Daredevil Dave (80) is jumping out of a plane for charity
Eighty-year-old Dave Dowling from Graiguecullen who will take a parachute jump in aid of cancer research, honouring the memory of loved ones lost to the disease. Pic: © Michael O'Rourke Photography 2026
“IT’S not that jumping from an airplane was in the head the whole time. It just came up,” said 80-year-old Dave ‘The Rave’ Dowling of his tandem parachute jump in aid of the Irish Cancer Society.
Dave, from Graiguecullen, decided this was the way he wanted to celebrate his 80th birthday and 60th wedding anniversary to his wife Josie. The pair married young and were “good auld dancers ... first on the floor, last off it”. A funny impression on the dance floor earned Dave his nickname.
“I was never at a rave in my life but they just put that on me and, ah sure, I didn’t object,” he said good-naturedly.
The couple have three daughters, three sons and “only 14” grandchildren, who all live close by. “They’ll never stop coming in and going out the door. We’re very blessed,” he said.
Two of his daughters have helped set up a GoFundMe campaign and get the word out about their father’s impending achievement.
The family are rallying around Dave to raise money for cancer research after five close members of the family died from the disease, the youngest of whom was 54 years’ old. “We’re not the only ones; hundreds and thousands of families are the same. You hear it every day,” he noted.
Dave doesn’t want to set a target for the amount he wants to fundraise because he is already impressed by people’s generosity: “whatever it comes to, that will do me fine”.
He also wants to make the 10,000-metre leap before it’s too late. “When you’re 80, you can’t do ballroom dancing or anything like that anymore. So it’s why I’d like to have done this.”
The Irish Parachute Club in Clonbullogue, Co Offaly is organising the charity jump and required Dave to get a clean bill of health from his GP before confirming the jump. He told his doctor jokingly “the only thing I have to do is scream on the way down”.
He might bring a photo album of his family members that have passed away on the jump with him to “bring them for a spin”.
He was not put off by hearing stories of other people’s parachute jumps. “We all have fears of this, that and the other, you know? I’m not aiming to get rid of any fear. Not at 80, you just don’t,” he said.
The event is booked for 21 March, two days before his wife’s birthday. They’ll use the occasion to get the family together and, maybe, have a jive around the room, too.
