Basejumper.com - archive

 

Some people think we are nuts and have very big balls to skydive.
And then, skydivers think that BASE jumpers are nuts and have very big balls to BASE jump.

Many adrenaline sports are as dangerous as you make them - but even the safest BASE jump is still very dangerous - there are MANY factorsto take into consideration.

Compare BASE Jumping to Kayaking, Rock Climbing, Skydiving, Skiing, Surfing or any other adrenaline sport. I can say I kayak, even if its on flat water. I can climb, even if it is closer to a hill than a wall. I can ski on a green run. Skydivng gets closer, and even though there are many factors that you have to consider on a skydive, BASE jumping is a lot more intense than most skydives.

In very few other sports do you risk "burning" a site. It is simply not dangerous enough for people to end up dying on a site and causing it to be banned. BASE is so dangerous that people are outlawing it when something goes wrong. I think that says something.

Just a few thoughts that ran accros my mind. People talk about skateboarding and surfing being the "extreme" sports. They dont know what they are talking about. I think BASE takes the cake by far.

I still think rodeo is nuts...

Why the hell did it double post?

you all pick which thread you want to post in!

I think free climbers are totally hatstand personally

surfing with the sharks around is nuts

Powerboat racing on choppy water is pretty extreme...

Not to mention diving, people continues to have a problem with breathing water.

// percy

i have a mate who does cave diving - (his mate does unchartered cave diving!!)- i think that is just mad as a box of frogs...


..... the most insane thing is sitting on your fat arse not doing any of these activities but watching TV................

the people whith greatest balls are thouse who get married,i tryed it once,and i can tell i will never do it again,THAT is scary

who cares what is extreme,you know,people think im cracy BASEjumping(Lee.. he he),i think some BASEjumpers are cracyer than me,but then the first group of people dont knows about thouse i think is cracy...

We all have our limits,which aint the limit for other people=what is extreme to one might not be to another..

I example think that anysports involving loads of work like football,marthon and so on,is extreme,but thats becours im a lazy boy

sometimes its extreme to think of that so many people think of their sport as extreme,instead of just enjoy what they like to do...

Dude I couldn't agree more. Those guys are nutz.

Sneaking around in the middle of the night climbing ladders, staris, and rocks sure seems like alot of work to me... Granted the rewards is worth it, but IU think BASE is hard work for sure.

Those who have seen me know why it's that much harder for me... lol

Ganja

sure is,but we get a jump as a reward of our efforts,tell me what a marton runner gets besides sore legs..

were all lazy boys here

Someone told me that "BASE will never be safe, but it can be as dangerous as you want it to be".

yeah, thats another discussion that has been discussed on DZ.com a few times...but anyhow

I dont like to title "extreme" sports. If I catch what you are saying the right way, I agree. A lot of people want to be the "I'm way extreme dude, thats rad, totally awesome dude". When I'm just enjoying talking about skydiving with some people, I have had them tell me, I consider myself to be an "extreme sports junkie". I try to be polite, but my answer is - OK MAN, whatever you wanna think of yourself as to make yourself feel better...

As for football and other sports...I think they can be extreme, in the sense that the athletes push themselves and the limits of the sport to the extreme.

Like you said Faber - just do what you want to do and enjoy it. Don't do it to be viewed as courageous or mr.bigballs by others, we have too many of those around.

bullriding - I consider it too crazy. You gotta have mad skills and some big balls, brass or titanium preferably. otherwise it'd be a problem...

.......and cruel to animals......



at least we dont hurt anyone / anything....

Have you ever been in the backcountry with avalanche potential?

Not that I don't think base has its dangers - but quite frankly, there are other "sports" where I've seen MORE injuries and just as small a margian of error. Some people just don't understand snowpack and stability for instance. For them trekking around in the backcountry with a set of skis or whatever, the backcountry just became way more dangerous than alot of base jumps.

