Basejumper.com - archive

Sorry to let you know, we had another fatality in LB today.
Details will follow as soon we know more.
Michi

Edit to fix the date, it happened on Saturday the 28th. Sorry.

BSBD! We will do a jump for him in the morning.

sorry to hear... fly free.

my condolences.

Really sorry to hear that

-Tony-

The jumper was Bernd, a 42 year old German jumper.
He was a very experienced skydiver and also an experienced BASE jumper.
The exit was Mighty Penis or also called via ferrata (exit at Stechelberg next to the cable car).

The jumper was wearing tracking pants but could not outtrack the last ledge and impacted with nothing out at terminal speed. The canopy came out of the container on impact, both loops where broken and the container was ripped open totally on one side.

My deepest condolence to the family and friends of Bernd. This is a terrible year for BASE jumping...

Pls be reminded that all the new jumps at Stechelberg are jumps for advanced and experienced jumpers.
If tracked, ultimate and flowerbox are for very good and experienced trackers.
The mighty penis is even more difficult and is not a tracking jump.
The mighty penis is a Wingsuit only jump. And it is for experienced Wingsuiter only.

Edit to add:
Mighty Penis is also called Via Ferrata

this is very frightening to think tracking the mighty penis..

condolences to family and his jumping friends..

13 deaths this year the same as in 2006 and one away from the 14 deaths in 2007 .

be safe

Can someone please pm me the last name? I would appreciate this very much, because I know a BASE jumper named Bernd who planned to be in LB in the end of the year. Thank you.

fly free, my condolences..

Exactly like Michi posted. I please ask everyone who comes to jump in LB to read the text above and think his/hers ability to perform jumps in Stechelberg. Be honest to yourself and about your skills. The jumps won't go anywhere but you only have one life. The MP is one of the most committing tracking jumps I've ever done and I agree with Michi that it should be considered mainly as a WS jump. Please track the Ultimate and Flowerbox several times before considering this jump. When people have asked me what's the skillset you need there, I've said that you need to be able to track the high nose 19 times out of 20 to the road. And even still the MP is fairly marginal jump. Life is precious so please play safe!

So again everyone, I ask you to be honest to yourself and respect the cliffs in LB (especially in Stechelberg) as what they are. They are advanced jumps for advanced jumpers and they require solid subterminal tracking skills!

My deepest condolences to Berndt's family and friends and the whole german crew!

My deepest condolence to the family and friends...

Michi, I am thinking of closing the valley for a good period, as we did in the past (2002 or 2003?) already due to such sad things, really, it won't hurt now.

Toni i like you but i totally disagree with you on this point.
In 2002 it was a complete different situation. It was fatality no 3 and 4 in the valley and it happend only seven days apart.
Back then BASE-Jumping was still an unknown underground sport with much less participants in switzerland.
Now 16 fatalities in the valley later, with youtube and all these tv documentations and media coverage, everyone knows whats BASE-jumping.

We and everyone else knows it's a dangerous sport. Jumpers die sometimes, it's a fact.
Its sad everytime someone goes in and i feel with family and friends.
I lost enough friends along the way to know how it feels.
We can try to educate jumpers how to make jumping safer, but we can't stop the fatalities.
If a jumper makes a big mistake he will die.
Some jumpers have been unlucky, this happens as well.

But BASE-jumping is not that special.
Earlier this year there was a sad anniversary: the 500th fatality on the matterhorn.
I don't think closing the matterhorn for mountaineers would help.
I think everyone should have the right to choose if he wants to climb a mountain or jump from a cliff.
Everyone who participates in such an activity has to accept the risks involved.

We don't have the right to tell anyone to stop jumping and probably loose thousands for travel expenses only because someone else made a mistake/ was unlucky.
If authorities want to ban BASE-jumping, fine, i will fight against that.

Moritz

Well said.

Prohibiting base is a step backward. Education is the only way forward. Fatalities will still happen. Hopefully every jumper learns not to jump the MP/Via Ferrata exit without a wingsuit, skill and guidance.

How is "closing the valley" carried out?

Ah, ok. Understood. We do need to prove that sometimes. All too often the assumption, even without such an incident, is such that we are not.

Education requires 3 main things:

- quality material to learn.
- a teacher capable of teaching the material.
- a student that is willing to learn the material.

Some students need a big stick in order to learn!

In BASE jumping, hope is for those who want to ignore, circumvent, or abbreviate the above process.

this is emotional reaction caused by accident.
As always, decisions driven by emotions are wrong.

 
It is not the sport - nor BASE jumping or any other extreme sport - that kills people and friends.

It is (always) the individual who is the biggest risk factor - at least from my point of view.

Therefore, if anything should be prohibited, it should be the individual doing things which he/she is not (yet) ready to do.

