Sports / Basejumping

BASEjumping is jumping off fixed objects with a parachute. ‘Wingsuit BASEjumping’ is jumping from a fixed object (usually a cliff) with a wingsuit and a parachute.

The sport is often misreported by the media and is subsequently misunderstood by many people.

Hopefully the information on this page and that contained in the linked pages will help to set the story straight - that is - BASEjumping is a beautiful sport that can be dangerous, but is mostly challenging, rewarding and transformative. It can take you to the most outrageously, beautiful places, and give you a perspective few people will ever have the opportunity to see. When pushed it can be brutal, but more often it is magical.

History of BASE

Using parachutes to descend from fixed objects is a pastime that evidence suggests, has been practiced, though infrequently, for at least the last 900 years. Unlike most leaps that were practiced in the 12th century, today’s BASEjumps emphasise launching without a previously inflated canopy. So, nearly anything that stands immobile and vertical or overhung could be considered jumpable. From the late 1700s through the 19th century, the advent of manned balloons drew the development of parachuting largely away from fixed objects to jumping from aircraft. It was not until the 20th century that fixed-object jumping slowly began to pick up momentum again as an extension of sport parachuting from aircraft.

The early 1900s saw the odd bridge jump and one stuntman made a successful static line jump from the Statue of Liberty. The military’s closest involvement to fixed-object jumping was represented by its parachute training towers, built shortly before World War II. Otherwise, parachuting from fixed objects has had only civilian and sport applications.

By the 1960s sport parachuting from aircraft had developed to the point that experienced skydivers began to more seriously consider trying their wings from non-flying objects. At the increased frequency of about one per year, people made calculated leaps from cliffs in the Italian Dolomites, El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, oil well derricks, and still the odd bridge.

The first jump from El Capitan was made in 1966 by Mike Pelkey and Brian Schubert. We are fortunate to have Mike’s account which is as follows:

“Brian Schubert and I were the first to initiate the El Capitan in 1966. The newspapers all made it sound as though we were a couple of idiots who flung ourselves off a mountaintop because we didn’t know any better. We had a lot in common, but I don’t think we were idiots. We were both 26 years old at the time. We were both “C” license holders at the time issued by the PCA (Parachute Club of America, since renamed the USPA). We lived in Barstow, California and made our first jump together at Elsinore in March of 1966. We were both grounded for 30 days for opening below 1,000 feet on that jump.

The idea for the jump was neither mine nor Brian’s. Another skydiver I worked with at the time mentioned the idea to me. He was not able to make it with us however. When I asked Brian if he would like to do something that had never been done before he was all for it. We studied every little scrap of information we could find on the El Capitan for the next 30 days or so before we made the trip to Yosemite to make the jump. The El Capitan was my 184th logged jump.

There were three of us on the long, tiring 8 1/2 hour climb to the top. We started early in the morning of the 24th and didn’t make it to the top to jump until about 5:30 in the afternoon. A friend, Jim Cleary, made the trek to the top with us to take pictures. Please note that he was NOT a photographer by any stretch of the imagination. He just went along with us to partake in the adventure.

The jump, needless to say was absolutely awesome. We knew we had enough altitude for about ten seconds of freefall (according to legal PCA rules) and stretched that out maybe a couple more seconds. We were both jumping 28′ round military parachutes modified in a TU configuration. The Paracommander had been around for a couple of years but neither of us had one.

Contrary to the newspaper reports, we were NOT “repeatedly bashed against the face of the mountain”. There certainly was no cliff strike in the freefall part of the jump. I had a bit of trouble after opening trying to maneuver in the erratic winds and made a poor decision at one point to turn toward the face and kick myself away. That decision cost me a fractured ankle that I knew I would have to somehow land on on the rocks below. Brian had worse problems. He encountered winds that actually collapsed his canopy the last 50′ or so of his descent. His injuries were considerably more extensive than mine. He suffered some broken bones in his feet. In retrospect we probably should have waited until the ram-air type parachutes were invented :)

The park rangers did not welcome us to terra firma with open arms. They confiscated our gear and camera and didn’t allow us to leave the park for several days so they could research the regulations to try to find a law they could charge us with. At that time they were not able to find anything prohibiting us from jumping from their mountaintops and returned our gear and camera.

The FAA grounded us for a full year and sent a letter to all of the local drop zones instructing them to “notify us and/or the local sheriff’s department if either of these jumpers show up at your drop zone requesting to make a parachute jump”. Fortunately we knew someone who didn’t subscribe to the FAA’s position and was happy to have us jump at his DZ as long as we had some log books with phony names.

Life Magazine decided not to do the story when they saw the quality of the pictures. The editor told me that “Life is essentially a picture magazine” and the pictures were not good enough to print.

