UK BASE in 12 hours

[BASE813 0]

Nice one JD and groundcrew in doing UK B A S E in 12 hours!

Was fucking hard work and very knackering!

600 miles and 1 hour sleep.......... but glad to be apart of it!



and yes my bruises still fucking hurt!!!!

[QuickDraw 0]

Jesus dude, you just have to rub it in don't you.

All sub 300ft ?

-- Hope you don't die. --

I'm fucking winning

[BASE813 0]

B-240ft
A-225ft
S-240ft
E-270ft


all freefalled of course!!!

Faber mate you should have been here rather than mincing Denmark!!!

[QuickDraw 0]

Did your neck give you any problems mate ?

-- Hope you don't die. --

I'm fucking winning

[iam 0]

.............Phew..............all of that and fighting of a rabid squirrell single handed


Respect JD.

"Don't ever knock on deaths door, just ring the bell and run away - it really pisses him off"

[Faber 0]

Quote

Nice one JD and groundcrew in doing UK B A S E in 12 hours!

Was fucking hard work and very knackering!

600 miles and 1 hour sleep.......... but glad to be apart of it!

bwaahahaha YOU GUYS ARE LAZYBOYS so you really needed sleep on that trip...

Nice once Congrat on that,now i expect that to me as i get there next time

Quote

yes my bruises still fucking hurt!!!!

so does your ... sure also.... did you go to the E were all my fans are? it still has my name on it as well as the E we did..

Stay safe
Stefan Faber

[Faber 0]

[Zennie 0]

My g/f is British & I was asking her if she could think of some potential Es in the UK. She mentioned some certain famous cliffs as a possibility, which I had also thought of, but I've never heard of them being jumped.

- Z
"Always be yourself... unless you suck." - Joss Whedon

[TomAiello 26]

Have you read Groundrush, by Simon Jakeman?

-- Tom Aiello

Tom@SnakeRiverBASE.com
SnakeRiverBASE.com

[Faber 0]

i saw at least 2 cliffs in Uk whch could(one were)jumped as i were there. the other has my name on it..

Stay safe
Stefan Faber

[narcimund 0]

Quote

Have you read Groundrush, by Simon Jakeman?

Fantastic book. Unfortunately it's rare and demand is high, so used copies generally go for over US$200.00. I was lucky enough to find one mispriced for only $20.00 recently, but I haven't seen another like that since. I keep my eyes open.

Jakeman calls his first cliff an "ancient malevolence." Brilliant!

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[Dwain 0]

The section in this book about his building strike (from the lead up in the stairwell through to walking away) is one of the best pieces of writing about BASE I have ever read. It made my heart race and I'm about as jaded a BASE jumper as they come.

Sadly I loaned out my hard cover, autographed copy of this book years ago and it's been lost along the way.

Nevertheless, not meaning to request serious copyright infringement (as I probably am), but if someone could post those few pages of the building strike here I'm sure it would be an enjoyable read for many.

[narcimund 0]

Fair Use Doctrine includes an exemption for reprinting short excerpts for review purposes. I might pour a glass of wine tonight and spend a little bit of time at the keyboard to post that segment or parts of it.

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[cpoxon 0]

Not sure if almost ten pages of a 125 page book constitutes fair use but here goes,

Quote

The next afternoon I returned to the bar to pick up my
equipment which I had left there for safekeeping. On
leaving for the station, my curiosity was aroused by the
sight of three tall black apartment blocks some half a mile
away. It was the B complex, visible between the
nearer buildings. Outside the underground station I
stopped to look once more, and having time on my
hands, I turned and started walking towards them. From
somewhere a half-remembered conversation drifted back
to me. An American voice:
'Anybody ever jump off one of them?'
'Must have...'
'No, man - I mean parachute jump.'
If they did then I've never heard of it.'
When I reached the first tower I was staggered by the
size of it. Four hundred and twenty feet high, a man-made
mountain of black masonry with the sharp corners of the
balconies jutting out down one side like the vertebrae of
some ancient dinosaur. The doors leading into the build-
ing were closely guarded by video monitors. These
apartments in the very heart of the city are the province of
millionaires and film stars. I was ready to turn and walk
back to the station when I spotted a small discreet side
door of wired glass. I stepped forward and turned the
handle. To my amazement, the door opened silently
inwards. I looked around me and passed quickly into the
concrete stairwell of the fire escape. Behind me in the
silence the door closed with a sharp echoing sound.