As a result of this idea we should care much more about any individual (and help them to do the right things - even to tell them being in the wrong sport) others than ban all others from doing what they are able to do.

But that´s only my very personal opinion,
Bernhard


My condolences to friends and family. It is always a big loss and we are all thinking about this sad situation.

+1

My condolences to friends and family. :(

"closing the valley" sure looks like an emotional decision.

frequently, jumping itself is an emotional decision. ("I got to jump this because [insert rational other than 'I am ready']").

 
The reason we had in the past in short words: it was all about respect.

Respect for the valley, for the nature of the sport with its alpine character (discover and adventure, not pure consumation), respect to base jumping, respect to the guy and his friends and familiy and at the end, respect to the valley and the nice willing people let us jump at THEIR paradise-home (not ours, think about that!!).

The freedom to jump whereever you want and whenever was not affected by this (in fact, it got one of the most interesting summer).

You can still do it as long you respect other people living there, other people doing what they like (like the paragliders, i do make part too).


Got BASE all about ego? About the realization of my and only my things? Scares me a bit...

The people that time respected that the valley was *volountary closed by jumpers themselves* was very accepted that time, by almost all base jumpers. Ok, time changed, defenetly, I agree.



(Robi, if respect is something emotional, then yes, it is/was emotional...)

Stay strong ;-)

Well, maybe not always, but I agree: In most cases its the jumper not evaluating all variables or simply overestimating their knowledge, skill or combination of both ( =ignorance)

Its a sad situation, because BASE jumping is such an individual sport with big egos and lots of opinions, so listening to other jumpers maybe a bit tiring at times, but what can we do to prevent these accidents where hindsight is 20/20?

Regulating who can jump what exit using what gear with what level of experience hardly seems possible nor feasible.

Maybe the Swiss BASE association website could be updated with a bit more specific information, but this still leaves everyone judjing their own skill-set.

My fellow jumping colleges arrived from the USA today and we will do some jumps in the valley this week. Their experience is mostly slider down, - so:

I am not their guide, but:

We plan to go the right way by hitting Yellow first, then the Nose or LaMousse, then High Nose etc . . . .
Will they listen to me? - I don´t know. Will they make stupid decisions? Not if I can help it: But I cannot prevent them from doing things that i would not, short of telling them "hey, if I was you i would not . . ."

And then comes the: "Oh BASE-god thinks he knows everything!" finger pointing . . .

How can we proactively prevent human error in the Valley?

Dom
http://www.321BASE.eu

Toni,

This is maybe not the good place and right time for discussion.
Toni brought up the whole new issue or better say dilemma.
Dilemma of how to react when something happen or what kind of politics needs to be applied.

Respect!

Does closing the valley shows respect?! Honestly - NO!
Not because you can not close it!
Let say, one jumper will jump, probably because he did not read about decision made here over this forum.. and whole closing the valley instantly becomes pointless.
No matter how big impact the fatality can have on some of us, the decision like you suggesting is not good.
What BASE community facing more and more is the FACT that with growing activity , the incidents and fatalities will grow as well.
It is almost consensus that regulating the sport similar like some other outdoor activities have is not the option.
What is left than?! Nothing, just one thing is possible to do! All more experienced jumpers need to have huge responsibility to control their students and young jumpers in general in order to reduce the fatalities.
Tom pointed were is the proble with thisas well, so it is not so simple.
Toni, questioning about the reasons why someone jumping is pointless as well, as wrong reason can not be sanctioned as well.
Lauterbrunnen belongs to CH and I think lets follow the advice and recommendations of CH BASE association first.

What I would like to know is following?!
Does anyone saw Bernd's jump?!
Did he had problem w stability?!
Asking that cuz MP is demanding spot but not so that w reasonable track jumper can not get away with it...

Fly Free...
Condolences to family and friends...

Just the way you can do it at your local place. Consider who you take to the exit, and if you choose to show a new exit to a fellow jumper, be sure to tell every minute detail about the jump, conditions and so on. Even though you are not responsible for your friends decision to jump, you are more experienced at that particular exit. Sharing exits must be sharing knowledge, not just showing a place to jump.

This opinion was not related to any particular accident.

V

We where totally 6 jumpers on that load. 4 of us went to ultimate. Bernd and another jumper went to MP. First the 4 jumpers of ultimate went and then the first jumper of MP with WS. Actually no one of us saw the flight of Bernd, we just heard the impact. At that moment of course all of us looked up and we saw him under canopy under the last ledge. 3 of us went up to see if we can do anything. But it was obvious from his injuries that he impacted at terminal speed. Canopy came out from impact, the container was ripped open on one side and both loops where broken. From that and from the position where we saw him under canopy we can be pretty sure that he hit the lowest big ledge. So I would assume that exit should has been ok, or else he everything would have happened higher up the cliff. I think he must have tried to outtrack the last ledge and did not make it.
These are assumptions of course because as I said, no one saw it happened. But I think this is a realistic assumption.

