Tue, Jun 22, 2010
Lifetime Achievement Award Bestowed On Former Executive
Director
The U.S. Parachute Association has bestowed its highest honor,
the USPA Lifetime Achievement Award, on Chris Needels, former
executive director of the association. USPA, a non-profit
organization that promotes safe skydiving nationwide and represents
the sport before the aviation industry, awards the Lifetime
Achievement Award in recognition of outstanding sportsmanship,
skill or personal contribution to the sport of parachuting and
USPA.
Needels has steadily contributed to the growth and prosperity of
USPA, which now boasts more than 32,000 skydiving members, since he
first joined the Parachute Club of America (USPA's forerunner) in
August 1963. A former commander of the U.S. Army Parachute Team,
the Golden Knights, Needels began his six-year tenure on the PCA
Board of Directors as a national director in 1975, serving as the
board's vice president, as well as chairman of several
committees.
He became USPA Executive Director in June 1994 and led USPA's
growth and enhanced its image in the aviation community to a level
unparalleled in the association's history. Needels retired in
December 2007 after almost 14 years as the chief operating officer
and after acting as the driving force behind relocating USPA to a
new headquarters in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Now USPA Executive
Director Emeritus, Needels continues to serve the skydiving
community as a board trustee for the National Skydiving Museum.
This past February, the USPA Board unanimously voted to honor
Needels with USPA's Lifetime Achievement Award, "for almost a
half-century of total commitment to USPA as a board member,
officer, executive director and skydiving museum trustee, providing
unparalleled leadership, vision and lasting stability."
Needels will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award at a special
ceremony the evening of July 16 at the conclusion of the USPA
General Membership Meeting at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Nashua, New
Hampshire.
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