RIP Shane McConkey
RIP Shane McConkey never heard of the guy, but came across this on Yahoo news...
http://sports.yahoo.com/ski/news?slu...v=ap&type=lgns
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shane_McConkey
Video of him in action... CRAZY!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUfF-kyKdGU
He had some big ***** to do some of that skiing in the video... only thing i don't get is the snow mobile on water... wouldn't it sink?
Base Jump video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtXt_UsZ4YQ&NR=1
http://sports.yahoo.com/ski/news?slu...v=ap&type=lgns
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shane_McConkey
Video of him in action... CRAZY!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUfF-kyKdGU
He had some big ***** to do some of that skiing in the video... only thing i don't get is the snow mobile on water... wouldn't it sink?
Base Jump video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtXt_UsZ4YQ&NR=1
NVM, read the wiki article:
Death
The following appears to be a report of the fatal accident from a fellow jumper of McConkey's:
March 26, 2009, Shane died while on a ski-BASE jump in Corvara, Italy.
We chose to ski off of a cliff with our wingsuits and fly them away from the cliff wall before opening our parachutes for landing. We skied and hiked off of the Pordoi cable car to a spot Shane had base jumped once before, in the summer. We spent a bunch of time preparing for the jump, building a kicker, helping each other gear up, and finally we were pleased and prepared and went for it.
Shane did a double back flip in perfect McConkey style. As planned, afterwards, he went to release his skis in order to fly away from the wall and safely deploy his parachute. This is where the jump went wrong. He was not able to release one of his skis. He remained focused on releasing it by reaching down towards his bindings. This, combined with the large unbalanced surface area of the one ski, put him into a spin/ tumble/ unstable falling style, that may have appeared out of his control, but in reality, Shane was not concerned about flying position or style; just concerned with reaching that ski so that he could get it off and fly or deploy his parachute. He succeeded in releasing both of skis and immediately transitioned into a perfect flying position. He then impacted the snow, and died at that moment. The whole thing took place in about 12 seconds. Once he released the skis, he was immediately in control of the flight and would have only seen the ground and imminent impact for a tiny fraction of a second before he hit. Shane’s parachute did not malfunction; it was never deployed.
Death
The following appears to be a report of the fatal accident from a fellow jumper of McConkey's:
March 26, 2009, Shane died while on a ski-BASE jump in Corvara, Italy.
We chose to ski off of a cliff with our wingsuits and fly them away from the cliff wall before opening our parachutes for landing. We skied and hiked off of the Pordoi cable car to a spot Shane had base jumped once before, in the summer. We spent a bunch of time preparing for the jump, building a kicker, helping each other gear up, and finally we were pleased and prepared and went for it.
Shane did a double back flip in perfect McConkey style. As planned, afterwards, he went to release his skis in order to fly away from the wall and safely deploy his parachute. This is where the jump went wrong. He was not able to release one of his skis. He remained focused on releasing it by reaching down towards his bindings. This, combined with the large unbalanced surface area of the one ski, put him into a spin/ tumble/ unstable falling style, that may have appeared out of his control, but in reality, Shane was not concerned about flying position or style; just concerned with reaching that ski so that he could get it off and fly or deploy his parachute. He succeeded in releasing both of skis and immediately transitioned into a perfect flying position. He then impacted the snow, and died at that moment. The whole thing took place in about 12 seconds. Once he released the skis, he was immediately in control of the flight and would have only seen the ground and imminent impact for a tiny fraction of a second before he hit. Shane’s parachute did not malfunction; it was never deployed.