Hi Toni,

I strongly disagree on closing any object just (much less an entire group), regardless of enforceability. Why?

If basejumpers themselves show through such an action that we think that closing objects changes ANYTHING to the better, how would you explain to anyone that you want to open the same object again? It seems like a very dangerous one-way to me…

Bernds Familie und Freunden moechte ich mein Beileid aussprechen.

Y’all B safe out there.
flummi

Why are you bringing sliderdown jumpers to LB? This has disaster written all over it. They tend to pull high before they get away from the wall and their subterm tracking skills do not exist mostly.
Good luck.
Take care,
space

Just to remember:

1. The "volountary closure" idea came from the SBA that time, as far I remember (please correct if I am wrong)

2. Sure, there were very few people jumping, we didnt blame neither, but as I said, it was widely "volountary" accepted not to jump in the valley for 3 months.

3. After this, there was also a long period without accidents (cannot say for sure, since I don't have the stats).


Again, this was an agreement within the BASE Jumping community, by ourselves, where the idea came from ourselves. I was less of a deal that time that it seems to be now.

(I am sorry for the americans just came here, there is a hell of fresh snow since this morning here... I hope they have good alternative program...)

Sorry guys, I still like the idea ;-)

my student Nik Hartshorne died at LB because of exactly this. once he moved up to Portland, he primarily did slider down jumps. he had ~500 jumps. he died at LB because his mindset and skill set was slider down.

Just to remember:

Keyboard terminator blah-blah aside, there will in fact soon be a suspension of jumping in the Valley that will be almost universally observed.

It's called WINTER.



44

Bernd was living the dream in his way. And he also was a tough guy. I'm sure he wouldn't complain on consequences.
For him there are no better words to say in memory than these:

Inspite of all danger there comes a time when the animal inside says LET ME BE FREE and you must roll the dice and throw yourself into the unknown and see what happens because that, that is truly living.
(Dwain Weston)

Fly Free Bro
M.

Like Michi said, none of us saw the actual freefall so we do not know for sure what happened and we never will. But based on my view what happened I agree with Michi, most likely he had more or less stable track almost to last stages before impact but his track just wasn't enough to clear the last ledge. Like Michi said, most likely (based on damage to the equipment and injuries to the body) he impacted with full terminal speed, nothing out and most likely died immediately. What I would like to add to Michi's description, now that I have been thinking about it for couple of days, the suspected point of impact from my point of view is a bit to the left (looking from the exit) to the optimal line for tracking. I usually track this exit very aggressively to the right, following the curve on the wall. The way I see it the "easiest" line to track is pretty much straight out aiming towards the left corner of the field between the river and the wall. From my memory the suspected point of impact (the point underneath we saw the canopy) was actually to the left from this line so it could be that he either was deliberately aiming to do a proxy track over the big ledges with trees on the left or he for one reason or another drifted to left from the optimal line. I agree with you Robi, it is absolutely demanding spot but a reasonable tracker can get away with it. Still, I would say like I wrote on my first post that this exit should be considered primarily a wingsuit exit only because getting away with it does not have that big of a margin built into it.

Yes Toni, You like this idea , nothing wrong w this that you like it. Problem is that you can not apply it.

Yes it was the less deal before as there was less interest.
Be free Toni and let others to be free! Do not regulate something, especially rushing idea like this.

Use yourself as example and do not jump. Be a missioner and walk around the valley and explain your idea and see how many will follow you...

regarding BASE jumpers closing the valley...

if you could somehow get jumpers to follow the closure, why can't you get them to read and follow all the solid advice already available?

if you could somehow get jumpers to jump "correctly" in the valley, then there would be no need to close it.

if people won't follow one, why would they follow the other?

Robi,

And you just answered yourself, why its not possible...


Last time I try to explain (is my english really so bad?):

The regulation was set up by the SBA Guys and the BASE Jumpers themselves



Further, the Feedback after these 3 months from the BASE Jumpers was very good


It was not my idea!
Its not about me!
Its not about regulating!
And not about beeing missioneer!

Over and out

This summer I watched what was about 2.5 feet away from another fatality. Someone not in our group who thought he could track it. Seriously, 2.5 feet. Maybe 3. (or maybe 10, but not enough). The jumper landed shaken and stirred, the video he had showed it closer than we even thought from the landing area.

This site is not for trackers....

This is the biggest load of shit and poorest logic I have heard in my life!

YOU can, will, and have to regulate yourself. It is 100% feasible and is 1000000% possible!