In fact, I believe that most base jumpers (well, the one's I know) take the sport so seriously, that they are able to say NO when the conditions are not condusive. On the other hand, I've had quite a few run ins with people who simply cannot say no when powder bekkons.

Not yet!

Point taken, but..... I can say I ski, and I do, but that doesnt take balls. I can say I climb, and I do but that doesnt take balls. Neither of those sports has to be dangerous.

So, to start BASE jumping takes a lot more balls than to start skiing or climbing. The average BASE jump is much more dangerous than the average ski run or climb.

Good point though.

But if you quit responding in the middle of a BASE jump, you WILL die.
If you stop responding in the middle of a climb, you'll fall and scratch yourself.
If you stop responding in the middle of a dangerous ski run, you COULD die. see?

Sign up another BASE Jumper that thinks Bull Riding is WWAAAAaaaayyyy more insane than BASE. Those guys shatter more bones than anyone, and then cut off the cast 2 weeks early and jump right back on. Hank.....

I don't know man... Sport Knife Fucking is pretty dangerous. The KFAA (Knife Fucking Association of America) posts some pretty heinous numbers of injuries and fatalities each year.

Try fucking the other end...

This technique works for all kinds of things including bulls and girlies

Hit a 45 degree slope with slosh all around you where if you fall you will tumble 1000 feet plus. That indeed takes balls.

More to the point, it isn't about balls. These sports are about precise calculatable risk. It takes a hell of a lot more than balls to base and drop into a steep chute. If you wish to live to see another day in these types of sports, leave your sack at home and learn as much as you possibly can prior to participating.

BTW - have you seen the average number of skier to skier collisions at a typical colorado resort over the past five years? Have you seen the number of paralysis victims resulting from these collisions? You nor the next guy may think skiing at a resort is dangerous, but I can fully gurantee you, it's just like being on the road nowadays. You have many different skill levels competing for the same amount of space.

<theory>
Generally, BASE jumping isn't banned at sites (e.g. nps) because of actual dangers. It's banned because the people in charge of such things look at the exit point(s) and feel their insides rebel -- "how could anybody jump from there?!?" -- and assume, therefore, that there must be something "wrong" with doing so. It's an emotional response: "I'm scared" gets confused with "that's immoral". This is a particular problem for BASE because fear of falling is deep-seated, visceral and immediate, unmediated by logic. Floating on a boat isn't particularly scary in and of itself, so, to be afraid of kayaking, most people have to think through to the potential consequences. Similarly, standing on a pair of skis as they move across the ground isn't by itself scary. Even climbing is less scary because the essence of it is hanging on (i.e. not falling). But to choose to fall from the exit point -- whoa!! I had a nightmare about that once!! Thus decisions about what is and is not "allowed" aren't predicated on any consideration of the actual relative risks involved.
</theory>

At a bridge recently, I watched as tour buses pulled into the parking lot, 20% of the occupants got off and took a few pictures of the canyon and bridge, bought a refrigerator magnet, and got back on the bus 15 minutes later. Remembering that as I stood outside the rail on the bridge, I realized that I got to experience the canyon so much more fully by jumping into it. I was reaching out to take in the whole canyon, not just looking at it like it was on tv or something.
Ultimately, it's got nothing to do with balls. Just not sure how to get this across to those who would ban things just because they can't imagine doing them.

be the canyon

No thanks, I'll just be in the canyon. Not sure I want to become a part of the canyon...

Ganja "What's my number" Rodriguez

That's some in depth thoughts there. Never thought about it that way.

But I still think you need to have a lot of courage (balls) to jump off of a BASE. You might not think you have balls, but I think any BASE jumper has balls. unless he is blind.

But what about the females? Surely they lack the BALLS to BASE jump. Should we then say,
Cause some chicks just don't have the balls to be BASE jumpers, yet they Monkey Flip off of rocks?



