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I regret to inform that the most BADASS, PROLIFIC jumper in the goddamn world has died…….Gabe arrived late afternoon packed and met us after we had made 2 fights with the afternoon load being poor winds. He opted to camp with us for the evening and hike in the morning……. We spent the evening listening to stories from Gabe and his grand plans for the summer……he was excited about life, his kids, BASE, and his plans for the summer. We started hiking at 7 am and Gabe was STOKED about the jump. We geared up and neither of the other jumpers on the load checked his gear prior to exit (We did review on video and it looked good). The first Jumper exited and had a great flight, Gabe and I jumped next, he left first and I followed 1 second later. His exit looked good with him ending up a little head high. The following is opinion from video of my flight with Gabe and the other jumper watching the entire flight from the ground following his flight. After exit he really didn’t start flying his suit until 100ft over the trees at the end of the talus and the suit was not performing well, this was the start of a 30 sec flight maintaining this distance for the remainder of the flight, with not enough separation we assume he had a problem reaching his BOC. Ramrod impacted the way he lived his fucking life …………….FULL SPEED……..NOTHING OUT………….. We were the first to reach Gabe and found his Pilot chute was still inside the BOC after impact………….Ramrod was a legend around here and was well known around the world ………anyone that knew him will feel this for a long long time.
Gabe was in a Ghost WS with an Apex Summit container and a Blackjack. It was his second BASE WS fight. (the first was from the same exit). The jump on a V5 yields a 55 sec flight with a 500ft deployment. 240m rock drop, 950m total, 1.5km to the reservoir(landing area). Gabe WAS “the fucking guy!!!” I miss him already………………………………………………………………………….

Well written.

I'm sorry you lost your friend. May he rest in peace.

Thank you Cam. I am still coming to terms with so many things after being a part of this experience and reaching out to many of you that I have met over the last 15 years in this activity for support. Gabe was an exceptional spirit and can be seen in a video of mine a few years back at 8:20 min

https://www.youtube.com/...D-s&noredirect=1

He was a loving caring father who never stopped telling me how proud he was of his children and their exceptional meaning to his heart, shedding tears of absolute joy while talking about them Saturday night by the fire. He was “Gabe” to the end and whether you like it or hate it, want to judge it or love it, want to be critical of his processes or fall in line to certain chaos…he will have inspired so many people to do way more than they would have without his existence in their life…and that is ultimately the connectivity that inspires all of us.

Ultimately this forum is about bringing lessons forward and Gabe was a huge mentor to so many. If you are an experienced wingsuiter/mentor this is not intended for you, because it is already very clear to you what happened here without asking any questions. And it is not intended for the few of you who will turn this thread into stupidity with the grey areas of any discussion and then get up in each other’s grill for whatever reason that I will never understand. This thread is for the people who dream of flying wingsuits in the mountains one day and who are presently learning on that path, like myself, or want to be on that path in the near future and I want you to find that path …

A few things I have reflected on in the last 24 hours that may speak to you … or not … It is not all specific to the incident here, but important holes in what I have observed in a process for progress that yields safe performance.

1./ Find a process through a Mentor or Course(or both or as many as possible) that provides clear steps along the way to identify the (your) barriers both physical and emotional through each part of the journey, which includes the days leading up to a WS BASE jump(Preparation, Gear Choice, wing choice, required skill sets) then to the actual jump itself and hard deck decision making moments during the freefall/Canopy that you must achieve along the way to live through it.

Make sure that process is in line to manage your learning disabilities; I say that because we all have them and we all need to be taught in special ways as we were all brought up differently. If you are a rebel to the system, then find that Mentor who can speak to the rebel inside of you.