YOU can decide your fate, your experience, your gear, your training, your equipment, your exit points!

YOU are totally responsible for your outcome!

Just like I am for mine.

If you analyse incidents and fatalities, it is VERY DIFFICULT to not include human error as one of, if not the only, root cause of the event.

It only becomes someone else's responsibility to regulate your life when you become incapable of doing so yourself. This could be true of jumping too. If jumpers show they are incapable, then someone else will regulate.

Not the desired outcome!

Slider up jumpers in the valley???? Sounds like a recipe for . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Teaching beginner skiing on black runs sounds like a recipe for . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

First SCUBA lesson in a cave sounds like a recipe for . . . . . . . . . . . .

It sounds like your are choosing your destination instead of your exit point.

So in the end, is boredom, lack of interest in existing knowledge, no time to do things right, etc a valid reason for YOU (you is not just you, it is each of us) to fast track, etc?

NO.

It is never a valid reason. It is just a justification for I could not give a fuck and I'm going to do it anyway come what may, because it won't happen to me!

Maybe you misinterpreted what I said!? Read it again, think, calm down and then reply with out a flaming A**!

If you don´t iunderstand what I meant I´ll explain it to you:
It seems infeasible and hardly possible to (have others such as the Swiss Government) regulate the sport of BASE jumping (which is what is going on right now) and tell people what they can and cannot do! (I will provide you with a link to the article!)

I know that BASE jumping is everyones own responsibility!

Most jumps in the valley are slider up!

Have a nice day!

http://www.bernerzeitung.ch/...affen/story/23743769

I'm really sorry that once again great pain comes out of the most beautiful, dream like, activity..BASE
Wishing strength to the family and friends at those hard moments.


BASE jumping is very demanding. I mean morally, psychically.
It takes big strength to weight all the aspects of a jump while at the exit point in the heat of adrenaline. I believe that every BASEr had jumps where he did that step while still feeling that he didn't took all the time necessary for preparation, while knowing that he is lacking experience for that (demanding)jump.
Why?
Careful, balanced thinking is extremely hard in the heat before the jump. (how clear is your thinking when looking and touching a beautiful naked woman -- you see what I mean?)
It takes lots of mental training and effort to control yourself in that kind of situations, to be able to say NO! I honestly think that's the hardest thing about Base jumping.
We spend most of the time thinking about our gear and how it works and that's OK, but how many time (in%)do we spend perfecting our mind control....
I am strongly convinced that at this point the only way to make BASE safer is to make it at least 50%-50%.
Because Base jumping is a MENTAL sport!
Until you are capable of getting up at 3am hiking in the cold for 2hours with your friends to a perfect exit point,in perfect whether conditions and after seeing them jump turn around and climb down with a perfectly packed rig(and not feeling fucked up) .... until then you are not mentally strong enough to be a safer base jumper

correction: that is the biggest load of bullshit in this thread.

keep telling yourselves how mentally strong,cool and generally badass you are that you are able to perform the enormous feat of throwing yourself from an object, you posers.
while bernd laughes at you from his cloud.

In my post I wrote..
It takes lots of mental training and effort to control yourself in that kind of situations, to be able to say NO! I honestly think that's the hardest thing about Base jumping.


you wrote...
keep telling yourselves how mentally strong,cool and generally badass you are that you are able to perform the enormous feat of throwing yourself from an object,

You mast be drinking....

This does not affect BASE-jumping at all.
This is a law to regulate commercial organisers of risky sports like bungee-jumping or river-rafting.
If you teach BASE for money you may be affected, but i'm not a lawyer.

There are some interesting things in this thread, but most of it has not much to do with Bernd's accident.
maybe a moderator should split it?

I am just responding to the way this post is going, not directly at Mikki_ZH.
Education is the only thing that has a chance for certain types of jumpers. Others enjoy the risks.
Example. Put up a warning sign at MP and state that only 2 out of 3 jumpers out tracked the ledge and see what happens. Could be interesting.
Just food for thought.
Take care,
space

+1

those are worse odds than Russian roulette.

Follow up with some statistic on K2

As of the 1st August 2008, 76 people have died climbing K2 or the Savage Mountain as it is known. This includes the 11 that were killed a couple of days before, when during an avalanche ice took out a section of the fixed ropes stranding 15 climbers, 4 were rescued, but the other 11 were not found.
The total number of people who have climbed K2 stands at 305 as of 1st August 2008, so the ratio of death to success stands at 1 in 4, (Everest is 1 in 10), only Annapurna has a higher death rate.
http://wiki.answers.com/...ave_died_climbing_k2

Annapurna
http://blog.stadum.com/...gerous-mountain.html

we are working on something like this and it should be up for the Christmas jumping season. Although I think the 2 out of 3 might not be a good idea and could lead to a false motivation to some jumpers to be one of the 2... We will put up some information about the jump on every exit in the valley. But then the ultimate responsibility will still be for the jumper himself. This can not be taken away.
Michi

That is what I meant by "interesting".
Take care,
space

I agree whole - heartedly with what you are saying. You do need physical and technical skills - most of which are attainable for most people. But that it IS the mental part that has the greatest influence on your destiny.
I, like everyone else, have been on both ends of the spectrum. I have done dumb shit. I have made good decisions too.

