Centralight

John Fisher would rather jump out of planes at 11,000 feet than do just about anything else. You might call it a hobby or, possibly, an obsession: "It's a little bit diff erent, but I don't golf much," says CMU's associate vice president of residences and auxiliary services. At 67, with 1,250 jumps behind him, he's pretty much always planning his next 20-minute climb into the clouds and four-minute return trip to Earth. "You get quite the adrenaline rush from the initial free fall and go from 125 mph to 5 mph when you pull the cord," he says. "You get a friendly tug on your back." Fisher frequents the Central Michigan Skydivers hangar at the Mount Pleasant Municipal Airport, where he and fellow skydivers meet up most weekends to fi nd a plane and a pilot willing to take them up. He's also been known to drift quietly over Kelly/Shorts Stadium to land gracefully on the fi eld before handing the day's game ball to the refs. Fisher, '70, M.B.A. '71, Ed.s. '81, enlisted in ROTC through CMU and, when he went on active duty in the U.S. Army in 1971, he began skydiving. "There was a jump club at Fort Lee, Virginia. I was bored, and I went over with another second lieutenant. He jumped, then I jumped. He never jumped again, and I'm still doing it." After leaving the Army, Fisher married and started a family. Skydiving wasn't in the plan. Until 2003. "Twenty-nine years later, I saw some guys at the airport. They convinced me to try again," he says. "It doesn't take much to get started. Even old guys like me can do it." • Hidden Central: Blue skies 27 centralight fall '14 John Fisher, left, joins former CMU Vice President of Finance and Administrative Services, David Burdette, on Burdette's fi rst jump.

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