The experienced jumpers were training with a group seeking a California formation record when their parachutes became entangled during descent.
LAKE ELSINORE, Calif. — Two experienced women skydivers died Friday after their open parachutes became entangled during a jump at a Riverside County skydiving center, authorities and the center said. Both women were taken to a hospital in critical condition and later pronounced dead.
Riverside County sheriff’s deputies responded shortly before noon Nov. 6 to a reported air emergency in the 20000 block of Cereal Street. Deputies found the two skydivers on the ground receiving medical aid. The Riverside County Fire Department said both suffered major injuries. No other injuries were reported. Authorities said the investigation remained underway Friday night.
The women were experienced, licensed skydivers who had traveled to Lake Elsinore to participate in an organized event at Skydive Elsinore, according to the center. The collision occurred as they were preparing to land, after their parachutes had opened. Skydive Elsinore said their canopies became entangled about 150 feet above the ground. Both women were transported by ground ambulance to Inland Valley Medical Center in Wildomar, where they died. Their names, ages and hometowns had not been publicly released Friday night.
Chazi Rutz, a 46-year-old professional skydiver from Arizona who participated in the jump, told the Los Angeles Times that the group was training to set a California record for the largest formation of women flying in an upright orientation. In that discipline, skydivers position their bodies in the air in a posture that can resemble sitting. Rutz said the existing state record involved 12 participants and the group hoped to complete a 19-way formation.
Rutz said the group’s free-fall portion of the jump went as planned. The skydivers exited the aircraft and formed together in the air before separating and deploying their parachutes. According to Rutz, the emergency developed after the parachutes opened, when the two women moved too close together and their canopies became entangled. The Riverside County Sheriff’s Office had not independently released a detailed sequence of the collision or announced an official cause as of Friday night.
Rutz described both women as experienced skydivers who were deeply involved in the sport. “We were doing something we loved, working toward a common goal,” she told the Times. The identities of the women were being withheld publicly while authorities continued their investigation and notification procedures.
Skydive Elsinore said there was no indication that equipment malfunctioned and that the center was cooperating with local authorities. The business expressed condolences to the women’s families, friends and others affected by the deaths. A representative earlier told City News Service that skydiving operations had been shut down for the remainder of Friday. Investigators had not announced findings about equipment or other possible contributing factors.
Weather conditions also remained an unresolved part of the investigation. Northeast winds were reported across the Inland Empire on Friday, with gusts reaching about 20 mph near March Air Reserve Base, roughly 14 miles east of Lake Elsinore. Authorities had not determined that wind contributed to the collision, and conditions measured at another location do not establish what the skydivers encountered during their descent.
The deaths occurred months after another fatal skydiving incident in Riverside County. In May, a skydiver died and another was critically injured following an apparent midair collision during a jump near Perris. Lake Elsinore also was the site of a March 2023 emergency in which a woman training for a solo jump became caught in live power lines. Firefighters rescued her without injuries. Authorities have not linked those separate incidents to Friday’s deaths.
The Riverside County Sheriff’s Office said the Lake Elsinore investigation was continuing Friday night. Officials had not released the women’s identities or a final determination of how their parachutes became entangled, and no official finding had established whether weather, equipment or another factor contributed to the fatal collision.
Author note: Last updated November 6, 2026.