My comments may seem harsh. However, whenever someone dies in this sport, there is an outpouring of "bad luck", "died doing something he loved", "emotions are hard to control", "grief", "attempts to explain away mistakes", etc.
Whilst all this may be true to some extent, it is important to provide a balanced perspective in these situations. The yang to this balance is the hard cold truth - we are each individually responsible for our outcomes. Whilst it may or may not be hard to make the correct decision all the time. We still have the information, support, freedom, and the opportunity to do so.

We can say NO! Each one of us have that choice! We just have to choose it when appropriate.

When is appropriate??????????

That is when education, teaching, and learning come into the equation.

p.s. none of this is directed at this particular fatality. It is just a response to comments within this incident thread.

p.s.s to ugojump

Yes, I know. It was reference to the fact that the travelling group arriving in the valley have mainly slider down experience and they are going to do slider up jumps. Refer to 460's comment about Dr Nik. At least it is good that a progression of exit points have been chosen.

Regarding regulation, it is outright dangerous to start and continue saying things like:
"you can't prevent bad luck"
"death is a big part of the sport"
"if you jump long enough, you are bound to get injured or die"
"I can't control my emotions and say NO"

What these seemingly harmless comments do is cement a culture and philosophy of diminishing risk mitigation beliefs and strategies.

You start acting out what you are saying.

You start beleiving what you say (again - I am talking about BASE jumpers in general, not specifically you as I do not know you).

It is like a child saying: "I am just not good enough". If he keeps this up, there is a greatly increased likelihood that the child will lose focus, self esteem, etc and not achieve the things in life that (s)he is capable of.

If the child is encouraged to change that to: "I am going to put in more effort and this time I will do this thing better", you tend to get different outcomes. Trying to get the child into this frame of mind is not easy. I know. I have kids.

The same is true of jumpers. Saying no is a skill that not all of us possess all the time. Myself included. But it is very important to encourage this philosophy.

If everyone is on a hard arse exit point, and no one steps up and says "I am not jumping because this is too risky", then everyone will probably jump. If one person says no, then it is more likely that others will do the same.

By setting the example, others are more likely to follow. That is human nature.



My day sucked - I went to a funeral. A workmate retired early from work and died of cancer related illness 5 weeks later. So what do you do? Live life to the full, fullest, careful, conservative????????
Go hard or go in? It's a personal choice.

p.s. I did understand what you meant and I did twist your comment a little. But the government can regulate. For example, they could say, "whoever gets caught jumping here WILL go to jail and will be fined $50k". I bet that will cut out 95% of jumpers. There will always be people who will break rules so you could never cut out 100%. Or they could force the establishment of an organisation and rules that control the sport.

The best way of preventing this is for the jumpers to regulate themselves now.

Self regulation is the most important way that our sport can maintain its credibility.

And this means that we are each individually responsible.

your posts are always excellent, and you have the expiereince to back it up.

great post, thank you.

you seem to be highly opinionated, with lots of experience and intelligence and wisdom to back it up, jive turkey.

I very much second Toms posts.

We (and up till now only we) ourselves are responsible, and yes, that includes training, preparation and decision making.

Just a comment. We base jumpers tend to be self centered. We imagine that 1 or more deaths will lead to the end of base jumping in a certain place. I don't really think so. Are mountains closed because of all the death occuring climbing them? Are cars banned because of all the accidents on highways? Is scuba diving outlawed because of the drownings? (In holland, more people drown per year then they die jumping with a parachute). Point is that it is not a fatality itself, but the accepted risk of a fatality which is the criterion we judge and are judged.

If we think there are too many fatalities, we should organise ourselves, especially ourselves at individual level.

Ronald

Just my point of view ....:
I had to give some interviews to radio and tv- stations after these two tragic accidents..
Ueli and Bernd..

Also in front of my colleagues at work, I tried to put these incidents in relation to fatalities from other sports activities.

Of course do more climbers die, more mountainbiker, more snowboarder...but that doesn´t matter..
WE are in the focus of the media and no pedestrian will follow OUR argumentation.

8 climbers at matterhorn died in an avalanche?
so what? Nobody who reads that in the papers feels the need to demand the closure of that mountain for climbers... Why should he..
2 hikers on their way to some summit slipped and fell to their death on a sunny sunday afternoon?
Oh yes, such a tragedy.. What´s up for lunch, honey...?

