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Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

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Re: Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

#91

Post by lr »

delhanty wrote: post #69

Six hours late on this thread and I can't see anyone calling out GoPro and friends: >Five days earlier, the GoPro star Uli Emanuele, 29, died when he crashed in the Dolomites of his native country, Italy. Freedom for these people (mostly young men) to die is one thing. But part of GoPro's profits are knowingly built up by a quasi-suicide cult. That's not that different from dealing heroin.

You have to wonder, how many of them would be doing this (or any other "crazy" thing) if there were no cameras, no YouTube, Facebook, or Instagram Live, etc.?

Re: Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

#92

Post by mcv »

PoachedSausage wrote: post #78
eternalcode wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it not banned?

How would you enforce a ban on people jumping off tall objects? The Antenna part of BASE must be getting harder to achieve. When I worked in the radio and TV broadcast industry we had problems with BASE jumpers climbing masts at remote unmanned sites, but physical security is always being improved. Also, you wouldn't want to try climbing onto a live high power mast radiator, you would be vaporized.

A ban might not stop people from jumping, but it would certainly underscore that this is dangerous. I don't think there's any commercial BASE jumping, but if there is/was, a ban would definitely stop that.

Re: Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

#93

Post by Spooky23 »

sundvor wrote: post #79
base698 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is in the land of the free. It's generally not banned in Europe, so most BASE jumpers who are active spend at least a few weeks a year there. About 10 to 20 die world wide in about a population of 1000 or so active jumpers. It can be done relatively safely but the group isn't big enough to regulate effectively and most BASE jumpers are hostile to anyone mentioning the idea.

How many would die of other causes, such as .. car crashes.

Probably a much smaller numbers. Cars are engineered to protect all but the most reckless and negligent from death.

Re: Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

#94

Post by kbart »

j_s wrote: post #90
cpncrunch wrote: post #29

Proximity flying is just inherently dangerous. Even with power, many people have died. Sparky Imeson, who wrote the "bible" of mountain flying, died from flying too close to terrain. The strange thing is that he was actually flying back to somewhere that he had had an accident in the past (the first time he just got seriously injured, the second time he died). If you look at the accident location, there is a valley a…

> There's gotta be safer ways to get an adrenaline rush. I was suprised to see no mention of VR as a potential alternative anywhere in the thread. I suppose realism still has a long way to go!

I doubt VR will ever replace dangerous sports. You get adrenaline rush precisely for the fact that you realize it's dangerous with a real potential of getting killed or wounded and the fact that you get away with it. Sitting in an armchair with no such potential consequences might get you some thrills but it's nowhere close to the real adrenaline rush. I don't actively pursuit this feeling, but driving motorcycle regularly had put me in several close calls over the years giving an adrenaline rush I realize can not be replicated in the safer environments.

Re: Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

#95

Post by Havoc »

Well yeah. That's kind like saying more people are dying from Russian roulette...while Russian roulette is experiencing a surge in popularity.

Do something stupidly dangerous enough & in large numbers and you get rows of bodybags.

Sounds callous but that is the reality of it.

Re: Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

#96

Post by JshWright »

lr wrote: post #91
delhanty wrote: post #69

Six hours late on this thread and I can't see anyone calling out GoPro and friends: >Five days earlier, the GoPro star Uli Emanuele, 29, died when he crashed in the Dolomites of his native country, Italy. Freedom for these people (mostly young men) to die is one thing. But part of GoPro's profits are knowingly built up by a quasi-suicide cult. That's not that different from dealing heroin.

You have to wonder, how many of them would be doing this (or any other "crazy" thing) if there were no cameras, no YouTube, Facebook, or Instagram Live, etc.?

I don't know how many people are doing it for the "internet fame" (my gut instinct is that it's a small percentage), but I'm sure there are many people who got into the sport in the first place because they watched it on the internet.

Re: Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

#97

Post by pipio21 »

delhanty wrote: post #69

Six hours late on this thread and I can't see anyone calling out GoPro and friends: >Five days earlier, the GoPro star Uli Emanuele, 29, died when he crashed in the Dolomites of his native country, Italy. Freedom for these people (mostly young men) to die is one thing. But part of GoPro's profits are knowingly built up by a quasi-suicide cult. That's not that different from dealing heroin.

Lots of differences with heroin.

I have been volunteer in a Spanish org called "proyecto hombre" that help people with drugs.

People on drugs are almost non human in order to take a dose, they will kill you,or steal and they really don't care because the only thing they care about is their next dose.

Once you have recovered the person it looks like another one, like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

I also did BASE in the past. I don't do it anymore because my girlfriend, I do sky diving which is way safer.

Most of what we have today, like airplanes, is possible because someone quasi suicided(Christopher Columbus, Magellan, Pasteur, the Curies, von Braum with rockets...).

Almost any single aircraft pioneer died as a result of accidents on their prototypes.

Re: Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

#98

Post by auxym »

mark_h wrote: post #22
chrissnell wrote: post #16

I had a close call this summer whitewater rafting on the Upper Animas River in Colorado and it has caused me to re-think every serious risk I take and has changed me in a big way. I was participating in a multi-day trip run by one of the local guiding outfits through the Upper section of the river, a much more difficult and serious undertaking than the Lower Animas, which is frequently run by average day-tripping tou…

I have a couple of friends, both white-water guides and accomplished outdoorsmen, and they both put whitewater in a different category of risk: you can do everything right, and still die just due to the unpredictability of it. One of them said he had an instructor who basically said "if you stick with this long enough, either you'll die or someone you know will". They were both in the latter category.

A pretty popular avalanche safety book [1] has, in the introduction, an actuarial table of your survival probability if you keep going out in avalanche terrain x days a year, year after year...

[1] http://www.mountaineersbooks.org/Staying-Alive-in-Avalanche-...

Re: Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

#99

Post by JshWright »

Gibbon1 wrote: post #77
cpncrunch wrote: post #29

Proximity flying is just inherently dangerous. Even with power, many people have died. Sparky Imeson, who wrote the "bible" of mountain flying, died from flying too close to terrain. The strange thing is that he was actually flying back to somewhere that he had had an accident in the past (the first time he just got seriously injured, the second time he died). If you look at the accident location, there is a valley a…

My dad was a mechanical engineer that spent most of his working career supporting the development of aircraft. Me mentioned there are two paradoxical things about aircraft. The higher you fly, the safer it is. Flying higher gives the pilot more time to fix problems. Took a while for early aviators to realize this. Many died. And the faster you land, the safer it is. Landing faster reduces the relative effects of wind…

> The higher you fly, the safer it is. Flying higher gives the pilot more time to fix problems.

I have heard pilots refer to "mistakes" as a unit of measure for altitude. You want to spend as much time as possible 2+ mistakes high.

Re: Increasing numbers of wingsuit jumpers are dying (2016)

#100

Post by danielharrison »

corporateslave2 wrote: post #47
base698 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a challenge mentally? Overcome fear see different places, have different experiences? I've been skydiving and base jumping longer than I've not been and it's led me to some of the most rewarding experiences of my life.

But those experiences are just self induced near death experiences. It's an illusion of meaning

Just like sitting in a chair all your life and eating fast food until you actually have a real self induced death experience , sans adrenaline.
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