From climbing up mountains to jumping off them
People frequently ask whether I’ve experienced any near misses while BASE jumping. It’s a valid question every jump operates on an edge where seconds and meters can dictate success or disaster, so potentially I would say every jump brings us precariously close to a disaster. Nevertheless, there have been a few standout moments that have imparted crucial lessons, particularly regarding speed and energy management when navigating close to terrain—where, paradoxically, speed can be your ally.
Some times I think to myself why the fuck do we do this. I sat in the helicopter swooping around the sharp valley ridges. The pilot would drop me in Saas fee so I could pick up my car and drive to the hospital. Although everything was now ok, this is when the flood of thoughts and emotions hit.
Soldering and alpinism overlapped by a few years for me. Even during training, a gruelling 32 week course (the longest basic military training in the world), I would spend long weekends in Italy climbing big walls. Short on money, I would use my excess field rations saved up from training exercises, my issued sleeping bag and thermals, mixed amongst my loud yellow t-shirts and assorted scrounged gear.
The idea of this is to make some points about doing a ski BASE, as with many BASE jumping practices there are many ways to do it. All with the pros and cons. I will mention these different methods, and mention the way I do it and why. At the end of the day it all comes down to risk assessment and what makes more sense to you.
Light in the mountains provokes various thoughts and considerations. Natural lights, stars and the moon promise a settled night, ideal for an unplanned bivi halfway up a route, while the lights of a mountain refuge can give you assurance after several long days on a route. Sometimes the lights from bedrooms, street lamps and porches give me entirely different thoughts:
I’m a serial hobbyist and can’t even decide on one discipline of climbing to concentrate on. But BASE jumping is my new passion, I like how the skills from both climbing and BASE jumping compliment each other and I hope to combine these two sports in the future.
All these extreme sports have one thing in common: they’re dangerous. Avalanches, cliff strikes, decking out; they all come complete with their own life changing injuries and the looming possibility of death.
After climbing the classic Don Whillans 
and Joe Brown route Cematory Gates, I stood on top of the route and looked down. The rock was sheer and the landing lay down near the road. The cliff was relatively low for a BASE jump but the extended hill would give us plenty of flight time. This jump had never been done before, so there was doubt in my mind.