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norcal21jg

We the People petition to legitimize BASE Jumping as an appropriate national parks activity

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Signed.

I hate the paternalistic attitude of the villagers in article. They're bothered by accidents and risk, so they want to stop other people from exercising their freedom to jump. They really think they have the right?



Haha. You're a dork. We land on their land.



Then land on public land. If the mountain / cliff / whatever is public property, surely there must be some public land nearby.

I can understand someone objecting to damage occurring on their own land... and nobody has the right to trespass someone else's property. The way I read the article, they were upset that the activity was occurring at all.

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It's not trespassing. Jumpers buy landing cards that support the residents and they do their best to only land in approved areas.

Some are upset. But most are extremely tolerant. Sometimes jumpers don't land in the designated landing areas. Usually it is no different than when the occasional skyjumper doesn't make it to the airport LZ. It happens.

Back on track, this isn't about LB, or any other spot in Europe. This is about the fight for fairness here in the US.

Cya
Never, under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night.

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"5000 for the president to address the issue"

Read the rules of "We The People" closer. According to the rules 5,000 will get it into the White House to be reviewed & sent on to an appropriate official. If you think the President will waste his time addressing this, dream on.

Nevertheless, I have signed on.

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"5000 for the president to address the issue"

Read the rules of "We The People" closer. According to the rules 5,000 will get it into the White House to be reviewed & sent on to an appropriate official. If you think the President will waste his time addressing this, dream on.

Nevertheless, I have signed on.



Yeah, I hate to be negative, but when it comes to politics, I'm a cynic. I'm thinking that a White House bureaucrat will pass the petition on to the head of the National Park Service, who will just regurgitate the current policy that we already know.

It might be more effective if 5,000 people write individual letters to their Congressmen.

But I'm in, for whatever good it does.

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It would be great if we the people could jump El Cap legally. It appears though at the current signing rate that we are not going to get the 5000 signatures required to make it an issue to White House.

It seems like we are going to have to start multiple voting. Vote often.
Looks like a death sandwich without the bread - Steve Deadman Morrell, BASE 174

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It would be great if we the people could jump El Cap legally. It appears though at the current signing rate that we are not going to get the 5000 signatures required to make it an issue to White House.

It seems like we are going to have to start multiple voting. Vote often.



That’s the attitude that got jumper banned in the first place.

Sparky
My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

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My dear, Idiot friend!!

Siegel Online is one of the premier and most trusted sources of news in Germany. Why would you see a need to remove the post, other than "burning" those news/ books you don't like or don't fit your view.

Suffice it to say that we had this in Germany also. Seventy years ago, 1938.


BASE Jumping in Switzerland
Village Appalled by Thrill Seekers' Deaths

By Lukas Eberle

The Swiss village of Lauterbrunnen is a magnet for thrill seekers looking to take part in the dangerous extreme sport of BASE jumping. In high season, they can be seen plummeting down through the air every minute or so. But a series of deaths has outraged locals.

Before Dominik Loyen, 43, leaps into the abyss, he dons his sunglasses. The German BASE jumper is standing on the edge of an 800 meter-high rock face in the Bernese Highlands of Switzerland. Beneath him lies the village of Lauterbrunnen. The sky is clear and mountain streams twinkle in the distance. Loyen takes two quick steps forward and flings himself over the edge.

He rushes downwards head first, barely missing a rocky outcrop. After 18 seconds in the air, Loyen deploys his parachute around 150 meters above the ground. Shortly afterwards, he lands gently in a valley field.

BASE jumping is a variation of parachuting, giving adrenaline junkies a buzz that lasts just seconds. But BASE jumpers don't dive out of planes. They jump from tall buildings, bridges and cliffs (BASE stands for Buildings, Antennas, Spans and Earth). And anyone who really wants to experience the feeling of flying comes here to Lauterbrunnen.

The village is a mecca for BASE jumpers. Enormous rock walls soar vertically at heights of up to 1,100 meters. Extreme sports fans come from around the world to enjoy the ultimate high, and there were around 15,000 jumps in Lauterbrunnen last year.

