Some families spend quality time hiking together, playing pickleball or getting too competitive over classic board games. The Matrones skydive \u2014 and break world records.<\/p>\n
Lehigh Valley natives Frank and Dominic Matrone, father and son, respectively, were among 104 skydivers from all over the world who broke an 18-year-old record \u2014 one the older Matrone helped set in 2007 of 100 divers \u2014 for the largest skydiving canopy formation in November.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor me, this was special because Dominic was there,\u201d said Frank Matrone, who now lives in Kutztown and works at St. Luke\u2019s Primary Care as a physician. \u201cI would have done it anyway, but having Dominic there with me was really neat.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe has more skill than I do,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
The record, set in Lake Wales, Florida, took about four days and a dozen attempts to build a massive diamond of carefully spaced skydivers with large canopy parachutes. It took years of planning and the participants were chosen via competitive tryouts.<\/p>\n
The 104 skydivers, starting with the first out of the plane at almost 20,000 feet, had 15 minutes to organize themselves into a massive human diamond in the air. They did it in 11 minutes and 15 seconds, and the formation was held for 20 seconds before the divers split apart to land safely.<\/p>\n
Dominic Matrone, who lives in Schuylkill County, said that being part of the record, his first, was \u201cpretty awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEspecially with how big the 2007 record was, and I don\u2019t even mean just like the size of it,\u201d he said. \u201cI mean the story of it, the mythology behind it, it stood for 18 years. It was a monument in the community.\u201d<\/p>\n
His father was eager to break his own record.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor the last several years, I\u2019ve been saying, you know, \u2018I\u2019m not getting any younger. We got to do this sooner,\u2019 \u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Frank Matrone, 65, has been skydiving since 1977, when he was 17. He has made approximately 5,860 jumps since then and set eight world records, with his first in 1994. His son, 27, started at 18 and has made 445 jumps of his own. The pair estimated that they make about 50-100 jumps together a year.<\/p>\n
![\"Lehigh](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/TMC-L-SkydivingRecord-0105-01-1.jpg\")
Lehigh Valley natives Frank Matrone and son Dominic Matrone were among 104 skydivers from all over the world who broke an 18-year-old record \u2014 one the older Matrone helped set in 2007 of 100 divers \u2014 for the largest skydiving canopy formation in November 2025. (Courtesy Frank Matrone)<\/p>\n
After skydiving for so long, it\u2019s no longer just about jumping out of a plane and landing safely \u2014 there are skills to build upon.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe develop a lot of canopy skills that most skydivers don\u2019t develop, don\u2019t need to develop because they don\u2019t fly in proximity to other people,\u201d Dominic Matrone said.<\/p>\n
Canopy formation \u2014 also called canopy relative work, abbreviated as \u201cCRW\u201d or just called \u201ccrew\u201d \u2014\u00a0is a discipline of skydiving in which groups of skydivers with canopy parachutes join together in the air.<\/p>\n
This record was \u201cthe most special because I was literally handing the canopy to Dominic,\u201d his father said. The duo was next to each other in the formation in the lower right corner of the diamond.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of normal people who don\u2019t skydive think skydiving is crazy, and normal skydivers who don\u2019t do crew think crew is crazy,\u201d Frank Matrone said.<\/p>\n
Dominic Matrone, a self-defined adrenaline junkie, \u201cclearly\u201d got into skydiving because of his parents. Aleth Matrone, his mother, is also an avid skydiver, but \u201cshe\u2019s not as thrilled about putting canopies next to each other as we are,\u201d her husband said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love the feeling of it,\u201d the younger Matrone said. \u201cI love the skill involved with crew in particular. I love the skill involved. I love the community.\u201d<\/p>\n
So, what\u2019s next \u2014\u00a0breaking another record?<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s some discussion about a record, but nothing is set in stone,\u201d Dominic Matrone said.<\/p>\n
In the meantime, he is interested in learning to pilot, or be the person at the very top of the canopy formation, along with organizing similar events.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just want to keep enjoying it and hope my health stays well,\u201d Frank Matrone said. \u201cWe\u2019re jumping with a laugh.\u201d<\/p>\n
Selma O\u2019Malley is a freelance writer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Some families spend quality time hiking together, playing pickleball or getting too competitive over classic board games. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":78356,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,121,120,182,139,432],"class_list":{"0":"post-78355","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-allentown","8":"tag-allentown","9":"tag-allentown-headlines","10":"tag-allentown-news","11":"tag-local-news","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-top-stories-tmc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78355"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78355\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}