Thomas

Dude, they're only like an inch high and surrounded by sand.

i have never thought of it that way before and have to admit thats a pretty cool theory. From Childhood we are taught "dont go to close to the edge" - it is taught from an early age that standing on the edge of things we can fall off is wrong and not the thing to do - for years this has been the way we are conditioned - this is in most societies and peoples conditioning. So when someone breaks away from this conditioning the "normal" people feel threated and confused on why or how you can do this....... just think of the reaction from people around you at work or in life - always its about the fear of heights or the fear of falling that causes them to think "your insane" - these other sports we spout as being equally as "nuts" are acceptable as they dont break with any of the conditions that are ingrained in us - kids always climb trees. climbing frames, they sledge when the snow falls, they ride bikes and horses, they are taken on boat cruises, they go swimming and under water - all of these activities that kids do can be linked in someway to the other sports / activities - not one will be of the nature of going to edge and falling toward the planet............

i agree with you - its peoples fear and confusion that gives them a negative view of BASE jumping...........

just my worthless thoughts worth..........

Here are some recent facts concerning K2, the wicked mountain in the Himalaya.

Total # of ascents since 1954- 198

# of climbers to summit, and then die on the descent- 22(including BASE #44 Rob Slater)

Total deaths- 53

# of bodies still on the mountain-49

Kind of a gruesome quest, IMHO...

So 27% of the people that attempt die? Or 27% of the people that succeed die?

Ganja

Good call, Jalisco. Think about the perceptions of any "falling" sport -- skydiving, BASE, bungee jumping, etc. Totally makes sense. In addition to the fear of falling, I think a lot of people drastically underestimate gear and overestimate their own ability. People think they won't get have a serious collision skiing or snowboarding because they can "move out of the way". The won't fall rock climbing because they can just "hang on". They won't go over any edges where they can "hit the brakes".

People are under the illusion that they can handle a crisis situation because of their ability to become a deer in headlights. They realize that this wouldn't save them in a "falling sport". They don't realize that not everyone freezes up, and that not every "fall" presents a crisis. And they drink human blood.

What is up with you ending every post cryptically? I still don't understand the relevance of the Knight Rider comment...

Im with you its all relevent I had a ski patroller buddy with twenty years experience meet his end in the alps last year. He knew snow like no one else I've ever met and he died fully kitted, in bounds in a big spring slab. Then you see these muppets cruising around on wind loaded back country slopes with jeans tucked into their boots and it makes you realise that ignorance is bliss for many but ill take caution and knowladge any day
p.s I've done a bull ride I would like to say its a great 8 seconds but it was more like 3 followed by a hard winding good fun though

As with anything with a high rate of return - there is a high chance of failure. Whether it be finance, steep and deep powder, hucking etc. I think it is crazy how far base has come in the past 10 years.
But, have you seen what people are jumping off today on mountain bikes? Did you see the guy jump over the tour de france?? These guys are doing 75 foot drops nowadays on these bikes with 8-10 inches of suspension. They are not crazy but extremely careful about each huck. As they should be. If anything, I think base has gotten safer over the past 10 years, its odd how much closer to base a mountain bike can bring somebody in terms of consequences for error. I would never huck like those guys do. Honestly, I'm 98 percent sure I'll never huck like many of the people around the world involved in base because I have a family now. But man, do I have a sincere appreciation for a huckster WITH a bigger brain than balls.

In Reply To :

And they drink human blood.

What is up with you ending every post cryptically? I still don't understand the relevance of the Knight Rider comment...
.........................................................

Hey... the111
Dude I share the same DZ with steve and jump with
him a little on the weekends.
I still cant figure him out half the time.
He is a true Geek.

If you figure him out let me know.

No O2 big mountain climbing, and living in Joburg. Extreme

I was training with the Canadian Avalanche Association in canada two years ago. A week after I was there, 12 skiers died in an avalanche. They were experianced guides.

The white death, to me, is far more scary than something i can see (read: the ground!).

ditto on that

All of them die, the question here is how and when. 27% of attempts die during the climb. 11% die after reaching the peak.

Of course, these #s aren't representative of mountian climbing in general. It's like taking the number of people who die on one stretch of highway to represent all people who drive.

