Basejumper.com - archive

here is the statement that i made to answer the what happenned question, it is written towards a broader audience than basejumper internet types and i cut and pasted it.

here it is:

Yesterday, March 26, 2009, Shane died while skiing in Italy. There are some technical aspects that are left out from this statement, and it does not touch upon the beauty of the Dolomites and the skiing we shared before the accident or Shane’s typical shining persona, full of adventure, humor and life experience.

We chose to ski off of a cliff with our wingsuits and fly them away from the cliff wall before opening our parachutes for landing. We skied and hiked off of the Pordoi cable car to a spot Shane had base jumped once before, in the summer. We spent a bunch of time preparing for the jump, building a kicker, helping each other gear up, and finally we were pleased and prepared and went for it.

Shane did a double back flip in perfect McConkey style. As planned, afterwards, he went to release his skis in order to fly away from the wall and safely deploy his parachute. This is where the jump went wrong. He was not able to release either of his skis. He remained focused on releasing them by reaching down towards his bindings. This put him into a spin/ tumble/ unstable falling style, that may have appeared out of his control, but in reality, Shane was not concerned about flying position or style; just concerned with reaching those skis so that he could get them off and fly or deploy his parachute. He succeeded in releasing both of skis and immediately transitioned into a perfect flying position; then he impacted the snow, and died at that moment.

The whole thing took place in about 12 seconds. Once he released the skis, he was immediately in control of the flight and would have only seen the ground and imminent impact for a tiny fraction of a second before he hit. Shane’s parachute did not malfunction; it was never deployed.

-jt Holmes
March 27, 2009

Damn

Thanks

I can't imagine? I wingsuit but don't ski.

Being constricted in the wingsuit and actually being able to reach and manipulate the skis at all and keeping your cool and flippining back over to try and start flying again! It musta took a lotta fight on those precious 12 seconds!?!?

Maybe (and I mean this in all due respect!) maybe if anything can be learned from this is ; when in doubt put your knees together ( to close the leg wing)and just cut away your arm wings and exract the PC!?!

I wasn't there and I don't ski-BASE/ski-WS BASE. I do WS & WS-BASE and know how confined you are when zipped up and can only imagine what the addition of skis being in the mix!?!?

Is there any insure as to why putting leg wings together to close the leg wing and cutting away the arm wings wasn't an option?

Peace Shane!!!
only met you once in Twin, but who I met was real fucking cool to the newbie I was at the time!

A reminder of the 3 priorities on every parachute jump.
I flew WS with Shane @ Lodi a couple years back, he was a good guy.
Question for you JT: Did Shane launch before you or had you already gone?

All incidents are like links in a chain, break one of the links and it may not have happened. No doubt adding skis to a jump adds a link as does a wingsuit. Wingsuit, skis, aerials equates to alot of potential problems. Whenever we choose to base jump we take risks and complicating the activity with other factors only increases that risk. As jumpers we can always question what if this or that but ultimately we all choose our own risks wether it is simply jumping off or adding in aerials, wingsuit, etc etc.

I never met shane but i hope he was happy in his endeavors. He clearly had excellant skills and experience. I wish the best for his family and friends.

Blue Skies

high speed un-controlled freefall with skis on is not really something you would want to throw a PC into. from what we have heard here from JT, the wingsuit was a small part of it. "closing the leg wing" would do nothing with skis on, a ski is a FAR more effective wing than a leg wing on a wingsuit, and has far more affect over a jumper, especially un-controlled. Shane had a problem with releasing the skis, he solved the problem. just not fast enough.

Horrible news, Shane was a pretty unique person, the little I got to know.

Sounds so pathetic given the circumstances but warmest regards, peace and love to Sherry and Ayla.

How does the release mechanism work?

Why did it not work this time?

does anyone have his or his wifes email address? Maybe we could start up a paypal donation account so we might be able to help his family out.

Here it is...

http://www.shanemcconkey.org

Sure wouldn't have been a bad idea on that jump.

The heel lever on the ski binding can be pulled upward to make the boot release as opposed to most ski bindings where you push down on it with a pole, or your foot to make it release. You can just attach a cable to the heel lever, and a handle to the end of the cable and rout it up your leg so you can reach it, then just jerk upwards and the ski will, usually, go away.

What was Shane's DIN set to?