Ensure your life goals are in line with the jumping evolution process. If you want to live till your 90, then I am the perfect Mentor but you won’t be jumping a large wingsuit for 12 years and you will have to clear all sorts of milestones to grow into new suits and gear and then maybe you can jump them off a cliff, if you haven’t already got cancer. This is clearly unrealistic for today’s folk and I say it in tongue and cheek because who wants to wait 12 years to fly a big suit? But really, the process to learn to fly a wingsuit efficiently and quickly EXIST and you don’t have to wait 12 years taking my mentoring BUT you must want to invest the time and money and interest to learn and grow from available resources. Then take reasonable steps to transferring those skills to WS Base exits while using the network of amazing FRIENDS that you have built in the process of getting to that first WS Base Jump. No one speaks to this more than the people I have seen as Mentor’s in my Path (Spence, Jimmy, Douggs, Coopers, Cambone, Kozi, Dillon, Sean, Lori, Gabe to name just a few of those who inspired me to be better and take some chances too.)

2./ All I seem to hear in wingsuit convo’s these days(DZ, around the fire, online) is that Big suits are clearly better. They slow you down more and therefore they give you more time to react to problems … the list goes on. I am pretty sure that the manufacturers of Pheonix, Tony Suits, Squirrel, etc … make different size suits to allow you to accomplish an evolution of your skillsets from smaller to larger suits. I know that anyone can hop a cliff and do a modified jumping jack and achieve a smaller descent rate relative in size of suits but stalling is not flying. The larger the suit the more accentuated the stall and recovery. I will say from a sense of grief and discovering yesterday’s outcome, I feel like a Ghost and other suits like it are very challenging suits to learn to WS Base fly in especially with a real time constraint of a 6 second rock drop, the reach to the BOC is hard and around a lot of fabric. Please listen, read, talk to different people and determine the short term and long term goals around YOUR learning to fly wingsuits in the base environment and choose suit sizes that are in line with life goals. It cannot be done in a day, and sadly, I am barely achieving it after several years but I am very conservative and am constantly the butt of all progression jokes …lovingly of course.

3./ Approach your first many WS Base jumps with a few key parameters established before the jump. Essentially “Know when to hold them, Know when to fold them”. In the same video as the one linked before, the first jump on that video is the site we are discussing here and for the sake of argument a very similar flight I had a few years back. In this jump, I had a very specific altitude in my mind for when I pulled the pin and achieved some kind of life saving result before going too far(Jimmy has a better word for this. I was new to WS BASE and had to establish guidelines so I did not “Chase the dragon” thinking I could make things better.

I watched the whole flight yesterday and I am not going to speculate on the mindset because that would be a fool’s approach. But after the first 8-10 seconds the wingsuit was stalling past a decision point for a safe opening. The 20 or so seconds to follow had me pale and desperately hopeful for a miracle. There were no serious attitude changes to show me of a desperate reach around the fabric, but I did see what appeared to be an attempted pull at around the half way point - one quick hand to body but not successful through all the fabric that would be inflated. The following 10-15 seconds the jumper appeared to try to just fly maybe to a safer altitude for pulling??(Speculation and therefore moot). The bottom line is discuss with your jump buddies what parameters they set for themselves for Jumps “going” wrong or better yet … What does “wrong” even look like when you have never done it before? When beginning to learn to fly the hill or corner just after exit, you need to gather BASIC safety information first and then work on improving the performance. “ASK, ASK, ASK!!”

4./ Watching yesterday’s PRE-Jump video gave me a lot of personal insights into my feelings around the matter. I would encourage anyone during gear up to touch their PC several times as part of the gear up process. I think I touch my BOC like 20 times before each exit because I switch between my Phantom 3 and V4 and it is slightly different. It is a key reminder to your body to know how to work the suit especially with all the fabric specific to each suit. The Jumper yesterday in my rear facing camera did not do any practice touch’s in the 90 seconds I had run before the jump and with only 1 WS Base Jump and a few skyjumps on that suit prior, I found that to be something I wanted to mention to those people with whom that may resonate.

Anyway, my heart is utterly broken today … For so many reasons which include watching a close friend and fellow jumper feel the shock, pain, and loss at the time where it turns very real. Like I have read here so many times “I wish I had done more to guide” but I have accepted through the years that people have their own processes. Gabe would prob not even let me tie his shoes because the knot would be too nice and not angry enough looking for 3WA! And I will miss that banter that he shared specifically with me for my flamboyant personality and silly processes … and underneath that tough skin was a heart of gold and a guy that poked at me lovingly!

