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Base: The final frontier
Free-falling: A BASE jumper launches from a dam |
A daredevil Norwegian student reportedly parachuted off London's new millennium wheel after sneaking past past guards over the weekend.
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And one day a year at the 867ft high New River Gorge Bridge in West Virginia, enthusiasts from around the world gather to jump off.
They are all devotees of BASE (Building, Antenna, Span or Earth), jumping.
Jump station: The Millennium Wheel |
Until they release their chutes, they fall at 60 mph, to death or glory.
Anything tall is fair game for the estimated 400 devotees of the sport around the world.
Arne Aarhus, 24, from Bergen, climbed the 450ft high London Eye millennium wheel - the fourth-tallest structure in the capital - in the early hours of Saturday.
His parachute opened after 65ft and he landed safely on a footpath, in full view of a surprised guard, who did nothing to stop him, it was reported.
 The buzz comes from breaking the law  |
| Mike Fordham of Adrenalin magazine |
"I was able to climb up a ladder on the inside of the wheel. It was very scary as it was wet steel and the higher I got the more obstacles there were in the way, and it started to curve.
"The view was awe-inspiring. I could see miles up the Thames, and Westminster looked beautiful at night."
British Airways, sponsor of the wheel, is investigating the incident. Security was stepped up last month after nine environmentalists climbed the wheel to protest dam projects in Spain and India.
BASE jumping is highly dangerous - at least 39 people have died since 1980 when it was invented by Norwegian Carl Boenish.
'Incredible feeling'
But it continues to attract the daredevils among us, for whom mowing the lawn at the weekends just doesn't cut it.
Jumpers reach 60mph before their chutes open |
"The buzz comes from breaking the law."
In an interview last April, legendary BASE jumper Thor Axel Kappfjell, said he delighted in playing outlaw and "fooling the authorities" as he gained access to his perches.
It is a similar mischief that AJ Hackett showed when he evaded security at the Eiffel Tower in 1987, and bungy jumping off, sparking a worldwide boom in the sport.
But without the relative security of a thick elastic rope, Kappfjell, like Boenish, died in his pursuit of the buzz, by jumping off a Norwegian cliff.
Kappfjell was known as the Human Fly. But even flies reach untimely ends, and he was blown by the wind on to the cliffs where he died.
Briton Gary Conner, who cycled off Beachy Head, said: "Landing successfully is an incredible feeling.
"You've done something difficult and dangerous and you're still alive.
"It's a natural high which it takes days to come down from."
The E-cyclopedia can be contacted at e-cyclopedia@bbc.co.uk
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