Death of a Base-jumper

BASE-jumping has nothing to do with jumping to base. They all come down eventually anyhow. The apronym BASE is short for building-antenna-span (bridge)-earth and gives the list of objects jumpers jump from, not where they land. (And an apronym is an acronym that forms a previously existing word.) The time to open the parachute is extremely short and the sport is therefore considered far more dangerous than parachuting from a plane or sky-diving.

BASE-jumping evolved out of sky-diving, but due to the lower height of the starting point for BASE-jumping the jumper never reaches terminal velocity. Higher airspeed allows better body control as well as faster opening of parachutes. The short time span allotted to the BASE-jumper makes the sport more risky than jumps from higher up.

The first base-jump was recorded in 1912 in New York from the Statue of Liberty, but the name was given to the sport was invented in 1981. 1912 is also the date of the first death, when tailor Franz Reichelt tested his newest invention, the coat parachute. There are two further jumps on record for 1913 after which a 50 year interval occurred. In 1965 the first jump after the interval was executed in the Dolomite Mountains in Italy.

BASE-jumping gained a wider audience and world view in 1976 when the opening sequence of the James Bond movie “The Spy Who Loved Me” showed a jump from Mount Asgard in Canada.

While some countries have forbidden BASE-jumping, others allow it upon review of a submission for permission, and some such as Switzerland, France, Italy, and Norway allow it from well-known and clearly defined rock formations. The stunt in Zurich which led to the death of the jumper was a permitted jump.

One of the world’s most famous jumping sites is in the Lauterbrunnen-Valley in Switzerland which has developed as one of the main jumping sites in the world. On the flip side, the deaths reported from jumps in that region are also the world’s highest. Until April 2009, 133 deaths from BASE-jumping activities had been recorded, of which 19 (or over 15 percent) in Lauterbrunnen-Valley.

Ueli Gegenschatz was reckoned one of the leading BASE-jumpers in the world with over 1,500 jumps to his credit. In an interview prior to the Zurich stunt he said that the risk of BASE-jumping was calculated and in no way suicidal. He might gain entry into the next edition of Famous Last Words. According to eye-witnesses he was knocked unconscious by the fall but regained consciousness still on site. His first reaction was an apology for a bungled jump.

The jump from the 88 meter (270 ft.) high Sunrise building was the start for a publicity campaign for Red Bull Mobile. Red Bull’s classical advertising slogan in German is “Red Bull makes you grow wings.” Red Bull and Sunrise have cancelled the publicity campaign immediately following the accident.

Gegenschatz died on Friday from the injuries he sustained during the incident.