JEDDAH, 16 April 2008 — Morocco stayed unchallenged at the top of the standings in both the accuracy landing and skydiving formation events in the 6th Jeddah International Championship for Skydiving.
Event assistant director Ibrahim Al-Sayyad said the Moroccan team have showed great progress and continued to lead.
He also said the weather cooperated boosting hope that each team will at least have 6 attempts in the accuracy landing, which is the average.
Both events require skills and sharpness especially, and difficult part is the skydiving formation. A big skydiving fan, Prince Sultan ibn Khalid Al-Faisal, president of the Saudi Skydiving Committee, attended the day’s proceedings along with his brother Prince Saud.
Prince Sultan said the championship has grown from its humble beginnings and commended the organizing committee for a job well done. It used to be limited to accuracy landing, he said, but now we have both events supported with international referees.
Saudi Skydiving Committee, he explained, is under the umbrella of the Saudi Aviation Club.
“Though we are not a sanctioning authority, we supervise and monitor those who want to practice skydiving here and ensure they follow the FAI rules and regulations,” he said. This hobby is no longer limited to military men, he said, “now anyone could practice it and here lies the role of the investors to offer new ideas for skydiving schools and club to make it easier for more youth to practice it,” he said.
Skydiving may be expensive in the beginning, he said, but once the equipment are in place it becomes affordable.
Women had been practicing it for long time, but here there is no regulation yet, he added, and the women will have compete alongside the men.
“If we got the permission from the authorities, and had the permission of the women guidance or parent we are capable of doing that for sure,” said Prince Sultan.
Thanks to these activities, Mishaal Al-Sudairi, marketing Specialist LTO (Jeddah Region) at the General Commission for Tourism and Antiques, said Jeddah became the top city-attracting tourists in the Kingdom as per the MAS 2008 latest survey.
“We have been supporting these activities through studies and supervision and later on via idenifying the negatives,” he said.
“We want to ensure the sustainability of these activities, and that they grow bigger. This is what happened with the skydiving now as it include two events,” he said.
Al-Sudairi also told Arab News that the Cultural Village in Obhur will open within three months and that they signed a contract to host the International Open Sail Boats Race for additional three years.