"and the ski will, usually, go away"

Yes, usually - but not always, as we see... That means that the release mechanism is not built from the start to be so reliable that you can bet your life on it. It was built from a different design perspective: not to release accidentally and lock itself when you put the boot in it - that's it. It's accidental release, not the reliability of intentional release, that is considered to be life threatening in its design. A little jam is usually not a problem as you can always wiggle your foot to free it using your weight for support. In freefall, there's no weight, and a little jam can turn into a big problem.

Engineering solutions that are not built from the start with the objective that your life 100% depends on it, should not be used in BASE.

So sad that we lost Shane to some mechanical part that couldn't be 100% trusted in the first place...

The need to get any amount parachute out will outweigh the need for stability and the release of the skies in direct relation the proximity with the ground.

This is basic Skydiving FJC stuff, as we tell the students when responding to a high speed malfunction, "if all else fails, slow the skydive down."

Shane was pretty cool, and he will be missed by many but the lesson should be apparent and if not it needs to be pointed out to those that seek to follow.

There are those that seek to push the "edge". Some do it by flaunting their luck in the face of conventional wisdom, and established procedures, and some who through determination, examination, repetition, and knowing when to walk away.

Yuri's post above is spot on as well. EVERY inch of the equipment must meet the test, and if it doesn't is can't be considered, even if it means the jump doesn't happen.

To steal a line for the Pilot's handbook.... there are old BASE jumpers, bold BASE jumpers, but very, very few OLD BOLD BASE jumpers.

You make a solid point about engineering equipment. I just don't come to the same end conclusion. A previous post had a link to a video of Shane doing several jumps involving front flips. He never released his skis.

It would appear that releasing the skis is optional, not mandatory. I have zero clue why Shane changed his technique, or how often he has released his skis. Obviously, he thought it better. I'd like to know more about that decision. Surely he was one of the most knowledgeable. He was the expert.

Once he made the choice to jettison his skis, you are correct, he depended on a flawed device.

I believe those were all jumps without the wingsuit.

oops.

I think your right. kinda obvious and I missed it.

launch. frontflip. release. wingsuit flight. deploy. all in 12 seconds? not for me.

i'd assume once he got the suit powered up surely there would be more than 12 seconds....

don't mean to take it off topic. I think Yuri's post makes a lot of sense.

BSBD Shane.

Your assumption would be incorrect. Its kinda like jumping into a bowl there.
Take care,
space

Nothing is 100%.

Shane wasn't doing a "standard FJC jump". From what I hear (as I don't ski BASE), you NEVER pitch your PC into your ski's. I believe Shane knew that if he did this, he most likely would have died anyway. He was fighting in the best way he saw fit. Like Calvin said, he succeeded, just not fast enough, unfortunately. Shane was doing something that I am sure not many (probably none) of us has little to no experience with. I think Shane knew what he was doing better than any of us ever will.

Fail

My condolences to Shane's family and his friends. :-(


I think you don't understand what they are trying to say. There's a line, that when you cross it, you have no chances to survive no matter what you do. In Shane's scenario, just a moment before you cross that line you have two options: a) keep fighting skis and die, or b) throw PC no matter what and maybe have a chance to live. Those 3 priority rules you are taught applies to anything releated with parachutes:

(ir order from highest to lowest priority)

1) Pull no matter what
2) Pull at right altitude
3) Pull stable

Also in skydiving there's a rule that you must try to clear malfunction only twice, and then you go for your emergency procedures. This is to keep you away from fighting malfunction and cross that line without even trying to get anything above your head.

we are basejumping
there are no rules.
we all will die one day

whats done is done.
no way to change it.

much love to his young family.
aim high ayla.
aim high.

Altitude awareness becomes a bit more complicated on a base jump where you're tumbling over sloped terrain with skis and a wingsuit. I imagine he had no way of knowing exactly where that 'line' was, and it was up to his best guess of whether or not he had time to fix the problem and live, or just roll the dice and chuck the pc into his skis.

This sounds like one of those jumps where textbook and FJC training just doesn't really apply. Had he thrown the PC right away and then burned in with a ball of shit hung up on his skis, people might have thought "gee, you never pitch into skis.. why didn't he try to release them first? He might have had time."

I think that his actions on that jump are a testament to who he was as a jumper... he chose the more calculated route of 'concentrate, fix the problem (based on how much time he thought he had), open the parachute' rather than 'dump into the skis and hope for the best'.

