Rochester skydiver's body recovered, but questions linger over what went wrong

A pair of the roughly searchers comb rough terrain surrounding the Skydive New England facility on Friday. (Courtesy photo)

LEBANON, Maine - The agonizing search for the body of a Rochester man who died in a skydiving accident on Thursday ended a little before 5:30 p.m. on Friday, but the search for how a routine jump could go so horribly wrong is far from over.

The body of Brett Bickford, 41, an experienced skydive instructor, was found in thick woods about 750 feet southwest of Skydive New England, said John MacDonald, a public information officer with the Maine Warden Service.

The incident unfolded Thursday around 2 p.m. when Bickford was executing a tandem jump with a beginning skydive student. According to MacDonald, after a period of freefall, a single parachute was deployed soon after which Bickford became detached from his student and fell to his death. He did not have an emergency parachute.

The unnamed male student landed safely in the normal landing zone.

A search got under way immediately with Game Wardens, Forest Rangers and State Police using K-9 teams, aircraft and drones, however it was called off around sunset.

Friday's effort comprised about 50 trained ground personnel and K-9 teams who fanned out in a square-mile perimeter to perform a grid search in the thickly wooded area. It was on one of these last grid searches that Bickford's body was found.

An investigation into what led to the fatal accident is ongoing, MacDonald said.

Tandem jumps are typically made with the student and instructor in separate harnesses that are attached, with the instructor secured behind the student.

Both jump out together at about 14,000 feet and freefall for about a minute as they head toward earth at 120 mph.

The search for what went wrong will likely center around whether there was a harness malfunction and why Bickford didn't have an emergency parachute.

Skydive New England owner Fred Cotreau said he was at a loss as to how such a tragedy could have occurred.

"This is beyond explanation how it happened right now," he told The Rochester Voice on Friday.

The last fatality at Skydive New England occurred in 2002 when an experienced female skydiver jumped solo and died upon impact.