The point remains, climbing everest or K1 or Denali takes some cojones and a shitton of skill.

I still think BASE jumpers are nuts tho.

You all should really check out the book "Falling, How Our Greatest Fear Became Our Greatest Thrill".
http://www.amazon.com/.../002-1313200-7112804

There is a lot of discussion in the book about how "normal" people's veiw of sensation seekers causes alot of the tension between the sensation seekers and themselves and how this tension results in things like laws against activities like BASE. Most of this tension is associated with falling or gravity associated sports like BASE.

I read a quote in some other article about sensation seekers that went, "We know them as thrill seekers, and they frighten us because nothing at all seems to frighten them. Yet from the safety of our dens and patios in suburbia we owe them a great deal. They’re the groundbreakers and the trailblazers, and their adventures and misadventures alike are the backbone of history."

So I guess this all just validates the idea that we're wired differently and so we choose to do things that "normal" people think are absurd. To the outside observer (or even to some experienced skydivers) jumping off a rock with a parachute seems like the purest form of madness. Most people with any significant involvment with the sport of BASE jumping either directly or indirectly know that it's just the opposite though. We do these things only after careful observation of all the variables and try to limit the amount of actual danger as much as possible.

So I guess the answer to the original question of "How dangerous is BASE?" is that it's as dangerous as you make it. We all have our limits and for most of us BASE jumping is a personal journey to find out exactly what those limits are.

L8R
837

Have you ever tried a blindfolded BASE jump? Now that is scary! Not for the faint of heart.

Rob

think i closed my eyes one jump..... haha joking

I draw my limit line at extreme bungy kayak jumping.....

according to spiderbaby's stats 11% of the people who summit will die on the descent.

a figure for total number of attempts is not given so
a percentage for a climber to die during an attempt cannot be calculated with the information given. I would estimate that the number of attempts is in the thousands.

just saw this post and had to say something. to me what makes skydiving and base more "extreme" is no matter how easy you take it in the sport you have to save your life.

i am convinced based on a mathematical analysis i did a couple years that approximately 1 in 15 jumpers will die base jumping. seriously.

Mathematically speaking, what is a (base)jumper?

Is it everyone who (hypothetically) got their BASE nr.?
Or does it require a number of jumps (of this or that category) during a number of years?

no it's anyone who has made a base jump with some general criteria that they do more than make a few bridge jumps occasionly. not just the one's with base numbers. make an estimate of the relative number of active/semiactive jumps without numbers and those with.

An interesting excerpt from a review of that book:

Here's an interesting thread I found on a physician site. If you do the math, they came up with a fatality rate for BASE jumping of 1 death in 2340 jumps. See the last paragraph if you get bored by the rest. That's fairly dangerous. Since their study was at a terminal wall, you kinda wonder if the overall death rate isn't actually higher since slider down jumps aren't included.

Read and enjoy:


How Dangerous is BASE Jumping?
Although B.A.S.E. jumping is clearly a dangerous activity, it has always been somewhat unclear how dangerous. Unlike skydiving, which in most of the world is a regulated sport, B.A.S.E. jumping is many parts of the world is illegal and consequently the numbers of people participating and their risk of injury and death have not been known. Kjerag is a world-famous B.A.S.E. jumping destination and therefore an excellent location the authors chose to study.

As a skydiver and physician, I studied injuries and fatalities in the skydiving world. We found a fatality rate of 1 death per every 117,000 skydives (in line with previously published national U.S. estimates) but we also reviewed injury rates and published a rate of injury, presentation to an emergency department, and hospitalization rate. (The Epidemiology of Skydiving Injuries: World Freefall Convention, 2000-2001. Journal of Emergency Medicine Vol 28, Issue 1. Pages 63-68 (January 2005))

Comparison between our studies suggests the fatality rate for B.A.S.E. jumpers at Kjerag was 50 times that of the fatality rate of civilian sport skydivers in the United States.