But our sport is in the media everytime, someone rushes in. That´s the thing WE have to deal with..
Pointing our fingers at other, truly more dangerous sports does not help us, because no one wants to follow that direction..
I had a discussion with Bernd at Ueli´s funeral, regardin exactly this topic..
All statistics describing ski, scuba-diving, mountainbiking, soccer, etc. accidents and all the other well known numbers of injuries, coming from insurance companies, the police, other organisations do not help us very much.
Our goal must be to reduce the numbers of accidents.
Every medium which leeds to that is ok.
signs at the exit, posts here, talking with each other on preparation for a jump.. everything...

Are we self-orientated? Yes we are.. more or less.. Like everyone..
After the most fatalities had happend, almost everyone with a solid number of jumps could explain why this must have gone that way..
Why not in front?
Ok, some incidents happend without the chance that another jumper could have a look at that guy and say:
hey dude, if you try to do this, you will go in..
But everyone from us who jumps with others or is in a place where he is in contact to others, such as in the valley, should walk with open eyes and should have the courage to talk to others if he sees something obviously wrong..
everyone is in charge for his own decisions, that´s right.
but at the end of the day, we do not want another rescue-helicopter, no more funerals, or more tragedy..
I hope that, due to whatever, I intend to make something stupid, someone walks to me and stops me from what I try to do.

coming to the point:
telling others that they are fat, does not make us thinner
no one cares about statistics, it´s all about headlines

most important is: think how YOU can make this sport safer.. for yourself and others.
and share your knowledge..

(sorry for my bad english and my long selfconversation, I had too much coffee in the last days..)

Our goal must be to reduce the numbers of accidents.
Every medium which leeds to that is ok.
signs at the exit, posts here, talking with each other
on preparation for a jump.. everything...

I am a newer jumper & have not been to Lauterbrunnen yet.

I think/agree reducing the number of rescues & deaths is crucial.

The more of us fuckers who are alive the better for our small club!

Your English is great.

Your logic is sound.

Sorry for your loss.

Chin up.

And don't do that next stupid thing you were going to do! I will try to do the same.

Tom, you're 100% right about people reducing their risks, themselves. As a safety engineer, I do this at work on a daily basis. Simply put, you think before you act. You consider variables, consequences, and ALL potential outcomes, not just your desired ones.
Too often, you can convince yourself that the thing you want to happen (which may only have a 5% probability) will happen. Difficult Talus? "No problem, i can out-track it". Sketchy exit? "I've got good feet". Questionable or old packjob? "I'm sure the PC will still work" The examples are endless, but you get the point.
Taking that extra time to research an object never hurts, but ignorance does.
Taking the advice of people who have jumped an object and are still around to talk about it just makes good sense. If you determine that they just got lucky, then adjust fire and do something different.
We are entering an era of BASE jumping where information is plentiful and the community is open and helpful to one another.
It sucks that Bernd died, but what would suck even more is if we don't learn from his death.

PS:

Thanks for making this thread worth this forum by talking about incidents, learn more from it and listening to different opinions and sights while we are on the way.

Still it would be naiv to think that we can prevent accidents. They will more or less stay in our sport because there will always be a gap between what people think they are able to do and what their real ability is. But the choice towards this is what we call our freedom.
And this is good like it is whilst in some way experience is not teachable.

Second we are the only one who talk about closing a public spot due to respect. Nobody demands this as the people in the valley already accept our risk taking.
The only reason we may should not "go in" so much next to their houses in the valley is because we should respect the folk's feeling as they have always to carry away our cold and deformed bodies.
This is much more stress for them than knowing about that we like to jump of cliffs risking life in some luxury way.
We therefore should proof more our responsibility towards their faith while we jump their homeland.

Getting back to the fatality which is the reason for this thread here there is no need to talk away a mistake because there was none. Bernd hasn't jumped because he thought: Now I'm doing something wrong.
He was a 100% thinking that this is going to work as intended.
In this case it is always easy to judge later that the ice had been too thin. For Bernd it was thick enough as long as the ice held him infront of the cracks he couldn't see.
In this way thinking, everyone of us is Bernd. Sometimes more or less lucky.

For him I can say: No he was not a fool nor a risk taker betting on fortune. He had been part of a big community respecting ethics and rules. He had his bad hair days in the same way as his bright sunshine days as everyone of us.

We spoke a lot the last days within our community about the incident and we can say the following to
understand what happened and to give usefull informations towards the people who basically are willing to learn out of history.