Kris

fuck!

That dude spent hours with me on top of a B. Before we got in the weather was crap but he wanted to get me my first B so bad that he wasted his whole night just for the chance. we ended up not jumping (he made the call first). still one of my best nights in BASE

And no one trying to stitch or litigate some one up yet? This is starting to be unfamiliar ground, where have all the "base jumpers" gone!

Good call sir! Hey, it's canada, they may tilt their heads sideways in a funny way when they talk and fart a lot, but apparantly, they still have some decency in them.

Sorry for the jumper and his friends and family, sounds like he was a great guy.

Thanks for taking the time to write this, it was really worth reading.

BSBD

Litigate? You've got the wrong country; you're thinking of the neighbour to the south...

Thanks to Cam & Kris for your write-ups/explanations of what happened. There are many things that have strongly resonated for me. I am so sorry about all of this and I hope you guys are holding up alright. This was a very unfortunate accident & a heart breaking situation to have gone through. We will all feel the pain of Gabe leaving us too soon as I believe Gabe holds a special place in many peoples’ hearts.

I have not been actively involved in the BASE jumping scene for a while but Gabe was certainly an integral part of my jumping. He was the one that believed in me and took me out and taught me how to jump, mentoring me and also just encouraging and supporting me throughout the journey. For all of Gabe’s wildness he was always conscientious of our safety, in this way we could go out and enjoy more jumping/adventures. Gabe taught me a lot, also setting an example of how to charge after life and live it to the fullest. Gabe was an inspiration to the people in his life and helped to lead us all to live up to our potential. More than that Gabe was a great and generous friend, always willing to help a guy out. We had a lot of good times together and I will miss him. I regret that we had somewhat lost touch over the last couple of years but our paths still crossed and I always enjoyed catching up with him and hearing of his latest adventures. I feel that as our paths diverge in life we can lose touch with those that were once so central to our lives and that is a little bit sad for me too. I just want you guys to know that I miss & love all my crazy BASE jumping friends and really want you all to play it safeish. I want to have the opportunity to run into my friends and catch up with all the latest and greatest…I have taken the time to think about this and I feel that I need to say the following:

If there is anything good to come of this incident I believe it will be for those that come behind and we will hopefully be able to take note of how some of the little things can add up and play a part in almost every accident. Sometimes we are lucky enough to survive our mistakes and I think that for me this can/has played a part in being overly confident in my own abilities. I learned a lesson when I jumped Ha Ling and my performance was not at all what I expected…barely making a 6 second delay due to a very poor exit and subsequent head down flight on the face of a very unforgiving chunk of rock. This was in a tracking suit and had I jumped that day in a wingsuit I would likely have been another thread in this forum. The funny thing is that even with my very limited skydive wingsuit experience the thought had crossed my mind and I had seriously considered doing just that. I had performed well on the few skydives I had, in both the tracksuit and the wingsuit, but as mentioned it was a very limited number. I bring this up because I think it is relevant to this incident. By this I do not mean the exit being relevant but a lack of (relevant) preparation/experience and an abundance of confidence/determination can be a disastrous combination. Please people, be aware of your limitations/lack of experience and if you have dreams to fulfill do so in a progressive manner that will give you much higher odds of survival in a sport that is clearly very unforgiving of mistakes. I feel that even 20-30 skydives in the particular wingsuit involved in this accident and it never would have occurred. We can watch our brothers/friends make amazing jumps and perhaps get away with some mistakes or taking shortcuts, therefore we can be lulled into a false sense of security that we too are ready & capable of the same. The description of this incident is haunting me, I cannot help but empathize with those final moments in Gabe’s flight. I believe Kris & Cam captured the essence of this incident and I believe that Gabe ended up in a terrible predicament. Not having the altitude available to deploy his parachute and perhaps struggling with the deployment. (I was not there and am only inferring the situation from what I have read above.) I may get put on the stake for my comments though my intent is not to ruffle any feathers. I just needed somewhere to say what I am feeling, this may not be the correct place but it may be the place that my words will give someone pause for some consideration of the stakes involved. As BASE jumpers we all know we can die BASE jumping but it doesn’t always really sink in past our own sense of immortality or imperviousness. Nothing I write is in any way to slight the memory of my friend & brother, I think that Gabe would like all of us to learn what we can from this. So if even one person reads this and it helps them to slow down, take your time, practice in a forgiving environment and live for the next jump. This is what my friend and mentor taught me.

