Escape artist pulls off coffin skydive at 14,500ft

An escape artist has parachuted safely to the ground after freeing himself from handcuffs and a locked coffin while it was falling at 210km/h from 14,500ft in the air.

Anthony Martin, 47, waved to a crowd after landing softly in a field in Illinois, about 113km south west of Chicago.

He said that after freeing himself, he watched the box plummet to the ground.

Martin was locked in the plywood box with his hands cuffed to a belt and his right arm chained to the inside of the box.

Two skydivers held the outside of the box steady as Martin — who first performed the stunt 25 years ago — tried to escape.

He said the escape was exhilarating but that he was disoriented because the plywood box moved wildly from side-to-side while he picked the locks, and he struggled to open the door.

"I didn’t feel any force, but what I felt was a lot of jostling. It seemed to me like I had a glimpse of the ground for a second then it [the door] came back and I had to give it another push."

Martin, who began teaching himself to pick locks at the age of six, somersaulted out of the box as he pushed his way to freedom.

"I didn’t know where I was... but I was hypnotised as I watched the box falling behind me," he said.

All the skydivers involved carefully checked the others’ equipment before Martin climbed into the box and was handcuffed to a belt around his waist and chained to the inside of the casket.

A prison door lock, for which no key exists, was screwed into place to hold the door tight as two of the skydivers checked for sight of the proposed landing area from the open door of the plane.

When everyone was ready, a small parachute attached to the top of the box was tossed from the door sucking the box from the aircraft.

The box rocked from side to side until around 6,500ft when Martin, from Wisconsin, emerged and tracked away from the box before deploying his parachute.

"It was one of the greatest feelings ever knowing that one of your best friends has again escaped death," said Rook Nelson, a champion skydiver, who coached Martin in the weeks leading up to the jump.