Basejumper.com - archive

I'll try and be concise but there's a bit to explain and points of view to be presented so without further ado.

From the get go, let's establish a couple of things. The following discussion doesn't matter. It's not important. Who cares? What does it matter what other's think? etc etc etc

But we can still discuss it right? So now we've got that out in the open, and to reiterate -this is just a fun discussion and when all is said and done, it doesn't matter a shit - let's get straight to the issue.

Many jumpers log their jumps. Some don't, and that's cool, but many do. Likewise, some jumpers, myself included, log the different objects they have jumped. Again, if you don't, that's cool, but i suspect many jumpers do.

At the moment there is a UK crane event taking place in the North of England . A very large mobile crane with a telescopic boom has been hired. The boom, which extends to over 300ft AGL hoists a cage up to the top which we then jump from; landing on a nice sandy beach in front of a fairly appreciative crowd.

After the first days jumping over some beers at the bar, a few of us were talking shit and we ended up discussing the different objects we have jumped. I was saying how it's nice to be participating in the event and to jump new and different objects and Dan the Man (my erstwhile regular jump buddy) stops me and corrects me. It transpires that the this large mobile crane is the exact same crane used for a different event almost ten years prior and several hundred miles distant in the south of England, when we participated in a BASE boogie jumping into a large, privately-owned open field. Furthermore, this exact same crane was also used a year earlier for the very first UK legal BASE event which was a bunch of us jumping and landing on a roped-off miniature golf course surrounded by trees and thousands of onlookers. His opinion: what I was logging as 3 different objects should in reality be logged as the same object and the idiosyncrasies of those jumps were a matter for my jump logbook.

Which of course immediately opened up a heated (but friendly) debate about the semantics of what constitutes a "new", "different", "unique" object. Dan feels that since this is the same mobile crane, irrespective of the location and situation you park it in, it is still physically, the same object. Of course, in that one key aspect, he's right. But to me, that felt like a dogmatic and literal view. I feel that factors like, the location, the physical GPS co-ordinates, the landing area, the hazards, the outs, the altitude, the pressure of a crowd watching, all contribute to what i perceive to be an entirely different experience and thus intuitively i feel it is a new object. Since it was only knowledge or ignorance of whether it was physically the same crane that differentiated between the two schools of thought, it seemed to me that other factors must therefore be given greater weighting.

Now for some reading, who haven't already defaulted to the "who cares" position and who maybe, like me, enjoy a good old-fashioned toe-to-toe mental/logical joust, they may already have instantly chosen a side. But here's just a few things to consider.

1. If you have jumped many static tower cranes attached to buildings within the same city or district, there is a very strong possibility you have jumped the same crane, albeit in very varied circumstances and locations. These tower cranes are supplied by a very small number of contractors and are, of course erected, used, then taken down and then moved and re-erected elsewhere. If it transpired that someone could prove, by obtaining the contract details and serial numbers, that several of your jumps from these, were in fact from the same jib part of the crane, would you strike them off your logged object list as a 'unique' object. This is the logical terminus if you agree in principle with the Dan school of thought.

2. My contention that 'a different' object surely ought to be defined by the overall 'difference' in contributory factors was countered by the argument (which i agree with btw) that you can jump the same BASE object from different exit points, from different altitudes, facing different directions, and land in different areas but it would indeed be the same object regardless. Most jumpers would agree that whether you static line from a sketchy balcony from 170ft directly over a busy street landing in the middle a plaza, or take a running exit from the roof, slider up with a long delay and land in a big field on the opposite side, if it's the same building, it's the same building no matter how different the jumping experience might have been. A different exit point and thus jumping experience does not mean a different object. As such these 'experiential' factors are irrelevant and should not be considered.

3. Ironically in a hypothetical scenario, if the mobile crane we were using for this event happened to develop a technical fault with the winch and the crane company rallied their resources and brought in an identical twin crane to replace it, I would not feel it was right to log this as a separate and new object (due to the experience being an identical one before the fault developed) whereas Dan, according to his criteria would log it as a new object....because technically it is.

Anyway, you get the picture now and there are numerous hypotheticals we can throw in to the debate, reductio ad absurdum. So I am genuinely interested to hear from all points of view on this and see what you guys think, particularly those of you who do keep a log of your 'different' objects. Where do you stand on this?