Take care & safe jumps,
Ed.

solid posts sorry for your loss guys

I'm curious why the low number of skydives in the ghost? Was that his only wingsuit skydive experience? Was he primarily jumping a larger suit and switched to the smaller suit to start ws BASE? Sounds like he has been in the sport for quite some time with quite a lot of jumps and was well respected with a good head on his shoulders?

I started WS BASE in a ghost 3, but with 250-300 sky jumps in it. It's very easy to end up head high in it, especially if you are digging out from a bad start. It also does not retain energy well, and in my opinion, because of this should not be deliberately flown above terrain. (obviously that wasn't the case here, but thought I'd put that out there for any future jumpers considering the ghost)

Sorry for your loss, RIP.

Hi Nick,

It wud surprise me if he had acquired more than 20 WS skydives total and maybe someone from his home DZ has a more accurate number. I do know the first suit he ordered was the Rebel in which he tried once or twice and complained of a built in turn. I did jump it and another experienced jumper the same and it was good, but needed to be flown aggressively. It was explained to him that the turn is simply a characteristic of a stall and recovery. From there it was my understanding that he tried an R-Bird a few times and then maybe his ghost a handful of times tops from what he told me. He did mention at the campsite the night before that he was excited to be getting 2 minutes freefall in his ghost from 15K ft. To another jumper and myself it seemed a bit shy of expectation but I have no experience with a ghost as the suit characteristics do not interest me, so we just let it be.

Perhaps someone from his home DZ can share an idea of Total WS skydives and on what suits. I believe my guess of 20 cud be ignorant. I don't believe he had too much coaching on WS in general and I am unsure where he was acquiring his information from or what dive plans he was using to acquire Basic Safety Skills.

He had been in the activity a long time yes. I think Ed makes some great points above about progression and getting a decent amount of experience before WS base. Gabe was severely passionate about BASE and it was very Inspiring to many. He was a friend but he never asked me "any" questions about WS Base, this particular jump, or wingsuiting in general aside from the Rebel's manufactured turn, so I assumed he had a more relevant Mentor. I now believe I made a poor assumption.

I am an old Man with four kids so my processes are slow as far as progression and for that reason, along with availability, I am really not the guy people get excited to learn from. It took me 300 WS Skydives on a Prodigy 2, Phantom 2 and 3, and then finally a V4 to really get the feel for the right pitch to actually fly each of the suits. Along the way I dealt with different unusual scary situations the fabric cud deliver and a malfunction the same before I felt ready to try WS base in norway. I am hoping that people see the need for pretty extensive skydive experience before WS Base especially with such a short rock drop.

This jumper did not enjoy looking over the edge of the jump, it brought him anxiety, but the reality is that this is an emotional barrier that must be resolved if one is to fly a suit in the right angle of attack to get the flight requirements. You are goona need to love cliff face to get performance. I will say this right now and maybe I am wrong, but one can probably assume that on their first handful of WS Base jumps they are going to be head high and flying close to stall as the natural tendency is to not want to point your head at the ground that is below you, especially at 1000 feet. I do recommend people try 12-15 second delays off even higher exits to just get used to that feeling. Wud love to hear from really experienced Wingsuit Base folks their idea of the first few jumps and how they guide their people through those jumps. That wud be a nice way to complete this thread.