Both options could have either gone well or ended badly. I don't really think that there's anything we can learn by applying FJC principles and trying to decide what he 'should have' done. When the chips are down, every one of us will just do what his gut tells him anyway.

Just my .02 rand, after only having the opportunity to hang out with him a few times.

RIP Shane.. My sincere thoughts and condolences to Sherry, Ayla, JT & Miles and everyone else close to him.

First of all guys, Shane was doing type of the jump what 99,9% of us wouldn't even dare to think about doing it, but 90% dare to play smart about what he did wrong!!
He was the pioneer in ski-ws-base jumps.. hassling w two components is hard for most of the jumpers, hassling w three components are super difficult ( as we see )
I have no doubt that he was doing all he could in order to survive! Was it all right? Was the set up on skies 100% safe?! NO it wasn't, as nothing in base is!

Therefore, be sure that this fatality will change the approach toward the ski-base-ws in the future
This fatality will also put many wanna be ski base ( ws ) jumpers away from performing the jump and probably make them live longer.
What looks easy on TV is always super hard.

RIP Shane, fly long and sharp as you use to live
My thought goes to his family
Robibird

that sucks he was a great guy...
Dylan

Agree. Sad people telling Shane what he could and should have done different, when what he was doing.....99.9% of the people here would not do.

So instead of leaving something like this thread behind to remember him, do something a little more positive.

Tell a story about Shane.

That nothing in BASE is 100% safe is a terrible reason not to try to make things safer. The original comment, that ski bindings are designed not to accidentally release where the preferred failure mode for ski-wingsuit-BASE would be an accidental release, is perfectly valid. It's also a very positive way to deal with a very tragic event.

There's no doubt that Shane was a pioneer in what he was doing, and my condolences go to his friends and family. But there shouldn't be such thing as "not learning, out of respect."

Correct base 736!!!... but the important fact is that he felt it is safe enough!
The smart way of dying does not exist. Those who doing such type of jumps are the ones who will put thoughts and energy in to it. it is obvious what went wrong and to emphasizes that here is not really necessary.
The bullet proof device does not exist and those who play w the ''toys'' are the ones who will see what is wrong. That is the reason we have those who dare and those who don't.
Aviation in general is the perfect sample of this what I am saying..

heres a story about cliffhuckstable.

I moved to Tahoe over three years ago. Always looked up to mcconkey and aspired to be a pro skier. Maggot met Miles D on a road trip he did before I moved from NY, and got Shanes number for me.
So when I got to Tahoe I called him, told him I was a jumper, and wanted to jump and meet the Tahoe crew. I got a call back a week or so later, inviting me to jump our very sick and large green bridge an hour away.
long story short, I was chased by 2 CHP helicopters in the woods with their spotlights on, while Shane and another ran off the bridge and hid. I got arrested and taken to jail for 12 hours. Shane and JT got a hotel room and waited for me to be released.
2 days later I get a call from Shane, he felt bad that my first jump with him I get arrested, so he takes me to his local ski base site near south shore.

Ive jumped and ski'd and hung out alot with him since then. Glad I did.

 
I haven't heard of anyone skydiving WS/ski combo but if I ever aspire to WS skiBASE I'd have to be comfortable keeping the skis on for the whole flight, start to landing and through any instability in between.

nice one rambo, fuckn classic!

I don't think anyone was trying to play smart here. Patrick De Gayardon did jumps 99.9% of us wouldn't dare think about doing yet he died as a result of a modification he himself did.

The design of the ski release was flawed, and the question is what can be done to make it better so that this doesn't happen again.

Do you think Patrick's death changed the approach towards wingsuiting? I still hear of people with insufficient experience taking up wingsuiting.

Finally I tend to disagree with the statement that the three rules would not apply here. I think they can apply to each and every single jump that we do. But hey, that's just my opinion.

Shane was a great guy, but he was also human.

Exactly. There's always something to be learned from such incidents, and "Incidents" forum exists for this reason. People simply want to know what other options were there, or what could have been done differently, so they can use this knowledge for their own safety and plan their jumps accordingly.

Will you please explain the ski release system that Shane was using to me, and how it was flawed? You're making quite a claim for someone who is not trying to "play smart."
RIP Shane. Despite having never met you, I know you touched the lives of many. I have much respect for you as a skier, a jumper, and as an innovator who expanded what we know to be possible.

o.k.
Can you explain why you feel the ski release system was adequate?