How would you, given the task, try to define 'different object' in order to avoid ambiguity?

For those who think it's not worth even contemplating or debating, then please feel free to not contemplate and not debate it and go about your day.

And remember folks....this really doesn't matter.

3 different objects.

In my view, the new object distinction is as much a function of where you're landing as where you're leaving.

*Edited to add: This isn't to say that jumping an identical spot and landing somewhere new (e.g. a WS jump) is ALWAYS a "new exit." I'm just saying that the landing is equal in importance in determining if the jump is a new object.

Brento, land at heli pad and; Brento, land a main LZ = Same object.

However,

Jumping a crane off the jib one night and counter jib the next, and landing in two totally different spots...I think deserves consideration for 2 unique objects.

If i bang your mom from behind and then flip her around. Is that like two different people?

You see, that's what's so interesting. Everyone has a different intuition about these distinctions. You see in your example above, even though the two jumps you describe would be entirely different experiences, that would still constitute the same object in my book. Two exit points from the same object.

We have a 650ft power tower over here. It can be jumped as a s/l from around 120ft to a south facing landing area with low level power lines and trees to contend with. It can be freefallen from about 220ft to the same lz, it can be freefallen slider off from 375ft to the east or west with large open landing areas or a uneven rocky "boulder" field, freefallen slider up from 650ft to the east or west or even through the wires to the south or to the north over water. In essence there are at least 8 exits points with 4 entirely unique landing areas, requiring numerous variations on gear configuration, depending on which jump you choose. But i'm firmly in the Dan camp here: it's one unique object.

Just two exit points surely!

All different objects of the same type. Take TV masts for instance; many are of essentially the same design, but the landing hazards / location / security may all be different. Similarly, how would anyone know whether the crane they'd just accessed on a building site had been jumped by themselves before at a different location?

But it's an interesting point. Take the famous cliffs nr Lysebotn. I've counted Kjerag/Smellveggen as separate objects as they are different cliffs and have different LZs, but not the individual exits of each (so Exit 4,5,6 all the same). Although when you further around the corner, there might be an argument...

Glad it went well up North!

Richard

That's really the spirit of my position on the topic. If it's a materially different experience, it's a materially different object.

Another example: The steel under a bridge is a different object than the bridge itself.

If BASE jumping is all about the experiences, then by logging my jumps I'm really logging my experiences. If the experience is different, I log it as such.

If BASE were about stats and records then maybe we'd need to standardize a bit more. I'm glad it's not.

this is actually a great discussion. and like you said, it doesn't matter much, but brings up another great point. if you are talking with another jumper who logs and are comparing stats, it is imperative to know how they log as it will put different implications of the weight of their individual stats in comparison with how you log yourself.

IMO, i log objects like Dan, exactly as the word object would describe it. i then change sub categories like exit points (or LZs) in the description as a different experience.

at the end of the day, no one really cares, it's just how you're writing it down, if you even do. but i love stats, and am a spreadsheet geek.

Well, there's no question that raw cold stats are no substitute for the fleshed out stories behind them. To tell you i did four jumps from the hotel Bali in Benidorm doesn't really enlighten you as to how literally life-alteringly different my experience was between jump 3 and jump 4.

But these kind of stats do play a part in BASE whether we care to admit it or not. Rightly or wrongly, if you are organising an event and are picking suitable jumpers for this event - jumpers you feel will handle the pressure of the event and have experience jumping the type of object you have been given access to - stats start to become a crucial tool.

Two applications from two jumpers, the first with 1000 BASE jumps against the seconds 100 BASE jumps tells us only that the former appears to be the more suitable candidate with the limited information we have. To discover that the former has jumped nearly all his jumps from the same 3000ft cliff whilst the latter has a variety of 40 urban objects suddenly (for me anyway) alters the picture. We still don't have any idea of the quality of either jumper but now the latter is looking perhaps the more attractive candidate if the event is from a 250ft building.

So if we agree that statistics, whilst not the be-all and end-all, do still have a use or at the very least can be interesting and enlightening then it follows that without broad agreement on semantics and definitions there can be no statistics. There is zero value in the statistic that someone claims to have 200 jumps from buildings if they define a bridge as a building ("well someone built it didn't they?"). Does it matter to jumpers the world over if someone is deluding themselves and claiming to be a BASE jumper if they're leaping off a 2-story roof into a swimming pool holding a sheet over their heads? Nope. But without us defining the parameters of what it is to be a BASE jumper then we have no common language or understanding of each other.