Word.

Estimated Rates:

1 death in 117,000 Skydives
1 death in 2,340 BASE Jumps
_______________________________

2007 Data

Known Deaths = Estimated Totals

18 deaths = 2,106,000 Skydives
14 deaths = 32,760 BASE Jumps
_______________________________

Hence, 120 Total BASE Deaths means
there have been about 280,800 Total
BASE Jumps IF the estimated fatality
rate is correct.
_______________________________

Do these figures seem accurate?

.Any idea how many fatalities at the Perrine total? They count a total of 9 deaths in Kerag since 1995-2005, does that jive with what the fatality list says? They record 20,000 jumps from there.

Here's the whole abstract BTW


How Dangerous is BASE Jumping? An Analysis of Adverse Events in 20,850 Jumps From the Kjerag Massif, Norway.

Original Articles
Journal of Trauma-Injury Infection & Critical Care. 62(5):1113-1117, May 2007.
Soreide, Kjetil MD; Ellingsen, Christian Lycke MD; Knutson, Vibeke MSc

Abstract:
Background: Extreme sports, including BASE (building, antenna, span, earth) jumping, are rapidly increasing in popularity. Associated with risk for injuries and deaths, this activity may pose a burden on the emergency system. Hitherto, no reports exist on accidents and deaths associated with BASE jumping.

Methods: We reviewed records of 20,850 BASE jumps from 1995 to 2005 at the Kjerag massif in Norway. Frequency of deaths, accidents, and involvement of helicopter and climbers in rescue are analyzed. Fatalities were scored for injury severity scores (Abbreviated Injury Scale score, Injury Severity Score, New Injury Severity Score) on autopsy.

Results: During an 11-year period, a total of 20,850 jumps (median, 1,959; range, 400-3,000) resulted in 9 fatal (0.04% of all jumps; 1 in every 2,317 jumps) and 82 nonfatal accidents (0.4% of all jumps; 1 in every 254 jumps). Accidents increased with the number of jumps (r = 0.66; p = 0.007), but fatalities did not increase, nor did activation of helicopter or climbers in rescue (p > 0.05). Helicopter activation (in one-third of accidents) in rescue correlated with number of accidents (r = 0.76, p = 0.007), but not climbers. Postmortem examination (n = 7) of fatalities revealed multiple, severe injuries (Abbreviated Injury Scale score >=3) sustained in several body regions (median, Injury Severity Score 75; range, 23-75). Most nonfatal accidents were related to ankle sprains/fracture, minor head concussion, or a bruised knee.

Conclusion: BASE jumping appears to hold a five- to eightfold increased risk of injury or death compared with that of skydiving. The number of accidents and helicopter activation increases with the annual number of jumps. Further analysis into the injury severity spectrum and associated hospital burden is required.

Off the top of my head, I'd say 5 (Stout, Corcoran, Dean, Lathrop, Drozhdov).



One of the authors is a very experienced BASE jumper, who is quite familiar with the site.

If I wanted to find out how many deaths total at Kjerag, Vibeke is probably one of the first 3 people I'd ask. If the List disagreed, I'd say that Vibeke was right and the list was wrong.



For what it's worth, I don't think that it's very easy (and potentially not very useful) to draw generalizations about BASE risks from site specific data. Kjerag is a relatively safe site, with abundant help (and supervision) from experienced and local jumpers. Trying to generalize about BASE from data about a popular and relatively safe site is bound to be error prone.

The same goes for any statistics you might draw from the bridge here, and unfortunately those are probably the only two sites with a sufficient volume of jumps to be statistically relevant. Which means that we can't draw meaningful statistics about BASE--only about those sites.

Further, we can only talk about those sites at specific times. Kjerag, for example, underwent some pretty dramatic tightening of rules and safety standards around 2001 or so (in response to a very bad season), which means that it's likely the statistics would look a lot different for the next 10 years than the last 10 (and that's leaving aside lots of factors, like increased safety margins from better gear, or increased risk factors from proximity flight).