The reports indicate that only one ski released as intended. Thus, either the equipment failed or the operator failed. I'm far more comfortable thinking the equipment was NOT designed for this application, and thus Shane experienced an unexpected failure mode.

Nope, I can't explain the "unexplained failure."

Broadcasting potential concerns about equipment seems like a reasonable use of the forum.

The actual report (I will take JT's version as gospel) was that neither of his skis released.......

None of the skis released.


Thanks.


This forum is to talk about the incidents; I am not talking about Shane as a person here, I went to the other forum to do that. The aim here is to know what went wrong in order for the same misake not to happen again because there WILL be more ski ws BASE jumpers.

Guys reread JT's statement.

sure, if it was concerns with equipment any of you knew anything about.

the people judging not just the equipment but the operation of this equipment by shane have NO IDEA even what the equipment even was. this would be like pool players on a billiards forum discussing collapsible pilot chutes for base jumping.

I disagree. It is not difficult to understand what went wrong with Patrick de Gayardon's system even for a skydiving student.
Also, without discussing the release system, Shane sacrificed altitude for stability. No matter what you say, chucking a pilot chute is still better than hitting the ground.

I stand corrected.

The best analysis of any accident is done by experts. Unfortunately, few do wingsuit ski BASE. Shane himself would be the best to diagnose this, but that is not an option...

Fair enough, not sayimg anyone is stupid, i'm more guilty of that than most. Just that the people insulting the ski release dont even kmow what it was let alone ever use it or even seen iy

Then lets talk about altitude awareness instead of experimental ski release systems and technique.
Sorry i got involved. Shane would be laughing at you, and i now will do the same, dragging the embarassment of getting involved.

Shane wrote in his blog on march 24:



Looks like the crappy ,old Tyrolia bindings had another problem two days later.

Fly free Shane

 Playing smart = talking with sense but without knowing facts, so all you say is correct but useless.

Talking facts = one need to know what is all about to offer useful information!!

...how many of us here ever put the skies on our legs recently?!

Why Patrick died?! that wasn't technical factor, it was simple human mistake.

Was the Shane's fatality product of technical failure or human mistake?! No one knows so far as no one here knows the facts...

Binding was maybe OK, but the temperature was low and air very cold ... maybe he hit w the skies to something, maybe, maybe....

Yes , we all here knows that skies refused to drop off from Shane's legs, nothing more...

Why?! ....please let this be discovered by people who knows, who were there...

Non-jumper/experienced skier who has read the BASE zone for years here, to comment on the binding issue.

"For these we are trying to focus on lines first and foremost not just base jumps with some snow above it. Its about the skiing for us not only the base jump. Having a parachute in our gear bag allows us to look at mountains and find lines in places that one normally couldn’t go so we are trying to take advantage of the opportunities these amazing Dolomites have to offer" - Shane

It is important to remember that the goal for Shane and JT is to use BASE as a tool in order to ski "the line that doesn't go."

Since they are skiing-focused, it is important they use a ski specific (as opposed to BASE specific) binding. They have chosen the most reliable upward releasing binding ever produced, and sacrificed some on-slope performance in their decision.

Being pioneers in the sport, the binding decision is as sound as it could be. Carl and co. did the exact same thing in choosing the best parachute available back in the day.

Ski bindings are expensive and difficult to re-engineer. this is why only a handful of companies have been successful in the arena. Unless Ski-WS-BASE becomes popular enough to produce a Ski-BASE binding, the binding choice is correct. Is there a really a cable tied to the binding? Was this the point of failure?

It seems that the real lesson to be learned is when to pull in uncontrolled freefall with skis on due to binding malfunction. JT has to be the leading expert on this one.

Shane and JT, you guys fucking rule.

I made a post over in Dropzone.com in the thread about this tragic accident. I got a few PM’s from BASE jumpers agreeing with what I said. It was suggested that I post my comment over here. I read through this thread and didn’t see anything similar to what I wrote so I have decided to throw it out here for your consideration. My comment was-



I'm wondering if his mental clock was calibrated to the normally slower fall rate with the wing suit "open and flying" and didn't adjust to the faster fall rate while he worked to get the skiis off.

I'm sure he knew that even with the skiis on, there was a point where he had to deploy. He might not have lost track of time but he might have lost track of altitude.

If you don't pull, it won't open.
If you do pull, it might.