A Plague From the Sky

Many locals, however, are not happy about the visitors. Some 28 BASE jumpers have already died in Lauterbrunnen, including a French jumper who fell to his death in June after his parachute failed to open. For the local residents, the BASE jumpers are a plague from the sky.

Dominik Loyen is originally from the town of Viersen in the Lower Rhine region, but has lived in Lauterbrunnen for the past six years. In Germany, he needs a permit for every jump, and the jump points and landing areas must be approved. But in Switzerland, no approval is needed from the authorities. "Everyone is responsible for themselves," he says. "The cliffs belong to everyone." He loves the moment just before the jump. "Every hair is standing on end. The body resists what the head wants. If you manage to keep control in these extreme situations, it gives you a buzz, makes you feel superior, big," says Loyen.

Summer is the high season for BASE jumpers in Lauterbrunnen. In the tourist information office a poster offers them advice: "Respect your limits." Already, early in the morning, the jumpers are marching along to the valley station of the cable car, each equipped with a rucksack, helmet and parachute. A gondola takes them up to the mountain villages of Mürren and Winteregg. After a short walk, they arrive at the jumping spots, known as "exits." They have names like Nose, High Ultimate and Via Ferrata.

Many BASE jumpers wear "wingsuits," full bodysuits with fabric surfaces under the arms and between the legs. This special outfit gives the jumpers momentum in the air. With outstretched arms they swoop down in a nosedive towards the valley floor, resembling a giant bat. The flow of the air creates a noise, a fine swoosh that sounds like a distant jet aircraft.

Everyone in Lauterbrunnen knows this noise. The cliff from which the BASE jumpers leap is immediately adjacent to the village. In good weather, they can see a Batman flying by every minute or so.

'Slammed Against the Rocks'

Right next to the gondola station is the Stechelberg elementary school, from which there is also a good view of the cliff. At the beginning of July, the schoolchildren were celebrating the end of their school year with a theatre performance, followed later by a buffet on the football field. It was a beautiful day with a bright blue sky -- BASE jumping weather. Once again, the sounds of jumpers in the air could be heard -- and then a shrill scream.

"We looked on as a jumper slammed against the rocks a couple of times. At the end, the man was left lying lifelessly in trees on a slope," says Rahel Charrois. The teacher is still shocked by it today.

Charrois says she has never seen a year go by without an accident. In 2009, a class on a bike trip witnessed a BASE jumper fall to his death. The cost of the thrill is simply too much, insists the teacher. "We teach the children that it is important to be careful when crossing the street. How can we explain at the same time that people go BASE jumping?" she asks.

Anger in the village is growing. Farmers have been complaining about the BASE jumpers for some time because they land in their fields. They can't make hay out of the grass that has been trampled flat. "But the worst part is the deaths," says farmer Mathias Feuz.

Sitting on a stool in his barn, he describes how he once made a deal with two BASE jumpers allowing them to land in his fields along with their friends. He had been close to accepting the sport. But then the two suffered a fatal accident. In all Feuz has been forced to watch seven accidents from his yard, and he can no longer stand it. "I don't want any more people to die on my land," he says.

Two Worlds Colliding

In Lauterbrunnen, these two worlds are colliding. The locals in this idyllic Alpine community feel like the residents of a death zone. Meanwhile the BASE jumpers are only interested in their next adrenaline rush. Next week, a BASE jump world cup is set to be contested in the Lauterbrunnen valley.

The jumpers have set up a small camp close to the gondola station, the BASE house. Inside the log cabin with a fireplace, Jonathan, a young American from California, is sitting on a plastic stool. He has bloodshot eyes and a scar on his forehead, having just been released from a hospital after he was caught on a tree during a jump in France. A branch pierced his abdomen and ripped into his bladder. The doctors told him that it would not have happened with an empty bladder. So from now on, he will always urinate before a jump, Jonathan says. He has never even thought about quitting.