Kris

"I do know the first suit he ordered was the Rebel"...
Anyway, no experience wingsuiter, with medium size ws jumped at a wrong place for his first ws base jump.
Another fatality easily avoidable

He also had a super old Birdman suit before he ordered his large Tony suit. I don't know how many jumps he had on it, but I don't think it was very many. I was always asking him to bring it out to the DZ so I could jump with him, but it never happened.

I also did some 'test jumps' on his large Tony Suit (X2, I thought? maybe it was a Rebel). He had done a couple jumps on it and claimed it had a built in turn. The suit flew fine for me.

Attached is a picture of me wearing his Tony Suit, if that helps identify it.

Thank you Cam and Kris for your posts.

It is my hope that there are lessons that can be learnt here, especially for the local blossoming BASE crew in Alberta.

My approach to wingsuit BASE was similar to Kris. I did many wingsuit skydives on my Prodigy2 (mostly solos) before being comfortable taking it off a cliff. And I did so on big overhung cliffs in Europe.

I don't think this object is appropriate to do your first wingsuit BASE jumps.

While I didn't see eye to eye with Gabe on some things, I enjoyed his positive attitude and enthusiasm for life. I enjoyed chatting with him at the fire at Eden. Condolences to his family and his many friends. He will be missed.

One of the hardest things in BASE is to tell your friends they are not ready for something. I used to struggle a lot to not impede on anyone's freedom and felt awkward telling people I didn't think they could do something. Every time I would share my opinion for someone to be conservative they would do it anyway and it would always end up fine. Then my one friend who I helped on her first BASE jump and is now on the fatality list told me about her plan for her first wing suit jump. I told her it was a terrible idea and I had flown that particular spot and it was not beginner suitable. She impacted with nothing out on her very first wingsuit jump.

The beauty of this sport is we all get to make decisions on our own. One of the biggest problems in our community is that nobody listens to anyone. Words are meaningless. The very people I've watched do fjc's at the bridge say "yeah I'm just excited to go slow and steady" end up in the valley 6 months later next to me in auras flying near stall speed.

The thing is this sport is fucking easy until it goes wrong. Going to Brento or Lauterbrunnen eliminates having to think for yourself. People feel safe in numbers.

But what do I know listen to the guys with years and years of experience.

Definitely not a Rebel. Looks more like an X2

Ehhh..... Looks like a rebel to me. Look how long those grippers are.
The X2 grippers are only 1" longer than x1.
Those grippers are a lot longer than any X1 / X2 I've ever flown,
and I'm at tonysuits every couple of weeks.

I guess you need to visit Tony more often ;-)

http://www.tonywingsuits.com/xbird2.html

http://www.tonywingsuits.com/rebel.html

Na, i actually own the suits, not just pictures on a website.
But thanks.

It was embroidered as a rebel.

Not sure why it matters. Wasn't the suit he was wearing. Andrew was just posting a pic for general info.

+1
So true, Mitch.

I had sushi with Gabe after his first jump there at Ha ling.
He told me he had trouble getting to the PC with this setup.
We laughed and shrugged it off.. We are invincible right??

He then told me a week later the same thing and that he was going to exit head high and then get up some speed to fly the WS.

I have under 100 WS jumps, but that seemed to be a wrong approach from what all of my experienced WS Base brothers had taught me..

Being a junior jumper I kept my mouth shut and said nothing to him about it.. After all, Gabe taught ME how to Base Jump.. Who am I to say anything to my Mentor?

The point I'm trying to make is this..
DONT LET YOUR FRIENDS MAKE STUPID DECISIONS..
Sometimes we need that peer to help keep us grounded, and alive..
The more jumps we do. the more cocky we get it seems.
We forget how dangerous our decisions can be.
We take for granted the lack of experience we ALL have in this sport.
I should have told him to reel it in and maybe do more jumps from the trike or rock some ballon jumps or whatever.
I was suppsed to do my first tracksuit jump with him that day but i found an excuse not to go because i felt i wasn't ready..

Yes there was no way of telling Gabe to stop doing something. But the odd time you can get through to people. If you say nothing you'll regret it..
I do.

I knew him 25 years. Ill miss that crazy bastard.
He was my longest friend.