[I]In his headlong dive the harpie passed through a thousand
miles an hour with ease. The wind rushing into his face
drew the cracked lips back revealing stained yellow fangs,
pitted and streaked. The sightless eyes narrowed to fierce
slits and the pitch leather membranes of his wings rippled
and snapped with the speed . . .[/I]

10
With Sure Direction

The B comprises a labyrinth of convention halls
and exhibition rooms set among neatly walled gardens
with a brick inlaid walkway. The main thoroughfare
takes traffic from Farringdon through a four-lane tunnel
which runs beneath the ground towards Old Street. This
means that. once on the premises, pedestrian traffic takes
the place of cars. The show pieces are the three towers, all
more or less identical. Until the recent construction of
Canary Wharf in the East India Docks, the central block,
S Tower, was the tallest residential building in
Britain. The triangular towers stand in line from east to
west so that, from the open-air underground station, one
obscures the others. Each block has a helipad on the roof
and a bright yellow line painted on the floor of the
stairwell leads up to it. In the event of fire, one has only
to 'follow the yellow brick road' through the smoke to
evacuation and safety. Curiously though, the roof is only
accessible with a key obtained at the desk thirty-nine
storeys below and that key must be signed out.
In the circumstances, I doubted the deskman's willing-
ness to surrender it to me. The only other way into the
open air was via the viewing balconies of the privileged
tenants. These were separate from the balconies of the
actual apartments.
When I reached the top stair, the landing ended with a
door identical to the one four hundred feet below. There
was a notice telling me that this door was wired to an
alarm in reception and that any attempt to open it and
gain access to the balcony would alert the security patrol.
On careful examination, however, I found that the door
was not fully closed. Several which I had tried on the way
up had been locked but, as luck would have it, this top
floor exit was open a quarter of an inch. A wire attached
to the door ran down the wall, and I supposed that,
though the door was not open enough to trip the alarm,
any attempt to open it wider would do so immediately.
Dropping my gear down, I sat on the top stair to think.
Outside was full daylight, and if I leapt from the
balcony my only escape would be on foot. To avoid
capture, I might do better to wait until darkness fell. In
my mind the coincidences linked together. The chance
finding of an open door below on such a highly guarded
building, my walking past with parachute specially
packed for a building jump when I should have been
working, the fact that the top door should have been
alarmed yet was open when all the others had been locked
- it all cricked at the nape of my neck.


I sat listening to the lift gear running alongside me in a
secret chamber concealed within the walls. Through three
long hours I sat and alternately decided to go ahead and
then in the same instant felt the almost uncontrollable
desire to run back down the stairs and flee. Every now and
then a footstep on the public landing behind me sent me
leaping down the steps to hide on the floor below, but no
one entered the stairwell. Not a soul in the world knew I
was there . . . save one.


[I]The carrion man hovered on the draught of air that rose up
the face of the building. His clawed hands flexed and then
closed around the edge of the roof as he settled above the
empty balcony. Folding his great black wings, he too
waited for the darkness in which he always sought his
prey.[/I]