Bernd had more than 2000 skydives within 20years in the sport. He had about 250 BASE Jumps within the last 5 years.
It was his 4th jump of that day. The jumps before he used a Prodigy and he was performing normal to good.
Unfortunately he ripped the legwing on the 3rd jump on a barb wire fence. Therefore he changed into his tracking suit for the last jump of the day.
It was his first jump ever on MP. They had been two jumpers at the exitpoint. He was the last to go and there was no video.
The guy who jumped infront used a WS with a good flight. He landed far away at the former BASE Race landing zone.
Of course the WS jumper used the ramp as intended straight out.
Bernd must have jumped shortly after the WS as this guy was still busy with landing when Bernd was already in freefall.

As the other guys of the group who were jumping before and parallel to them at some close exit points didn't know Bernd's timing, they only were able to register the impact sound of him without any obsevations of his flight. As they hear the sound they immediatelly looked up to the cliff, seeing an inflating canopy.
Their observation about the position and height of Bernd also helps to reconstruct plausible on what happened.

Infront of the jump Bernd was given all the infos an experienced jumper would get before he's going to jump this exit the first time. Especially that if you see that if your track is not your best one than you need to pull high and early inside the overhang cathedral.

Since today there are two things more to consider in this case. It was about 3pm and the face of the wall was in the shadow whilst the coming "winter" evening faded already away the daylight. This is therefore important as we now know that Bernd suffered some partly eye desease which affected his 3D vision.
We only can guess today why he have hidden this towards his surrounding world.

Regarding his exit he may jumped straight or let's say not that far to the right as he should, giving him not a straight flight to the face of the mountain meaning the cliffstep below. We can't say if he corrected his flight pattern in freefall but both ideas, a diagonal flight pattern or some pattern corrections, are consuming height over ground and so brought him closer to the ledge as he for sure ever wanted to.

We also can assume it took one second more to adjust the performance differnce between his prior jumps with his WS and his present jump with the tracking suit.
This makes perfect sence as some of us know how different both "sweet spots" are.
It even could have confused him a bit for a moment as his forward surge was much less than he may expected.

As it was his first jump there he couldn't rely on any references like what is looking normal or what must be the feeling like. He was at the tip of his spear and exploring the new exit.

So there came the point where he should have choosen to pull but decided to go ahead. He couldn't reflect to some references as he hadn't any visual experience on this particular relief.
Of course here he also was majorly affected by his visional problem. We don't know if some glasses would have helped or why he was taken this issue not as serious as he may should have.
Knowing this it isn't hard to imagine how difficult it must have been for him to judge the almost invisible ledge of this dark shadowed wall, grey in grey with lower getting daylight.

As we also know the rusult of the jump we know he was to short to make the ledge. I even belief he realized at one point that it's to late for pulling as he was to close over the top slope tracking parallel to it.
And at that point he must have realized he should have had pulled earlier but visionaly misjudged it. The only chance left for him was to track it out.
Then there came the end of the top slope which doesn't continue straight but levels out a bit before it falls off again into a 100m step plus the bottom slope.
There was the point he hit the cliff in full speed. Of course he was givin all to make the ledge till the last moment. That's why there was no emergency pull driven by hope.

He must have done some protecting move short before the ground as the physical body inspection showed that he obviously must have hit more in an upright body position.
The impact killed him instantly.

At that point his container was compressed towards the top so the top loop broke off and the canopy was catapulted upwards. The bridle and the PC had also been pulled this way in reversed order. The bottom loop is still intact till today.
That's why his canopy opened normally even he never pulled. There are also evidences on the handle that it must have still been in the pouch at impact.
The rest of the story is known ...

So I conclude that if we follow simple numbers to create a picture of relative understanding here we can say:
If we reduce 10 on flight pattern, 10 on visuals, 10 on performance issues we can give it as a result that Bernd was only doing 70 even he beliefed he is going to do 100.

Nothing to prevent here ahead of it as everybody gave him all ethics, rules and infos to respond on.
So he was not "dumb" at this point at all. He was just a "victim" of his own created circumstances.

So 70 obviously wasn't and still is not enough for this part of the valley.

So I won't give some other good advices here how to judge yourself or circumstances better while you are looking in the mirror. To much luck was gifted to me in the past.

But for sure this is the lesson to learn here and maybe the main task of our sport at all.

I hope not to offend anybody by this post. Of course all conclusions are based on my personal researched assumptions.

I'll keep him in mind as a loyal friend who lived the dream of flight his own way ... sometimes not in common sense but who does.

Condolence to his family
M.