Who cares
Adventure sports have x factor,that is why they are called ADVENTURE sports!The danger in all the sports is our EGO,the little fucking thing that makes us do shit and tells us we can do that ..no problem!We can talk and talk about the same old shit but our egos can not comprehend its own finality even when we see others get fucked up ,we continue on and think that will never happen to me,but most shit is due to human error and of course we are all human and that i think is the crux.Time will tell if you made good choices or bad choices because only you will suffer the consequence of poor choices and of course be rewarded for choices that were correct.The ones that live life to the fullest know first hand that a life of adventure has extreme highs and lows and except the x factor with their whole being and of course want to chase the dream as long as possible.Lets not take ourselves to serious,we are not permanent,but lets try to keep our little egos or big egos in check .The ones that have the most fun in life and live with no regret...Win!

IF you need comfort in stats,maybe you should do a gut check and ask yourself ,risk and reward is it worth it to me and would i do this shit if i was the only one on the planet!
Gary Begley

i don't think its dangeruse at all
its all in your head in fact your more likely to slip and fall in the shower and brake your neck or OD than die base jumping

Most of us will die in our bathrooms like Elvis

Ive done some pretty scary multi-pitch aid climbs. Ive gotten disoriented and lost on a zero vis scuba dive. Ive kayaked some pretty insane rivers and creeks at well over flood stage. I have ran some good sized waterfalls. I have free soloed 600ft climbs(no ropes). Ive been shot at and chased by rebels on foriegn soil(that was nuts). I was sitting on a bus that the Isreali police boarded and shot a man(didnt stick around to find out why). On a steep creek in the middle of nowhere, I broke my kayak paddle and my boat, got stuck over night with no food, fire, clothes in freezing, sleeting weather. Had the rescue squad searching for me. I was killed in a motorcycle accident and revived by the brave men and women of the Virginia Beach Fire Dept. Ive been knocked out in my kayak upside down rolling thru class V's. I was a cop in the projects, and I worked in a max security jail.Got physically stuck in a cave. I have taken people down rivers that they had no business being on(commercially). Ive been stuck under rocks, rafts, and fat ladies. Ive been held up with a shot gun and harrassed by drunk locals while climbing. Ive seen more death than you can shake a stick at. Ive see it heard it been there and done that, and people call me crazy cause I BASE jump. But I love it. Its been a dream of mine for years and years and years. Years before I knew there was a name for it. Except for my first jump(super fucking scared) I love BASE jumping.

So, to answer the question, yes, but then again, so is everything else I do. AND I DO NOT CONSIDER MYSELF TO BE "EXTREME" I HATE THE EVIL MEDIA.

some people who have lots of children are nuts!!!

was reading your post with a 'monotone' expression...but I liked this part...sounds like you have suffered long and hard ...

back on topic.
Even when you approach it with a very safety concious attitude...there are still some inherent risks within BASE you just cannot plan for,or fix when shit happens...
As long as you truly take that on board and accept the ultimate consequences of that.....the rest is just stratification based on the decisions you make, what you are planning to do, what you are risking to do it and how prepared you are ,skills wise ,to succeed at doing it
My opinion only...as a BASE tadpole

Curious how the BASE "statistics" would stack up against climbing one of the dangerous mountains... say Annapurna which has a 32% fatality-to-summit ratio!!

Would you do BASE with that ratio...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annapurna

No

Zoter sadly died wing suit BASE jumping

No, I would not BASE jump if the rate of success was 68%.

That's just 1 mountain's statistics, not representative of the sport as a whole at all.

Most jumpers in the sport for any number of years have gone for "that 1 jump where shit was going to be 50/50".

That's all Annapurna is, 1 mountain, so the comparison is not really corollary except in the context of 1 BASE jump worth of danger.