'We Would Like to Preserve the Diversity'

The BASE jumpers in Lauterbrunnen take big risks. Anyone who jumps incorrectly, or doesn't judge the wind properly, will probably end up slamming into the cliff -- after which there is no escape. In the past 12 months, six BASE jumpers have fallen to their deaths. But the local authorities do not want to ban the sport -- the region is one of the few in Switzerland which does a better tourist trade in summer than in winter, thanks in part to the BASE jumpers.

Peter Wälchli, the mayor of Lauterbrunnen, sits at his tidy desk in the local government offices, a big man with a round face. "We have everything here for our visitors, apart from the sea. We would like to preserve this diversity and not ban individual sports," says Wälchli.

Then he talks about civil and aviation laws. He knows them well. The same discussion flares up after each fatal accident, and that is when Wälchli says: "The BASE jumpers are acting legally; they are not violating any laws."

Mathias Feuz, the farmer, gets into a rage when he hears his mayor talk like that. Just the other day, an Australian had an accident when his parachute became caught up in the gondola cables. It is just a matter of time before the next tragedy occurs.

"The authorities don't want to ban the jumping because even a dead BASE jumper brings money in," the farmer says angrily. Many in the area would earn some cash in such a case, "the doctor, mountain rescue" and also the hotel and restaurant industry -- "when the relatives travel here," says Feuz.








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Post hidden due to complete and utter trolling.

As much as I'd love to rage on the poster, that would make them get just what they wanted.

But I'm 99% it's just a troll post, considering the blatant parallels that could be drawn to skydiving in the statements they made.

Now enough troll feeding, more signing...

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>And what exactly is that reason ?

The first BASE jumpers in Yosemite trashed the place - left trash all over, left graffiti etc.



My reply was meant to be sarcastic. I am very much interested in how petejones45 would have answered.

I am very well aware of the failed USPA Yosemite program :(

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I didnt sign it because there is good reason that BASE jumping was banned from state parks



oh BTW, BASE is banned from NATIONAL parks (the NPS - Nazi Park Service), not state parks.

I have made BASE jumps in a number of State and City parks, and none of these jumps were illegal.

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I promise not to land in your fields of hay next to any of the walls we have in the US (since this isn't about the Swiss Valley). If you could, please mark each field with a giant pink flag that reads, "Less than 1/2 the story"

Thank you for your input.
Never, under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night.

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The first BASE jumpers in Yosemite trashed the place - left trash all over, left graffiti etc.


Does anyone have any links or articles about this? I'm curious to read on who, what, when, etc. I think it's odd that they'd ban all "basejumpers" and not just those people.

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The first BASE jumpers in Yosemite trashed the place - left trash all over, left graffiti etc.


Does anyone have any links or articles about this? I'm curious to read on who, what, when, etc. I think it's odd that they'd ban all "basejumpers" and not just those people.



You have to go way back in "Parachutist" and "Skydiving" to read about that. It was before the internet days, so you're not likely to find them online. Find a jumper with an collection of old magazines and start reading.

It's a long, strenuous hike up to the top. Jumpers would hike up, sleep overnight on top, and jump first thing in the morning. They would abandon all their gear except their rigs at that point, leaving the rangers to clean up their trash on top. There was also one incident I recall where a truck was used to take jumpers up a closed jeep trail to cut down on hiking time.

10% of any group of people can screw things up for the other 90%. It's a typical bureaucratic response to ban an activity for everyone, because of the actions of a few.

And they do this based upon an old law prohibiting "aerial delivery", which was originally written to prevent illegal miners in the wilderness from getting equipment and food resupplies by parachute drop. So that law wasn't even about recreational skydivers.

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It was legal for about 6 weeks on a trial basis in 1980.You had to have a D lic. And apply for a back country permit. There 8 slots a day and you had to be off the rock by 8:00 am. This required you sleep on top the night before. The rules were simple and presented no problem.

But there were a few that couldn’t be bothered. There were people sneaking up and jumping at night, riding bicycles over the edge, jumping with pogo sticks, leaving trash all over the place and generally acting like assholes. They made no attempt to go along with the program and after 6 weeks the Rangers had enough and closed it down.

The bandit jumps has continued off and on since then.

Sparky
My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

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