Jumping on other occasions, I had blindly overlooked
the moments when doubt pointed to the dangers. There
had been the presence of my friends to strengthen me.
Shared pride had assured me of courage then, but now
I was answerable to no one, and my heart sank. Having
brought myself to the edge and looked upon the dare, I
found that all I wanted was to run. No part of me wanted
to open the door and step over the rail. Yet everything in
me yearned to feel that euphoric surge pounding through
my body. Gradually I overcame my fear and moved into
that unshakable state called 'purpose'. I turned away from
the plentiful warnings and excuses that my brain offered.
Night was falling across the city and lights were
coming on. I got up, walked across the landing and stood
looking through the glass door at the opposite tower.
Thirty-nine storeys all lit up orange, red and yellow. Far
below lay the street, mapped out in bright headlamps,
teeming with people and cars. The open-air underground
station crackled and flashed blue sparks, and beyond,
awesome with its output of power, London was twenty
miles of lights.
I pulled on my chute and checked it. Time to go,
Necessity decreed that I take all my possessions with me
so that no trace was left of my passing. Symbolically I
was like a fighter 'donning armour before entering the
fray, for the layers of clothing were all that might protect
me from the ravages of the harpie's embrace. At last I laid
my hand on the cold steel door and focused on my own
reflection in the glass. A face of desperate commitment
gazed back at me. Disgusted with my loitering, I turned
the handle and stepped out into the cold. Above me the
harpie shot bolt upright and began to move excitedly
from side to side along the roof's edge, gloating and
slavering.
Somewhere a clock chimed five. Inside the building the
alarm bells must be ringing, and I thought of the tiny lift
containing the security guards that would even now be
ascending towards me. There was no hurry, no doubt
assailed me, I had nowhere to go but over the edge.
Gripping the masonry, I clambered up on to the left hand
side of the balcony until I was balancing on the thin rail
with one hand on the wall for support. On the ground
hundreds of people were milling around, the noise
wafting upward. Opposite I could see into living-rooms
level with me in the next block. Beyond that, the lights of
London faded into the distance, and above all the stars
sparkled frostily in the cold December night.
I took a final glance back at the empty balcony and its
yawning glass door. For hours there had been the hollow-
ness of the stairwell and the echoes for company. Now, in
the flat featureless night, I felt small and alone. Turning, I
leaned forward, looked straight down, and jumped. From
ten feet above me the carrion man also jumped landing
square on my back, and we fell away from the thirty-
ninth floor together. After looking out across the black
plain of London spattered with twinkling lights, the con-
trast of the scene below was a glaring madness rushing up
at me.
My fragmented focus took in the window on the next
floor silently passing, and the flicker of the rain drip
gutter, so close that I could see the cracked paint. Beneath
me the grey asphalt was marked out into the dotted lines
of parking bays, and looming into view came a white
painted 'Emergency Services Only'. Cradled in a cannon-
ball of flesh, my consciousness kept taking pictures as I
hurtled through the cold, clammy air. The chamber re-
volved, and ten feet out from the glass on the twenty-
ninth floor the hammer fell. My parachute crashed open
and I saw it flying clear, away from the building. But on
looking up, I finally saw the true face of my madness. As I
watched, the parachute turned through one hundred and
eighty degrees until it was facing the building less than ten
feet out and three hundred feet above the street. Three
storeys later the canopy hit the corner balcony, hung up,
collapsed, ripped through and dropped me. Gaming
acceleration, I tried to catch the balcony below as I fell
past. My arms smashed across it, numbing them both so
that I thought them broken. Then I was tumbling help-
lessly, smacking arms and legs against the stonework,
cartwheeling from floor to floor. Still in the harness of
my shredded parachute I fell for two hundred feet.
I held my crossed arms over my face and head, desper-
ately hoping that I would not dash my skull open. I fell in
a sitting position, smashing the base of my spine again and
again on the stonework, and then bouncing down to the
next ledge and banging a shoulder on it.
I remember looking up the column of lit balconies, and
then smacking into another, looking down at the street
lamps zooming up to me, and cringing and hunching my
shoulders as I crashed to the next. The overall feeling was
certainly not one of fear; there was no time for that. In my
mind I was completely convinced that at any second my
back, my neck, my skull, that everything would shatter
on the ground and I would be dead. Realising that this
was all there was, that I had lived my life, came as a shock.
Plans for tomorrow, next week, whenever, none of it
mattered because there was to be no more. It was as close
to the moment, the 'now' beyond the one-thirtieth, as I
had ever been. I am about to die, NOW.
The last time I had seen the street lamps they had
looked really big. I knew that I was very low and that I
had only moments left. Something within me that paid
no heed to logic made me reach for my reserve. In truth
there was no possible way the reserve chute would open
or even get line stretch in time. But it was really the only
thing left. Falling at speed, skittering down the face of the
masonry, my eyes now tight shut and my back hunched
in a futile attempt to survive the last impact, I hooked my
thumb of my right hand into the reserve handle.
