable feeling.”

He didn’t tell his family until after the jump. “I wasn’t able to convince any of my friends to try it,” he said, laughing.

That little adventure in 1972 led to a bigger leap of faith for the young Emirati as he, along with six other expat skydivers (two British, two Americans, one from the Netherlands and one from Denmark) jumped in February 1976 from a height of more than 30,000 feet. The world record at the time was 24,000 feet, set in the UK in 1973.

Led by Col Baqer, the founder and the president of the UAE’s first parachute club, the Dubai Sport Parachuting Club, the team of seven men successfully made the jump, but were told they had not broken the world record because of a technicality.

“They told us because we were not all Emirati, but a team that was made up of different nationalities, we were not a proper Emirati team and so could not be recognised for our record jump,” he said.

But it did not matter, he said, waving his hand in a dismissive way. “We did it and we are proud of our jump.”

Col Baqer was the first Emirati and perhaps the first Arab to attempt such a feat.

“Sky diving back in the 1970s was a completely different experience, as we had to start from scratch and it was quite dangerous,” he said. “But there was honestly nothing more beautiful than simply floating over your home, overwhelmed by the winds around you and the desert below you.”

It was no easy venture.

A 26-minute documentary by Rothmans International, recorded on a 16mm format but recently restored and posted online, captured the team as they jumped and trained, with oxygen masks brought in from the British army. They are shown running and swimming, jumping into a swimming pool to simulate a landing in the Arabian Gulf, hanging from ropes inside their homes and learning how to move their arms and legs.

The documentary shows the amount of work behind the scenes of a record sky-dive attempt and also scenes of Col Baqer’s personal life, including his police work, taking his falcon to the desert, taking part in traditional Emirati dances and playing baseball with friends using sticks and cans.

The team began their attempt in December 1975 with training jumps starting at 5,000 feet (1,524 metres) increasing it each time, until, on February 24, they made the final record-breaking jump at 30,000 feet (10,000 metres), the altitude at which modern passenger jets cruise and where the air is minus 34°C. They fell for 3 minutes and 55 seconds.

“That may seem a short time, but not when you are falling. It felt very long, like a lifetime,” said Col Baqer, who always wore a red jump suit that identified him from the rest of the team. “I slept for three days after that jump. I had bruises all over my body from the air pressure and winds,” he said.

“I will never, ever forget that jump.”

Looking back, Col Baqer seems always to have been destined for the jump. After returning to Dubai from England, he joined the police in 1973. The following year there was a chance meeting with a British man, Tony Keoghan, a former member of the Royal Air Force Red Falcons parachuting team. At the time, Mr Keoghan was visiting his brother Mike, who was working with an oil company in Dubai.

Together, the two decided to introduce the sport to Dubai, with a civilian club that received the blessing of a young Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, now the Vice President and Ruler of Dubai.

“The focus was sports and civilian. The army had its parachute jumpers and divers, this club was different. It was open to anyone and everyone,” he said.

“I believe in the importance of agility and sports, where people should dare to push themselves outside their comfort zones and try different sports, like sky diving. I really wanted young Emiratis to try something different, to be adventurous. The training that goes into free-falling sky diving changes you and tests your patience and strength of character.”

It was during one of his previous jumps that he got the chance to meet the founding father of the UAE, the late Sheikh Zayed.

At the June 1975 Gulf Swimming Championships, the seven sky divers, who called themselves Dubai Sky Pioneers, performed a jump into the waters along the Corniche.

Sheikh Zayed then asked to meet the team and was surprised that there was an Emirati among them.

“I felt so honoured to have shaken his hand and to have proved myself to him, that an Emirati can do this kind of sport as well,” he said, laughing at the memory of meeting the most powerful man in the country in a soaking wet red jump suit. “It is just one of those memories I really cherish.”

Col Baqer’s sky-diving days ended with that historic leap from 30,000 feet, as he turned a new page in his police career to become a pilot and one of the first members of the police air-rescue team.

“Once you have been seduced by the sky, you can never leave it. I spent my life watching over the roads and the shores of Dubai, and have flown along Sheikh Zayed road, seeing it being built every day until it became the great road that it is today.”

He recalls one particular rescue incident, from the 1980s, after spotting a box with two small boys in it stranded adrift in the sea not far from the Jumeirah shoreline.

“I couldn’t just go to them as the winds from the helicopter may have toppled them over, so I flew over to the nearest boat I could find. It happened to be a fisherman’s boat, so I called out to him using a loud speaker, and he followed me with his boat. “The two boys clung to him as he pulled them out and put them in his boat.”

Col Baqer retired in the 1990s but has kept records of all his sky-diving experiences, as well as stories of his days as an air rescuer and patrol officer. He likes to share them with new generations of Emiratis whenever they happen to discover him and his aerial adventures.

“At the time, sky diving and parachuting wasn’t taken that seriously. Now, there are big competitions and events related to them, and it is one of the country’s biggest tourist attractions. I just want Emiratis to know that one of their own people was the first. There are so many historic moments done by Emiratis that never got properly documented or the recognition deserved.”

But whatever the case, sometimes, some people are just born airborne.

“Just last week, my six-year-old niece sky dived. Of course, it was an assisted one, but nonetheless, I told her mother, why not? She has an uncle that was a parachuter.” He laughed. “The sky and conquering it will always be my first and most profound love story.”