Victoria Cilliers wasn’t worried when the first parachute failed, plummeting 4,000 feet from an airplane to the ground. A former British army captain, Cilliers was an experienced skydiver and knew what to do next. When Cilliers’ backup chute failed, too, she knew something had gone seriously wrong.
In April 2015, Cilliers was on a skydiving excursion with Emile Cilliers, her husband, a former army sergeant. The couple married in 2011 and had two children together. Although the relationship started strong, Victoria was concerned that Emile may have been unfaithful. When he proposed skydiving together, an activity they both enjoyed, Victoria thought it might be a way for them to reconnect. Victoria only later realized she had almost been the victim of the skydive murder plot, and that her husband was responsible.
How did Victoria Cilliers survive?
Falling through the sky at speeds reaching 100 miles per hour and with few options, Victoria Cillier’s first concern was survival as both parachutes malfunctioned. Victoria did what she could to slow her descent over farmland in Wiltshire, England. She assumed the predicament she was in was an accident. Rescue crews, meanwhile, rushed to where they thought she might land, and brought a body bag.
“As the ground loomed ever closer, I forced myself to push fear from my mind. ‘I just have to fix this,’ I told myself, as I fought for my life. ‘My children need me,’” Victoria later said. Victoria hit the ground, badly injured but miraculously alive, with a broken pelvis, back, and ribs, according to the Independent. Some think her small size and the plowed field helped her survive the fall.
Why did Emile Cilliers try and kill his wife?
At first, Victoria Cilliers believed she had somehow survived a terrible skydiving mishap, but the skydiving company suspected foul play. A police inquiry discovered that her husband, Emile Cilliers, had tampered with both of her parachutes before the jump, and that information cast another recent incident in a new light: About a week before skydiving, Victoria noticed a gas leak in her home, and had even texted Emile: “Are you trying to kill me?”
Emile had caused the gas leak, too, and had been more than unfaithful: He was on sex websites, sleeping with his ex-wife, and in a significant amount of debt. Victoria nearly died for her insurance policy, and so Emile could pursue a relationship with another woman. In 2018, Emile was convicted on two counts of attempted murder, and one charge stemming from the gas leak, and sentenced to life in prison with no chance for parole in 18 years.
“Your offending was extremely serious with your two attempts to murder your wife. They were planned and carried out in cold blood for your own selfish purposes which include financial gain,” Judge Justice Sweeney said when Emile’s sentencing was announced. Today, Victoria is in a new relationship with another skydiving enthusiast who was there the day she nearly died.
