Wingsuits

HAL9000

Just had a week in Chamonix. One thing we  saw was two guys jumping from the top of Brevént (about 3000 metres I think) wearing wingsuits. No photos I'm afraid but essentially suits with webbed bits between your arms and legs so that you can sort of fly. Apparently they will reach speeds of around 200kph and will follow gullies and ravines for maximum thrill before opening a parachute for the last bit. Amazing. Also one of the scariest things I've seen.

thermionic

Yes, amazing stuff. First time I saw a video clip of it I was adamant that it was a hoax. The way they fly so close to the side of the mountain... No room for error.

Dominic

When I was a kid the boy 2 doors away was rushed to hospital with broken bones after jumping out of a bedroom window dressed in his new Superman outfit .......it made the papers.
He didn't learn........about 3 years later he was in hospital for months after getting 3rd degree burns for tying a Rocket firework to his back and lighting it in an effort to fly
I was banned from playing with him.

stratosonic

Incredible to watch, they make it look easy! My brother is working his way towards wingsuit jumping, he passed his formation skydiving license in March and persuaded me to do a tandem skydive for my 50th birthday last month. It was an amazing experience, my brain went into overload when we actually started falling out the plane at 12,000ft, then after a few seconds you realize you're not going to die and can enjoy the view!  Another experience ticked off my bucket list  

Panama_Jack666

digitalscream

@Panama_Jack666 - and here's a companion video:



Everything else aside, he chooses brilliant music for his videos.

Also, please take the YT video out of your sig. We got rules on that sorta thing, y'know

Panama_Jack666

Yeah, great videos. He did quite a good GoPro one recently where he talks about the crash that nearly killed him on Tabletop Mountain.

Sorry - didn't realise about the link in my sig. It's always been there since I joined, didn't think it would matter as it's a link to my channel page and not a video. Will remove it immediately!

digitalscream

Panama_Jack666 said:

Yeah, great videos. He did quite a good GoPro one recently where he talks about the crash that nearly killed him on Tabletop Mountain.

Sorry - didn't realise about the link in my sig. It's always been there since I joined, didn't think it would matter as it's a link to my channel page and not a video. Will remove it immediately!

Cheers for that - if you put "My YouTube channel here!" and turn that text into a link, it'll still work without trying to turn it into an embedded video. It's obviously something that's changed in the latest version of Vanilla.

Panama_Jack666

Cheers @digitalscream ! I may trial some time without it on my sig. I doubt it'll be detrimental to my audience! Good work on the latest update, your efforts are appeciated! Sorry for derailing your thread @HAL9000 ! I'll shut up now

hugbot

I do wonder how you get into that stuff. I mean hurling yourslef off a mountain isnt like getting a driving lesson or something where you start off slow. 

strtdv

I'll just leave this here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatalities_due_to_wingsuit_flying

Sporky

Do they do them in tweed?

lloyd

Crazy bastards and unsurprisingly there are "accidents" (I put them in quotes because you can hardly call them accidents IMO) where they die-the ones doing fly bys meters past rocks and bridges. Good luck to any one brace enough to do it-it looks awesome fun. There's a documentary on CH4 about one-he seemed to have a genuine death wish, and was happy to go out doing something he loved.

Mkjackary

strtdv said:

I'll just leave this here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatalities_due_to_wingsuit_flying

Much lower than I would have thought to be honest.

I know it is off topic but compare that to the number of fatalities from the Isle of Man course over the years.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Snaefell_Mountain_Course_fatalities

stimpsonslostson

Watch "Flight" it's a documentary on Netflix about the evolution of parachuting->skydiving->base jumping->wing suit flight

Fascinating stuff… and then you notice that all the luminaries of the sports development are being referred to in the past tense.