But before I had time to pull the handle, everything, all
the madness and speed, came to a sudden stop.
On the thirteenth floor the shredded material that was
left of my canopy caught momentarily on the corner
stone of the balcony. Smashed and bruised ten feet below I
hung swinging against the next floor. With numbed and
gory hands from which the skin had been ripped I
grabbed the stone sill as the sound of tearing cloth reached
me from above. A shadow engulfed me. I screamed out
loud and then all was still.
I hung there with the edge of the balcony in front of
my nose and my arms hooked over it. The last chance and
the split second to use it had produced a response and a
strength that I thought had gone from me. Looking down
over my right shoulder, I could see cars moving to and
fro, people still walking home. Not a soul had seen me.
My mind having surrendered to and been fixed on the
fact that I was about to die, I now had to summon back
the instinct to survive, rather than just letting the ledge
slip easily from my arms and falling away backwards the
hundred feet or so to the road. I was aching and hurt. To
give in would be so easy. Death from impact must be
painless. How long does it take for the body and skull to
crush on the ground and squeeze the ghost out of the
living flesh? What kind of now was that? Too fast for
pain, I was sure.
Fight. If we stay long enough on the threshold of the
door between the dead and the dying we alienate our-
selves from either. Fight. You are here, you are not dying.
That has passed. Your choice is to live, but you must
fight. You are living; your dying has stopped. Now is not
your time. Now is life. Now is LIFE!
With a desperate surge I put all my remaining spirit
into a frantic kick and hooked my right foot on to the
ledge. I pulled myself up to lie across the foot-wide
balcony wall with my ribs aching and my heart pound-
ing. I stopped for a second with my head' facing outward
and looked down again to the street. Christ! It looked as if
it would suck me in, could just pull me clean off the wall,
like at C Bridge.
I eased myself down inside the balcony and slumped to
my hands and knees on plush mattingi The rigging lines
of my parachute hung from the balcony above so that it
looked as if I were caught in a spider's web. Now, for the
first time, I peered into the apartment on whose balcony I
had landed. There were potted plants everywhere, a black
leather sofa and a glass coffee table, complete with steam-
ing coffee cups. A television set danced colours at me
through a big picture window, and in the kitchen I could
see the shadow of somebody making dinner.
Now the instinct to fight rather than surrender was
replaced by the need to flee. Senselessly the urge to run
charged me with energy, not prompted by anything
more than an impulse to distance myself from the whole
thing. I guess that it was a conditioned reflex. As soon as
you land, disappear. The normal reason is to avoid arrest
and incurring the wrath of the powers that be; now I
merely wanted to go, to get out.
I tried for a minute to pull the parachute down from
the upstairs balcony, but it was stuck fast and so irrepar-
ably ripped that I hit the single point release pad and
shrugged it off my shoulders. On the left of the balcony
a narrow corridor, maybe three-feet wide, branched off
to the apartment's fire escape. Fending myself off the plate
glass window with bloodied hands, I lurched down this
escape route and crashed into the fire door. Grimacing
with pain, I felt for the bar handle in the dim light and
threw myself bodily against it. The door clicked open and
I fell into the twelfth-floor landing, barely keeping on my
feet. Opposite the lift doors with their ornamental
number panels was the main stairwell. Reeling across the
landing, I hurtled down the stairs to escape.
In my flight I never for an instant stopped to reason out
any course of action. All I knew was that I had to get
away. Pounding down the last few steps, I crashed
through one door after another, expecting at any moment
to find security staff blocking my escape. Even as I
emerged from the glass door that I had entered so long
ago I felt as if they were hurrying to intercept me. I
walked away, not running, just walking as fast as I could
into the shadows. And half-way across the floodlit landing
site my nerve broke and I ran into the night. I turned right
and moved through the crowds on the street. Above me
the ragged strip of my canopy shifted slightly in the
breeze way up on the thirteenth floor. I stopped in a shop
doorway and looked at myself in the glass. White and
slack-jawed, my reflection stared back at me, blood on the
nose running along the lip to the chin. Then the aching
started to come in waves from within.
People walking past looked at me and then away. I was
a blank, some guy with nothing better in his life to do
than bang about in shop doorways at night. Don't talk to
him, he's either crazy or dangerous. Looks as if he's had a
fight already. Come on.
As I walked off into the night waves of pain washed
over me from my lower back, the raw flesh on my hands
and elbows stinging. Every joint ached. I was shaking
uncontrollably and limping badly now. My throat felt
tight, choking me with emotion. My ribs ached terribly
when I breathed. Eventually I stopped at a dingy bar and
sat shaking in the corner while alcohol eased my state of
shock.
After some time I took a night bus to north London
where my brother rented an apartment. Nobody
answered when I knocked. Pale and shaking, still in shock,
I pulled up the tarpaulin on the back of his pick-up truck
and eased my way inside to sleep on the bare metal floor. I
pulled the tarpaulin back over me, shutting out the night
and the December cold as best I could. The moon crept
across the cover and over the shape curled beneath it.