Snowmobiling is insane. Yes you could ride safe and slow, but what fun is that? Night riding is a little safer cause you can see oncoming lights, but when i only go once or twice a year, and go screaming through the trails on a sled that goes 100+ mph, doesent turn or stop well, then realize there is probably a similar idiot going the opposite direction, just as out of control, and possibly drunk...scary shit. I decided not to go anymore.

how long is a length of Rope?

Back in 2007 I was supposed to take a nice
Moron co-worker Tandem for Father's Day.
As the day drew near his pregnant wife
was flipping out from fear + hormones.

So him and I spent a few hours collecting
risk data on activities they were already
doing or had done.

Snowmobile deaths was super high but
even more shocking was Deer collisions.

Here are my 3 most likely
causes of my own death:
1. Cancer
2. Car Accident
3. Parachuting Accident

Mine are:
1. Pissing someone off and getting shot. (from behind, if I see it coming I'd get them)
2. Getting bit by a zombie in the apocalypse (start preparing now, if it doesnt happen naturally I'll genetically modify a virus to make it reality)
3. Spontaneous combustion (self explanatory)

Those guys have bruised nuts.

Answer: Twice half its length.

I've done a ton of weird stuff. IMO, alpine climbing, even in a place like Chamonix, seemed more dangerous than BASE to me. People die like flies on hard technical climbs in the mountains. Some climbers like to think that scary aid climbs on big walls is really hairy, but few die on them.

Alpinism is quite a bit different than rock climbing. You deal with objective dangers that can't be avoided, like rock fall, storms, avalanche, etc. The closest I've come to getting whacked was on alpine routes. During the summer that I was in Chamonix, I believe there was an average of one fatality per day on the entire massif.

You can go back and bolt the snot out of those routes, but you can't stop that rock from taking your head off.

As for BASE, it is like most things. You can make it dangerous or not by your choices. Some jumps are more dangerous than others. You know that beforehand, just like rock climbing.

That said, Spiderbaby should tell us the story of when he took a huge whipper off of Southern Belle!

Me:

1-Aircraft accident
2-RSO flipping the switch on me. Fucking air force.
3-Filming Stunt Accident.
4-Controled drone flight into controller.

Edit:To remove the green STI from my text.

...or how he and a buddy learned to BASE jump by reading about it on the internet.

He is a legend. Unlike most legends, he has damn sure earned it. Quite a life.

I was in Denver last month, downtown, and looked at the tall buildings, wondering which one he flew into. Literally.

I know guys who have hit buildings, but as far as I know, he's the only one who stayed inside, gathered his canopy, and went down the elevator.

Never met him in person, but this is classic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQe3kqTYW4c

He can sure tell a story!

John Hoover, BASE 95, hit a building, landed on a guy's desk, look around and was trying to cut away his parachute, the parachute was hanging outside the window, it reinflated, and he was dragged out through the window. he hit the building two more times and landed hard on the roof of a two story adjacent building. He wasn't badly hurt and took his lines of his shredded parachute, tied it to some conduit on the building roof, shimmied down the lines, and ran away.

Hank jumped a tower south of Austin and somehow hit the guy wire attachment point. Then went to Mexico and hit the wall of a big cliff. And then moved to Denver and flew into a building...

Yep, that's Hank. I've skydived with him plenty of times and am pretty sure there is no shortage of parents who have put him into the "bad influence on my kids" category.

One time at the DZ, I did a "grocery sack" jump. That's where you put a round on a BASE rig, pack the round into one of those plastic grocery sacks with the two convenient carrying handles, put a skydiving rig on over the BASE rig, exit the plane in a sit, and toss the grocery sack. After riding the round for a while you cutaway the round and deploy your main.

I had never seen it done but had heard about it for years and since the DZOs were on vacation, it seemed like an awesome time to try it. I was geared up and sitting around waiting for the load and saw that most of the jumpers had looks on their faces like they *knew* they were going to see me bounce. The pilot, who was a highly-experienced jumper, looked at me and said, "It's all fun and games until someone gets hurt."

Not Hank.

Hank laughed and said, "Walt's not like the other kids...", and jumped with me, shooting video.