I don't know why everybody concentrated the discussion on ski bindings. Can't you see a broader picture? The question about how release works was merely rhetorical. OF COURSE, 99.9% of jumpers will never do WS Ski BASE. But the lessons that are highlighted by this fatality are applicable to 100% of us:

- pull no matter what. "Dirty" pull is better than no pull.
- don't rig in freefall
- don't use any critical equipment that was not specifically designed with the utmost safety in mind for your intended task. Especially if it was designed to do a task OPPOSITE to what you need to save your life.

And yes, the lessons NEED to be spelled out loud EVERY TIME no matter what caliber jumper taught us these lessons with their blood.

In the words of Shane himself, "Hey buddy, do yourself a favor - Slap yourself in the face really hard and then say "Dyooo! Stupid brain!""

RIP Shane

What do you mean, fail??

In both skydiving and Base, PULL is the number one priority....

So pitching unstable with skis on, has a 'chance' that your canopy may deploy cleanly.

Not deploying at all, for whatever reason, has obvious repercussions...

BSBD Shane

Well, that was a while ago, but... I meant that Wwarps post was a "fail." For this jump releasing the skies was not "optional" in the sense wwarp was suggesting b/c shane was in a wingsuit, not doing slider-off stuff like in the videos he was referencing.

Edit:
Because this wasn't his first ws ski base, and he eventually got both of his skis off.

Yeah, a chance. Obviously not a chance he was willing to take in that situation. Period.

huh?

in my way of thinking, the highest priority after jumping is to get a canopy out. in a freefall jump, that requires throwing a pc. serious injury if not death is to be expected without an attempt to deploy the parachute.

jettisoning skis is NOT required, it is optional. sure, the skis might prevent flying the wingsuit, so? was flying the wingsuit critical to survival? (I've received a PM stating it was not.)

oh, and calling a system adequate because it HAD worked before is lame. that is like saying "I've smoked for 30 years, no problems. Why worry?" if gear manufacturers thought like that, they would have stopped developing gear years ago! afterall, the gutter gear normally worked, why change?

-----

unfortunately, we BASE jumpers forget the need for managing the skiing aspect safely as well. thanks to a previous poster who pointed out that Shane used the best system currently available.

Excuse me. I'm out.

You're assuming that you'd fix the binding instead of introducing an intermediate system which may be a simpler problem; like the Voile split-board interface or alpine touring free-heel adapters.

Modifications to a boot lower may be most practical since you wouldn't compromise ski flex or how far your feet are from the ground.

You might also piggy-back on the engineering students' efforts to build an avalanche release system for snowboard bindings.

Or just design a pulley system which converts the direction and length of the cutaway cable pull to something usable for modern ski bindings.


Aptitude, motivation, and resources (people, time, motivation, money, and otherwise with some ability to trade one for the other) could be a fine substitute for a commercially viable market. A mechanical engineer who skis, base jumps, and had a season-ending injury in one of the sports might do it because he wants something fun to occupy his increased spare time that might be of practical use when he's recovered.

I didn't know Shane, but I've been wondering how someone who has survived so many base jumps could chuck a double gainer probably 1-3 seconds, and then spend 9-however many seconds fucking with their bindings and then turn over and try to start flying?

Your comment is probably exactly how something like that happens. If it were me, at about 6-8 seconds I would be trying to get my ski's below me with my back toward the sky and dump.


Edit to add: because I have never flown a wingsuit or even track pants, and am not at all used to long freefalls. I imagine not seeing the ground during a base jump and counting to 8 and just sitting here in my chair it gives me chills.

I have to disagree with this statement as it is applied in this scenario. The ability to deploy a canopy could be the priority.
If you know that the bridle will be severed due to the sharp edges of the skis in this scenario, How would your priorities change? In Ski WS BASE, there very well could be different priorities. One could assume that the quoted statement means that even though deploying upside down where there is a 99% chance of no deployment is better than an 80% chance of deployment with the skis being released. I don't buy that quote above. Ski BASE is a hybrid sport as is WS BASE. Skydiving or BASE priorities do not necessarily apply in the same hierarchy on their own. Much less in the hybrid sports. If one is only doing super conservative jumps in Skydiving/BASE, then it is probably a decent credo to go by.
Think about it.
Take care,
space

Said with kindness and respect to all:

I generally appreciate that the incidents forum on the site doesn't degenerate into the free-for-all that the forums generally do on dz.com. Most BASE jumpers seem to post a simple RIP or kind word and move on. That said, sometimes there is something to be learned that can save lives and that information should be shared.

