Gravity is the force that ‘pushes’ everything to the ground, when Santa falls from his sleigh, it is gravity that causes him to fall down to earth.

Tip: to reduce the effect of gravity on your falling Santa, make your parachute as light as possible. A few days before the catastrophe, in early December 1932, newspaper editor John McPhee was looking for a way to promote the upcoming Christmas parade, held in Mesa every year. The year prior, the town’s Santa had arrived by plane, though it had been a grounded one and Santa had simply walked down the steps onto the tarmac. This year, McPhee wanted his arrival to be something special. I’ve been very well looked after at Birmingham Limb Centre at Selly Oak, the West Midlands Rehabilitation Centre. After his accident in 1998, he married Sarah, the nurse who was caring for him at the rehabilitation centre at Headley Court in Epsom, Surrey, and the couple now have 14-year-old twins Harry and Oliver, who plan to be at the finish line to greet him in February time. Discuss the differences in the designs, why were some of the parachutes more successful than others? Research different parachute designs and learn as much as you can about what is needed for to make a really effective parachute.

VERY WORTHY CAUSES

Challenge your class to make a parachute for a paper Santa using any or all of the equipment in the trays.

How the Birmingham Evening Mail reported on Aston Villa's win over Arsenal in December 1998 TREATMENT AND VILLA PARK RETURN He still has treatment with prosthesis expert Andrew Sharpe at Birmingham Limb Centre in Selly Oak and is looking forward to returning to Villa Park, hopefully at the start of April. They did, however, buy some things – hundreds of presents. It seemed that parents, in an attempt to undo at least some of the trauma inflicted on their children, had gone overboard gift shopping that year, and brought hundreds of dollars to the local store owners. So, in some way, the event did, in fact, accomplish one of its goals.Your figure probably fell straight down and had a hard landing at first. The figure equipped with a parachute probably had a softer landing, but it was probably also harder to predict where exactly it would land. The figure equipped with the parachute with the hole in the middle probably still had a pretty soft landing. All of this is expected. He convinced a local clothing store to let him borrow one of their mannequins and dressed it up in the stuntman’s Santa suit. Then, he rigged the fake Santa with an automatic parachute, like those used by the military to make cargo drops. As they reach a certain altitude, the parachute automatically deploys, letting the load drift safely to the ground. It’s 17 years since my injuries. I don’t dwell on it. The guys that I’m involved with in this particular event have had far more traumatised incidents than me. If I’m allowed to compare, mine was a scratch compared to theirs. It was a bad day at the office, I’ve always said that.

Use the Gratnells trays for target practice. Can you get your parachute to land in the tray? Does adding wind, from a fan or your breath, effect the direction of travel or the time it takes for the parachute to fall to the ground?Tip: If you have a stage area, small step stool or balcony, you could use this to give extra height for the final tests. Make sure the place you choose is safe and, if you are working above ground level, that the activity is carried out under adult supervision. I guess that it is the over riding message that we’re all saying to our serving and past service colleagues, and there are many of them out there, who have had serious injuries. Compare this with how long it takes for a paper Santa with no parachute to fall from the same height (this will be your control). What is happening? If you do miss your delivery, the courier will normally attempt delivery the next day or leave a card through your door so you can rearrange delivery on a day that is convenient for you.

Rogoff, it turned out, had been carried from the pitch that December afternoon with internal injuries, two broken legs, a broken pelvis and a broken arm, after being tended to by two surgeons who happened to be at the match. He was on the operating table within the hour and given 177 units of blood as doctors grappled with complex surgery; he would be on a ventilator for a further three weeks. When he finally regained consciousness in the new year he had to decide whether or not surgeons should amputate his left leg above the knee, which was in a bad state after he “left my patella [kneecap] on the top of the stands”. He took the awful decision to amputate. And so, in front of the “largest crowd in [Mesa’s] history,” a plane loaded with a plastic Santa Claus took off. At 4:15 p.m., right on schedule, the door of the plane opened, and the pilot pushed out the mannequin.McPhee attempted to cover for the catastrophe by claiming that Santa’s ability to survive was part of his magic, the same kind that helped him deliver gifts to all the children of the world each year, but hardly anyone bought it. It started out as a perfect plan. A stuntman dressed as Santa Claus would leap from a plane over the town of Mesa, Ariz., and parachute down into the center of the town’s annual Christmas parade. He and his three team-mates hope to complete the challenge in around 50 days in aid of Row2Recovery, The British Limbless Ex-Servicemen’s Association, Help for Heroes and the Endeavour Fund. Have a couple of round robin competitions, testing your parachutes against each other, to see which is the best.