Man jumps into marriage by skydiving

The wedding of Peggy Sue Cordia and Jason Stieneke was marked by all the usual mishaps.

A few relatives didn't follow the seating plan. A tape was cued to the wrong song. A decorative candle-lighter wouldn't light.

But the groom's skydiving entrance onto the church's front lawn? Almost perfect.

"It kind of relaxed me," Stieneke said Saturday at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Cape Girardeau. "It got rid of all the butterflies ... . It's getting married that's the scary part."

The Jackson couple met on a blind date in 1999. Cordia, 30 and a teacher's aide, said it wasn't love at first sight, but a romance blossomed along with her interest in his passion: jumping out of airplanes.

She's done two jumps, both tandem with an instructor. Saturday's jump was the 358th for Stieneke, 26, a solvent disposal technician.

He always envisioned skydiving into his wedding. His fiancee agreed with the plan, but as the big day approached, she aired a few concerns.

"I asked him what would happen if he fell and broke something," Cordia said. "He said, 'That depends on how bad I'm hurt.'"

Although a Baptist minister performed the ceremony, the couple picked Westminster Presbyterian Church for its center-aisle design -- and roomy acreage with no trees.

At 2:30 p.m., a half-hour before the wedding, a small plane passed overhead. Guests on the lawn shaded their eyes and pointed skyward as Cordia watched through a picture window in the church's sitting room.

The video camera operator executed a perfect landing on his feet. So did groomsman Pat Lema. Then came Stieneke, skidding to a stop on one thigh.

Cordia applauded and jumped up and down, her feet invisible beneath layers of floor-length, puffy white dress. Then she scurried off to her dressing area -- bad luck to see the groom, an attendant explained.

Other than the plane starting to overheat and a little grass stain on his black tuxedo jacket, the jump went as planned, said Stieneke. And the guests were delighted, except for one of the most important: mother of the bride Verna Cordia.

"She is marrying a good man, but I wish they would stop jumping," she said. "They both know how I feel about it."

Her daughter hopes to begin skydiving lessons this summer and land all by herself soon.

That's just the way things are for certain people, groomsman Lema explained. He met Stieneke through SEMO Skydiving Club in Charleston, Mo.

"It's a skydiving thing," he said. "If we are going to do something major in our lives, we do it skydiving."

hhall@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 121

jjoffray@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 226