However, though this is now the second longest thread in incidents, I can't believe that it is because we have something to learn here. I'm willing to bet the the half dozen people in the world who actually participate in Ski-WS-BASE have already talked about the equipment issues and are learning the lessons that are to be learned. For the vast majority of the rest of us who will never be talented enough to even consider combining the three together, I submit that we are just making noise. It's like the crowd at a basketball game telling the professional athletes what to do. Noise.

Maybe some people want to have something to say about the death of a celebrity. There are even people coming over from the sister site to contribute "remember to deploy your parachute". I'm sure there is a bit of the rationalization that always occurs so we can tell ourselves that the deceased made a mistake we wouldn't make.

I didn't know Shane, but each time a friend has appeared in the incidents forum, here or on dz.com, I have been glad to see the arguments stop and the thread dry up. JT posted a clear and concise initial post. I propose that there is not anything else to be learned by those posting or reading here.

@Avenfoto- good post. This thread should have ended there.

Well said

Agreed

 
I didn't know Shane, but I've been wondering how someone who has survived so many base jumps could chuck a double gainer probably 1-3 seconds, and then spend 9-however many seconds fucking with their bindings and then turn over and try to start flying?

Your comment is probably exactly how something like that happens. If it were me, at about 6-8 seconds I would be trying to get my ski's below me with my back toward the sky and dump.


Edit to add: because I have never flown a wingsuit or even track pants, and am not at all used to long freefalls. I imagine not seeing the ground during a base jump and counting to 8 and just sitting here in my chair it gives me chills.
exactly. you have never flown a wingsuit. go to your dropzone and put on a pair of skis and an s fly and fall out of the plane and see what happens.

he did what he had to do to try and solve the problem. he had no other choices that would work.

Nowhere in JT's original message I can find that Shane was wearing a wingsuit. Could this be specified?

Ronald

read slowly and again...

"We chose to ski off the cliff with our wingsuits..."

I stand corrected....

So sad. I still think about this every day and wish I never heard this news. Part of me thinks i should let the thread dry up and leave it alone; but the other.....cant let it go with out speaking my mind.
I had a friend who is one of the most special and unique people to enter my life nearly die when he over rotated a series of flips, waited to get stable, then pulled at 75 feet. His injuries were insane but he lived.

No doubt Shane did what he thought he needed to do. I'm not trying to sit here and say that he should have done anything different.

For me though, pulling at my planned hard deck no matter how fucked up the situation is how I'm gonna go out.

Look what Jessie did in Reno. Pulled and got his Ski stuck in his lines, spun in on concrete, and limped away.

I think the lesson is skis, wing suits, Rubix Cube, and whatever else you might be doing whilst base jumping, pull at your planned hard deck then deal with the next set of fucked up circumstances you were just handed.

The few times I met Shane allowed me to appreciate how special he was. I don't take for granted a single moment I get to spend with the people who share this life altering experience. Miss you TJ.

PS. I dont Ski, or wing suit.

This all makes me think about the last few moments I spend with our good friend Darcy, we were at the top of the popular southwestern terminal wall in Norway, having waiting for a weather break for few hours. And then the weather breaks, clouds clear and everyone is ready to jump. Darcy as the sport he is wants to be the last to jump to see that everyone gets to jump. I have a small still camera with me and I think that I want to take a shot of everyone who was on the load but as my hands get cold I think that I will get a shot of Darcy on the next load. Never knowing that for Darcy there will not be a next load. Please everyone cherish every moment that you spend with special people in this sport and live them like those moments are the last you'll ever have... You never know when it will be. I still regret not getting that picture of Darcy and miss that Greek every day. I've never net Shane but after seeing what he's done he has my biggest respect. All my thoughts are with his family.

Bought a new TV for my wife today so she could watch it outside. She went out and I set it up and started watching for the dirst time in maybe 6 months. Nitro Circus was on so I stopped surfing. After a few shows I see a 2 second clip saying "Shane McConkey - In loving Memory".

What a sucky way to find out a brother died.

I never met Shane but we exchanged a few notes as we sparred on this forum and although I berated him in fun for some of his antics I had a lot of admiration for him and the way he lived his life.

I know it's the basezone, Shane but this time there will be some bro'ing down.

Peace brother.

J.