A DAREDEVIL dad-of-two plunged to his death while trying out his new parachute for the very first time.
Simone Bacchiega, 51, had over 600 parachute jumps to his name and was considered an expert.
But tragedy struck when he made a mammoth 13,000ft jump at the at the Is Paulis airfield in Sardinia, Italy on Wednesday morning.
Just 130ft from the ground Bacchiega allegedly made a sudden turn in an attempt to correct his landing.
But he lost control and plunged to his death.
Born in Cremona, Italy, Bacchiega had been visiting the tourist hotspot with two friends to carry out the jump.
‘TRUE LEGEND’
Skydiver, 49, who died during jump is pictured as his parents pay tribute
DIVE TRAGEDY
Skydiving instructor falls to death without parachute after horror accident
He was eager to test his new Crossfire 109 high-performance skydiving canopy he had brought just weeks earlier, according to reports.
Bacchiega’s friends could do nothing but watch on in horror as he plummeted to his death.
Emergency services rushed to the scene, but all attempts to revive him were unsuccessful.
Field instructor Valentino, who witnessed the incident, said the fall was “terrible”.
“The ambulance arrived within minutes and they immediately began CPR.
“Unfortunately, there was nothing more that could be done”, he said.
Cops seized Bacchiega’s equipment to investigate the possibility of a technical fault.
Simone ran his own home maintenance company and had a passion for skydiving and boxing.
He leaves behind a son and a daughter.
It comes just weeks after a world famous skydiver was killed in a horror plunge from a helicopter after his parachute failed to open.
French freefall champion Pierre Wolnik, 37, died on February 9, when a jump in Mont Blanc went catastrophically wrong at altitude.
Wolnik is said to have leapt from the helicopter above the Alpine mountain range before disaster struck mid-air.
But his parachute failed to deploy at a critical moment sending him into a fatal fall, according to reports.
The athlete slammed into the ground at high speed in the Bossons area, where emergency crews rushed to the scene but were unable to save him.
His body was later recovered and transported away by helicopter.