Walt

So what you're saying is that all he needs is a span to get his Smack BASE?

only if he's on smack.

John Hoover was one of my best buddies. We and Roso were a gang. They were both quite the characters.

The story was much better than what really went down. He definitely didn't land on a desk. He never really went inside. He bounced off of the collision while glass and metal blew out and fell to the street.

I need to get that stuff transferred from VHS to CD. You guys would love the gear.

Anyway, BASE is a lot like Alpine climbing. There are still a few risks that cannot be avoided. One of them is still the same: off heading opening leading to an object strike.

The original pack jobs back then were horrible. You flaked it out and laid it on its side. Anyone remember that one? Prior to that, you laid it on its side and rolled it up like a sausage. The pro pack showed up in 86 or 87, and this is the basic modern pack job. Much better.

So pack jobs changed pretty quick. Within the first 5 or so years of BASE, and it has been tweaked considerably since. Still there are the occasional off heading openings. People still strike objects on slider down jumps today, although the odds are better.

The number of things that can go wrong are finite and knowable. When you step off, you must know all of those dangers and be ready for them. Even if the last 100 have been on heading, do you want to risk your life that this next one will BE on heading? I hope not. You have to be ready to react instantly. You have to have a plan on each jump and each object.

These days, fatalities are different. The early fatalities were mainly object strikes. Now people go in without deploying a parachute. Last year it happened to a number of people. They got screwed up on an aerial or flew into a ridge. Never deployed the parachute. Something as simple as that.

Number one: Deploy your parachute. If everyone just did that, the fatalities would shrink drastically. It doesn't matter how good the gear is, you have to toss the pilot chute to take advantage of it. The majority of modern fatalities happen just that way. Go read the list.

One of the most common ways to die rock climbing is by screwing up and not being attached to the rope when rappelling, or rapping off the end of your rope because you didn't tie knots in the end, or being lowered by your belayer who lets the end of the rope go through his device and dropping you. A guy died on the Nose like this a couple of weeks ago. The Nose is super well protected. He just screwed up. He was rapping down to get some dropped gear. He leaned back and somehow hadn't clipped in to the right rope. He hit one of the ledges on Camp 5 and died from it. I've been at the exact spot. There was nothing very dangerous there, he just screwed up.

Lots of climbing fatalities happen like this. Simple mistake. Dead.

The odds have gotten better with better gear and pack jobs, but people still strike objects. You have to know this beforehand, and have a plan to deal with it. Just rolling the dice will eventually catch up to you. So take those known risks and minimize the shit out of them. Never bet your life that you will have an on heading opening.

Still, the things that can go wrong are, as I said, finite and knowable before you even jump. Minimize those risks, and deploy your parachute. A large percentage of modern fatalities happen with an un-deployed parachute.

No kidding. It is that simple, really.

Jester put this video on youtube. Allen, Payne, Hoover, Roso. They were all a riot.

It is 26 minutes long, and hilarious. If you pay attention, you will see George, the blonde guy, having a line over and clearing it with the new line release modification. Lineovers never happen at the DZ.

Mark Hewitt compounded both femurs from a lineover from a building. The story goes, while he was recovering, he thought of routing the steering lines outside of the slider. The only really strong toggle stows back then were "Zoo Toggles." Within a year everyone was using this, and it saved quite a few people from serious injury or worse.

Quite a sense of humor!:

https://www.youtube.com/...IM&feature=share

Damn, that was some great video--thanks for posting the link!!!

Walt

Damn yellow jacket almost got me, picking up rotting logs in the woods for firewood, being too drunk and pain free, sucker got me 10 times before I even knew he was stinging me. Might add a couple epipens to the med kit. Anyone here allergic to stings or bites? My leg with all the stings is huge but looks like a local reaction, was too inebriated to tell any systemic response haha. I'd be pissed to have survived BASE and be taken out by a tiny little insect, fuck wasps.

Why am I not terribly surprised?

Love you Baby!