Good post.

hmmm,.....somebody mentioned that after every fatality evreybody starts to talk about common sense, avoiding ignorance, not to get a undistroyable hero attitude etc....
that we have to learn something about the tragedy,...blablabla.....

the people who think about all this before and still do are not the ones who should start thinking,.....

it should be the "other ones",...but the tragic is that these people are out of reach,.....

i had enough conversations on the exit or on the ground with jumpers and try to make them understand that they had a wrong idea and going to hurt or kill themselfes,.....
they smiled and thought..."bloody idiot,...dont tell me what to do,..."
...and on the next day when hes lying on the bottom i said to him "I TOLD YOU!!!"
most of them listen but dont understand,....
because they got their own point of view and they are strong minded to get their way,....
as an BASEr you have to be strongminded,....
but there is still a reality!

everybody lives in his own idea of reality,..

thats the reason why everybody dies in OUR reality...

we never gonna change this....

the difference is only when you fuck up in a skateboard trick, you break you arm or loose a teeth,...in our sport its much worse,....but its the same attitude,....

"i am good, i can handle this,....the others do it,...so am i,.....no problem,...its been done before...sooner or later i have to do it anyway"
and when some says DONT do this,...or not the right time,...whatever,...he will start TRYING,.....

and then comes reality!!!! his or the other,....

you find a new continent or sink with your ship,...
without this attitude columbus would never find india...
but when you bite of more than you can chew,....???

so , what to do? i think WE never changes this,....
its human nature,......thats the tragic,....
human error will live forever,....if we like that or not...
and it makes no difference between expiriencend, unexpirienced,....take a look on The List,....

peace and stay safe,......


------------------------------------------------------------
scetchy exit, 20 knots ,wrong direction:

"if we are at the way to the exit anyway,...we can go till the end,....if we are at the exit we can check the wind, .....if we check the wind , we can perform a rockdrop,.... if we throw a stone its safer to put on the gear,...if we got the gear on anyway we can do a pincheck,...if the rig is checked we can JUMP!"
and we do,....
and its still sippery,...still 20 knots,.....still shit....
even when it worked out fine,....

sounds familiar???

I just want to add there is not given you will get the same flight from the same exit every time. Most of the time you start flying early, but sometimes you will experience you are just falling, and there is no obvious reason for it. It can be a bit change in the wind direction, the temperature differences in the valley, shadows, etc.

Thanks for adding this possible issue 434.

Still he has had the chance to pull higher ... but he didn't.

So it is up to us now to proof better in the future to make him not laughing on us smartasses when we meet him on the other side ...

To other comments I just want to say that we shouldn't throw stones in anger while we are all sitting in the same glashouse.

I wonder what will be posted here once I'm on the list ...

Till then may the force always be with me!
M.

low buildings are the most dangerous object i know of. plain and simple. low buildings are a roll of the dice with your life.

Not related to the accident in any manner but can you please explain why a low (say 60m) building would be far more dangerous than for example a cliff or a dam (or any other solid object) of same height? Especially if you're able to jump the B from corner giving you an opening sector of 270deg whereas on a cliff it's more or less 180deg.

If you believe in statistics you can check Nick's BFL (http://nitrorigging.com/documents/BFL.pdf). According to Nick's statistics of 128 fatalities 67% has happened from E's and only 7% from B's. Obviously the jump numbers are much bigger annually from cliffs as well but still it might not be the only reason on the huge amount of cliff fatalities.

sorry, i'm editing this comment in. i posted this on the wrong thread. i was thinking of the Red Bull Swiss fatality.

____________
i was not trying to offend anyone. there is a discussion about what to learn from this terrible incident. my experience is that low buildings (below 90 meters) are too dangerous to learn anything consistent. winds move around buildings in such strange and erratic ways. these winds can be strong even when the prevailing wind is light. the presence of other buildings and the subsequent wind effect, concrete, and power lines all make the jump chaotic. having low freefall airspeed when tossing the pilot chute can also cause a lot of issues, such as a spiraling pilot chute from the winds. i am certain there are also low cliffs that can be extremely dangerous too, but as a general rule, i have found the winds to be terribly inconsistent on buildings.

"Still it would be naiv to think that we can prevent accidents. They will more or less stay in our sport because there will always be a gap between what people think they are able to do and what their real ability is. But the choice towards this is what we call our freedom."


These few sentences sum up this entire thread and all other discussions relating to fatalities in our beautiful sport. Very well said.

Whether it is a seasoned veteran jumping a highly technical exit or a newbie jumping the Idaho Bridge, fatalities WILL happen. Closing shit down WILL NOT prevent them.....period. As others have said, education and proper mentoring will help, but not prevent. Look at this accident, it was stated Bernd has an lots of parachuting experience combined with experienced jumpers input on this specific exit/jump/flight. Multiple variables led up to the tragic accident.

To Mahle: thank you for posting your well thought-out and analyzed recollection of what happened. If it only gets through to a couple people then it was worth it.

Condolences to Bernd and all others who lost their lives BASE jumping in 2009 ....what a shitty year