Basejumper.com - archive

So let's say a base jumper won the lottery and decided to buy some land an build an antenna, private property, and he owns the antenna jumped all day everyday, could the law prosecute you in any way shape of form?

For a proper answer there needs to be more to your question. Are you charging people to jump from your antenna?
An antenna is only designed to hold so many people(so many pounds)and you know BASE jumpers are going to get hammered and quadruple the number of people on a platform and collapse shit trying a world record or some other dumb shit. Can thier family sue you for dumbcrap like that?

I use this as an example of what many BASE jumpers would show up and do at your private A.
http://www.youtube.com/...amp;feature=youtu.be

bit of a hard opening, no?

Hahaha who knows I didn't win the lottery and I don't have any intent to build an antenna, just wondering what type of legal issues from local police, there's always a possibility to get sued when you own something that someone can jump off of, but I mean if it is on private property what laws are you breaking if you jump it?


And if I won the lottery, I wouldn't charge you guys, but I would envite everyone over to my place for a party!!!!!


That was a hard opening!

keep it to yaself mate, then ya have no legal issues at all hahahhahah

What jurisdiction would your hypothetical structure be in?

The law varies a lot in different places.

So you win the lottery and decide to install a swimming pool... You get the permits, dig the hole, put up the fence, invite your friends over for a dip. Is there ANY difference???!!!

jon

unless the jurisdiction that you were to build the "A" in had some sort of ariel delivery law like NPS then they most likely would have no reason to prosecute you.

the problems you would most likely face are building it in the first place. you would probably need a permit from the local municipal body in order to construct the tower and they will probably require documentation of signed leases for the communications equipment which is normally on the towers as well as some sort of FAA registration or approval (if over 200' AGL) before the locals will even consider issuing the permit. so basically, you might need to make it a legit operational tower.

this info is based off of some research i did a few month back on this exact subject. I walked into the local Building department and asked if i could build a 350' freestander for using my large telescope.
it is probably different in every jurisdiction but im sure with enough money anything is possible.

There is if you then decide you and your friends are going to jump off the roof into your swimming pool and somebody gets seriously hurt of killed. they could probably file a lawsuit against you or even worse the family could for allowing it.

i think the same would apply to the tower. you would probably need to have anyone jumping it sign a waiver of some sort just to protect yourself and post no trespassing signs all around it and put up barbwire fences to keep out unauthorized people and prosecute anyone who breaks the rules!

Oh The Irony!

If you're talking about doing this in the United States of Lawyers, plan on getting sued eventually. That's how this country is......you get sued if some fuck-wat tresspasses to steal something off your private property, trips on say a flower pot, falls, splits thier head open, required 10 stitches. They come back and sue you for.....??? whatever they can.

Dont laugh it's happened....multiple times REmember the mc'd hot coffee incident?

Waiver or no waiver....those things dont mean shit, sadly

Have them pay some money to gain a one millionth ownership of the property and the tower. It makes it very hard to sue themselves for a liability issue.

Remember the mc'd hot coffee incident?

The background to that infamous verdict
has several relevant facts which greatly
impacted the award the plantiff received:

http://www.stellaawards.com/stella.html

I can tell you from personal experience a
skin graft hurts worse than a broken femur!

Shareholders sue the corporation they hold shares in all the time.

The latest case in point in the news is Third Point (a shareholder) suing Yahoo.

The OP asked if there was any danger of the LAW coming after you.

I think he meant to ask "Is there any reason the law would come after you for jumping off your own antenna?" -not- "Is there any liability reason anybody could come after you."

My friends can jump off my roof into my pool all day long and the cops would have nothing to say about the matter. Perfectly legal. Right???!!!

jon

agreed

like i said, unless there is some sort of law against parachuting or something weird like that in the jurisdiction then probably not.

the OP's question in essence is... is it illegal to base jump from something you have permission to jump off of? a little search and the answer is no, it is not unless there is a specific law against it in a particular place like the NPS laws. whats illegal is usually gaining access.

so, if you built one i think the more relevant issue is liability when someone fucks up because if you build it, they will come and they will eventually fuck up. when that happens too many times, eventually the law will step in and intervene on behalf of public safety and all that builshit.

Laws do vary especially if any of the land is outside your ownership where you are subject to regulations. As long as you own and build the tower on you're land you should be OK but need to check FAA regs on structure height if your in a control zone or any city ordinaces or powerline clearances. We had a good deal in 90's to bring a 900' tower from N.Car., but cost of transport and just replacement hardware to install the tower was about $240,000. using free jumper labor and had to buy 17 acres of land to incorporate the old cement anchors from a pricious tower at a good price. Problem is, who wants the title in their name. Best waivers won't stop law suits. Even if you never lost a case, and it could be set pretty tightly, you cannot prevent people from suing which means you need a lawyer on retainer. Most US Courts do not make the looser pay the winners atty fees, especially of the loser lost a relative to jumping, so until we get some common sense liability laws, similar to Idaho trying to give ski resorts better protection, I wouldn't want to own a jump tower. There's too many easy one out there.
Rick

Perhaps for shareholders in a publically traded corporation. The two scenarios seem notably different.

Even in partnerships, you can see the partners suing the entity. Same thing in LLC's, S corporations and C corporations. I just don't see how stake holding is going to protect from someone suing.

You'd be better off to have the tower owned by a separate entity (or individual), and then operated by a business (of whatever organization) that was owned by different individuals, with a contractual arrangement that specified the operator was liable for any suits. Even then, there would be ways a good plaintiff's attorney could get around that.

If you really wanted to get into nitty gritty liability law, I know an experienced jumper who teaches BASE courses for a manufacturer and was an ambulance chaser in a previous life. I bet he could think of all kinds of ways to mess around with the liability issues.

Regardless, I think from a purely business perspective this is a non-starter. Why would jumpers travel and pay for tower jumps when they are available for free all over the country?

I would be interested in hearing what his ideas would be.


If you made it tall enough I think plenty of people would go and pay to ride the elevator and jump in the daytime! I also think other potential income producing businesses could be operated from the tower to make it profitable.

Well to answer most questions I did win the lottery but it was only 4$ so it's not going to be constructing any type of tower but hey I figure someone out there has looked into this issue in the past or has thought about it, it would be nice to walk out of your back door and climb your own antenna and jump off... It's kind of like hunting for me, walk out my back yard wak to the back 20 aches and climb my tree stand, it's easy and there's no risk because no one is going to harass you for hunting their land!

just move to europe, cheaper, and terminal cliffs.

or buy a plane