My friend, you are over complicating something that really is not complicated.
I jump something, land, look back at the object; if it's the first time I've jumped it then into the log book it goes as a new object.
If I look back and I've jumped it before then it doesn't make it in-simples!
It's not about height, location, lz, hazards, access or anything else you can think of-it's about the object itself. You can put that crane on the moon! It's still the same crane.
Non Rerum Inpediunt...

Simples but entirely arbitrary and whimsical according to your criteria. You know as well as i do that when you land and look back at that tower crane on the side of that building under construction you've just jumped from that there is an incredibly high probability (having jumped probably a hundred of them in and around London over the years like you have) that it is the same crane you have jumped before. You're not dumb. You know that. But you brush aside that possibility and intentionally opt to remain ignorant, because it seems a petty distinction to make when considering all the other factors that constitute that jump as a whole. You land and think "never landed here before, never jumped next to that building before, never had those visuals before, never even been to this part of town before, it certainly feels like a brand new jump to me...let's log it as object number blah blah" but you know looking back at that big blue crane, it looks very much like the big blue crane you jumped last year when the exact same company were building X or Y. But you think "fuck it" ignorance is bliss and it seems hardly relevant: log it as new.

In short if it was truly all about the physical object, you'd take a moment when on top of it to identify if it really is the same jib! Wouldn't be too difficult would it? They must have serial numbers or unique identifying marks. But you don't worry about it because you're not the BASE jumping equivalent of a trainspotter. You understand it's about the whole and not about a serial number.

And if you do manage to jump that moon crane and once you've had a good look for a serial number to ensure it can go in the log book as a new object, remember to take a fatter delay! Gravity isn't as strong up there!

Even more simples!

I feel that the fact that someone had to pack up the crane, move it to another location, and set it up should be enough to make it count as a different object.

If a building is torn down and re-built using the same materials at a completely different place, it should be considered a different object right?

Point 1. - Since it's taken down and re-erected repeatedly, it should be different objects.

Point 2. - Same objects, different exits. As the building doesn't change physically between jumps, it counts as the same object.

Point 3. - Technically it's different objects, but maybe leave a note that it's nearly identical to the previous crane? More of semantics and personal choice.

I'm not a BASE jumper though so what do I know...

The vast majority of times, there is no ambiguity so this issue hardly ever raises its head. But there are special occasions when you're stopped in your tracks and have to think about it...which is the spirit of how this thread should be read: a discussion of exceptional circumstances.

Only yesterday i heard on the radio that 20 Fenchurch Street in the city of London known locally as 'The Walkie Talkie' had been voted Carbuncle of the year by British Architects. It just so happened that i haven't jumped the Walkie Talkie but i have jumped 20 Fenchurch Street! You see i jumped the building that was on that site before they tore it down and then built the Walkie Talkie in the exact same spot. I know Dan has jumped both iterations.

If a jumper's criterion was a simple one and they went purely on 'different GPS co-ordinates' then these two buildings would have to be logged as one, which to me, would be crazy. This highlights how a definition has to be a combination of factors and criteria rather than simply one blanket 'rule'.

Similarly, there are a few cases i can think of (but are still jumpable so i'll refrain from site naming) where buildings have been so drastically and extensively refurbished that even according to Dan's singular criterion he would have been exiting from materially (architecturally) different objects. One of these is a building (or rather buildings) that are now annexed wings but were built in different decades. Both wings have been jumped from two entirely separate rooftops. One object or two?

And don't even get me started on scaffolding!

I log:

1) Date/Time
2) Location (Country/city)
3) Object (BASEo)
4) Exit (point)
5) LZ (main or alternate or whatever)

So even if the object is the same, You can look back and see it was a different jump.

It's not really an issue though is it, because it's your logbook not anyone else.

It's a mildly interesting thing to think about but at the end of the day there's no right answer only opinions - and you're sure as hell not going to change DTM's mind and I don't think he's going to change yours! So it's kinda like discussing politics, except that the outcome either way will have zero effect on anybody but you!

Tombstone has several exits next to it but it's all the same 'cliff'. Different object?