Brian and I lost contact less than a year or so after the El Capitan jump. He and I were the best of friends at the time, but he went off to the police academy and I moved away from the area. He was the best man at my wedding and we named our son after him. My son Brian is now 26. Brian’s daughter Tina discovered the articles on base jumping that mentioned our 1966 jump and took it on herself to locate me. In the process she met Marah Amberlyn Strauch, a young filmmaker doing a movie on base jumping called “Gravity”. Marah had already interviewed Brian in Hollywood when I responded to Tina’s letter. I met Jean Boenish at Marah’s place in Hollywood. She presented me with a certificate, El Cap 2 (Brian went off two or three seconds ahead of me), signed by Carl before his death. Brian and I had a great reunion after more than 37 years. We all plan to make a trip to Yosemite for a weekend in August and to attend the Bridge Day event together in September. Jason Bell has asked us to speak to the crowd of about 450 base jumpers at the event. We’re looking forward to it”.

Finally, in the next decade, BASE jumping began blossoming into a sport in its own right. In 1970, parachutist Don Boyles, using a standard military surplus B-4 container and 28-foot military surplus round canopy, successfully jumped and free-fell from the 1,053-foot-high Royal Gorge Bridge in Colorado. Then, the following two years, Rick Sylvester made three more jumps from El Capitan, this time by skiing off with a triangular-shaped Thunderbow canopy. Sylvester was an expert skier and novice skydiver who would, in 1976, repeat the stunt for a James Bond movie, this time with a round canopy from 3,600-foot Mt. Asgard on Baffin Island in Canada. Though newer, better performing square-style parachutes were being developed at the time, in 1975, Owen Quinn made a highly publicised jump from the 110-story New York World Trade Center using a round canopy. But it was really the El Capitan ski jumps that proved to be an important catalyst in the popularisation of fixed-object jumping a few years later. By 1977, a small group of very experienced skydivers (some of whom were also expert hang glider pilots) had realised that with the new, modern, high-glide-ratio square canopies, the overhanging El Capitan could be repeatedly jumped with consistency in reaching the meadow landing area instead of landing in the rocks or trees directly below. These jumpers made plans to jump El Capitan the following year. The time was finally right for the concept of powerless self-flight to break away from aircraft launches and return to its pure roots of using objects for altitude, as had been done until the 18th century.

On August 18, 1978, after putting a year of thoughtful research into the concept, Carl Boenish and three other expert skydivers made the first modern leaps from El Capitan, and popular BASE jumping was born. The jumpers used their regular aircraft skydiving gear: a state-of-the-art piggyback dual container system with a round reserve and a square main, tape-well or three-ring riser quick-releases, leg straps with B-12 snaps or thread-through closures, and standard 36-inch pocket-stowed pull-out pilot chutes. Unfortunately, El Capitan is located in Yosemite National Park, where an administrative regulation was in effect which called for a ‘responsible sanctioning organisation’ for the activity, and this requirement unexpectedly proved to be a major bureaucratic hurdle to cliff jumping there for years to come. When initially contacted by the National Park Service, the United States Parachute Association neither had knowledge of the activity nor could sanction it due the fact that cliff jumps originated below the minimum opening altitude of the USPA’s Basic Safety Regulations, so they refused to become involved. Bureaucracies being generally unable to deal with the individual, the Park administrators consequently decided to take a stand against cliff jumping activities in their jurisdiction and began arresting and citing jumpers with violations of two ostensibly applicable sections of the CODE OF FEDERAL REGULATIONS, title 36: 2.2 Air delivery, and 2.36 Powerless flight. The precedent was set, and the National Park Service became an unexpected source of ill-founded legal problems for cliff jumpers in Yosemite and everywhere else in the National Park system. Nevertheless, the movie film and still-photograph coverage of the recent pioneering jumps was shared throughout the general skydiving community and created a wave of jumper enthusiasm that swept over the Park as of the following May. Legal difficulties notwithstanding, over 50 more jumps were made by almost as many different jumpers by the end of 1979. The jumpers shared the necessary technical information by word of mouth, though dissemination was far from comprehensive, El Capitan is a very forgiving jump site and skydivers were able to get enough basic information to make the leap safely. As the rate of jumping increased, it was apparent that both skydivers and spectators loved and were inspired by cliff jumping and that it was bound to continue. So Yosemite chief chief ranger Bill Wendt made a sincere attempt to help cliff jumpers get organized sufficiently according to regulations for permits to be issued for the activity.  In early 1980, the USPA decided it could be involved after all. Cliff jumpers united in a cooperative effort with the Park officials, and permits for jumping from El Capitan were first issued by the National Park Service on July 1, 1980. Over the next nine weeks, 372 jumps were made from El Capitan. However, a few major wrinkles had yet to be ironed out in the overseeing of the activity: some unnecessary accidents and damage resulted from insufficient preparatory and technical information being available to the burgeoning number of jumpers and from the inflexibility of a few NPS- imposed jumping restrictions; the entire burden of administering the activity was unreasonably cast upon the Park officials since there was no other organisation in existence at the time for fixed-object jumpers.  The USPA claimed inability to help administer the activity in any way. Thus, the method that had been set up for authorized administration of cliff jumping quickly proved infeasible, and permits again became unavailable after September 9, 1980. In stopping the issue of permits, NPS officials failed to discern that cliff jumping should have been allowed once again after a sufficient period had passed for making organisational and regulatory changes; otherwise, cliff jumping would not stop but only be driven underground and away from acceptable safety measures, which it was at Yosemite. But progress and development of the sport did not stop; cliff jumping did continue, there and elsewhere, and the focus turned to perfecting techniques and discovering other types of fixed objects that could be jumped from.