Skydiving Fatalities - Cease not to learn 'til thou cease to live

[Zennie 0]

Quote

Have you read Groundrush, by Simon Jakeman?

I'd love to, unfortunately the closest I've ever come to that book was a copy on a picnic table in TF that was being loaned to another jumper.

- Z
"Always be yourself... unless you suck." - Joss Whedon

[evilivan 0]

Quote

so used copies generally go for over US$200.00.

$200?!? Wow.... any offers for my mint condition hardback copy? I'm currently in the housing market and could use the cash...

Think I picked my copy for £8 on the internet; the guy would be gutted if he knew.

"If you can keep your head when all around you have lost theirs, then you probably haven't understood the seriousness of the situation."
David Brent

[evilivan 0]

.....and of course congrats to JD et al. And a knarly decision on the B there, McFly, especially after the WDI's experience........

Not many out there with UK BASE, never mind within 12 hours. Nice.

"If you can keep your head when all around you have lost theirs, then you probably haven't understood the seriousness of the situation."
David Brent

[TomAiello 26]

Quote

Think I picked my copy for £8 on the internet; the guy would be gutted if he knew.

I bought mine on-line from a used bookseller in London. it came to around US$20, including the shipping to the states.

-- Tom Aiello

Tom@SnakeRiverBASE.com
SnakeRiverBASE.com

[QuickDraw 0]

Thanks Craig, that was fucking intense to say the least.

-- Hope you don't die. --

I'm fucking winning

[stuartjl 0]

Thanks to Mac and JD for letting me Ground Crew. This was my first Ground Crew and the standard of professionalism was outstanding on their behalf. They definately set the standard!

[narcimund 0]

Yup. You guys got good cheap copies like I did. Here's the results of today's search:

# Bookseller Notes Price

1 Alibris [United States] Jonathan Cape 1992 First Edition Hard Cover Very Good in Very Good jacket Base jumping. Terrifying, often moviong account of jumping off Cheddar Gorge, 1000 foot television masks...a test of Zen in action at the most extreme. 3e. Keywords: Sport Base Jumping $206.19

2 Astley Book Farm via Abebooks [United Kingdom] Publisher: Jonathan Cape, 1992; Hard Cover. Very Good/Very Good. First Edition. Base jumping. Terrifying, often moviong account of jumping off Cheddar Gorge, 1000 foot television masks.. a test of Zen in action at the most extreme. 3e $207.28

3 Andrew Barnes Booksellers via Books & Collectibles [Australia] Publisher: Cape London 1992 1st edition 127pp., b/w pls., dust jacket Fine octavo. $240.00

4 Andrew Barnes Booksellers / Military Mel via Abebooks [Australia] Publisher: Cape London 1992; 1st edition dust jacket Fine octavo. 127pp., b/w pls., $240.00

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[andy2 0]

those are all first editions. Did they make second editions? Always the second editions are worth maybe 10-30% of what a first edition is worth.

---------------------------------------------
let my inspiration flow,
in token rhyme suggesting rhythm...

[narcimund 0]

I've never seen a second or later edition offered. My $20.00 one is a first in Excellent condition.

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[Spiderbaby 0]

Way good job on the BASE in 12 hrs. Regarding the 1 hr. sleep, to quote "The Spiders From Mars", you can sleep when you're dead. That story from Craig ,however, brought back way to many close memories from my little building strike episode. At least my strike was over in a flash, it was the aftermath (hospital, jail, lawsuit, court, years worth of fines) that hurt the most. Rippin good yarn, though it makes me wan't a valium.

"It takes a big man to cry, it takes an even bigger man to make that big man cry"

[Faber 0]

BASE 813 DO know how ground crew works he´s like a pro on it. i owe him BIG time for my B

Cheers mate,im not sure i could do it

Stay safe
Stefan Faber