Expansion

1979 and 1980 were the pioneering years of fixed-object jumping. It was a period of great excitement during which an ever-increasing number of skydivers began to expand their abilities beyond the use of aircraft. A complete foundation was laid for the future development of fixed-object jumping in which movie and photographic coverage played an invaluable role. In August 1979, four more jumps were made form the Royal Gorge Bridge in Colorado. One of the participants, Carl Boenish, was responsible for having organized, filmed, and taken part in the previous year’s historic jumps from El Capitan, and he was destined to take part in, and film nearly every major fixed-object jumping development until his death on July 7, 1984. On this trip to the Royal Gorge, all of the jumpers were using equipment similar to the state-of-the-art equipment used at El Capitan. However, due to the lower altitude-1,053 feet agl- and the tighter landing area, two of the jumpers decided to try a pilot chute assist. This worked very well in contrast to the jumpers who free fell from the bridge. After this experience, one of the jumpers suggested accelerating the square canopy openings by defeating the slider. Not quite a year later, this method had been tried, proven, and accepted as the primary equipment alteration. In 1980, some direct experimentation was done with airspeed on exit. Fixed-object jumpers theorised that a build-up momentum could aid both stability on launch and better clearance from the object, much as the acceleration of previous sky jumps had carried the jumper off the edge and away in a condition more closely related to familiar aircraft skydiving.

Today BASEjumping is a well established sport all around the world. The sport has dedicated gear manufacturers, organised international competitions and regular major events. These include annual festivals from buildings in China and Malaysia and Bridges in the USA. The ‘Go Fast’ Games at Royal Gorge Bridge in Colorado attracts over 200,000 spectators every year. There are also all-year-round legal jump sites such as the 500ft Perrine Bridge in Twin Falls Idaho (where more than 10,000 jumps are made each year), over 70 cliffs in Moab Utah, cliffs in Italy, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland to mention a few.

Why Would You?

The two most common questions regarding BASEjumping in Australia are WHY (would you want to jump off a cliff?) and IS IT LEGAL?

The second question is the easiest to answer, but is still largely misunderstood by the media who generally report BASEjumping ‘as an illegal sport’. This is not correct. To understand BASEjumping and its status you need to know something of its history.

In Australia it is legal to BASEjump in Queensland National Parks, but not in NSW National Parks (without a permit). Other objects can be jumped if you obtain permission. There have been sanctioned BASEjumps made from the Sydney Harbour Bridge, the Rialto Building in Melbourne and high cranes at various major events like the Australian Motorcycle Grand Priz.

When compared with other ‘extreme’ sports BASEjumping’s safety record is comparable or better than activities such as rock climbing and canyoning that are permitted in National Parks, yet it has far less environmental impact. When subjected to rational scrutiny, the ban in NSW National Parks is not logical and it could be argued that it contributes to, rather than lessens accidents because while the activity is illegal it cannot be regulated like other sports.

The answer to ‘Why‘ BASEjump is complex and varies with each participant. BASEjumping is not randomly throwing oneself off a cliff, building, bridge or antenna. Essentially BASEjumping is an exciting sport that challenges you to perform at your best. The majority of participants are dedicated athletes. To BASEjump well requires a minimum of 200 skydives, disciplined judgement; fine motor skills, expert canopy control and mental and physical acuity. The price of failure can be high, but the payoff for success is commensurate with the risk. The level of physical and mental control required to jump well contributes to unshakeable self-confidence, which translates to greater happiness and effectiveness in everyday life.

There is little doubt some jumpers like the ‘outlaw’ tag and would make illegal jumps even when there are legal alternatives, but these people are increasingly in the minority. It is unfortunate that they and BASEjumping accidents attract a disproportion of media attention (for example the death of a prominent BASEjumper produced a rush of media requests for interviews - 17 on radio in Sydney alone, whereas a spectacular World Record and world first for women illicited no unsolicited requests from radio). As the sport continues to develop in sophistication so does the level of training, skill and dedication of the participants. There are legal sites in all other countries where the sport is regularly practiced. Most Australian BASEjumpers would welcome the responsible regulation needed to open safe legal sites in NSW National Parks. They are athletes not outlaws.

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