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Throwing your body off a bridge in a bungee jump < ombines
terror with an incredible rush of adrenalin. As suicidal as it
t'hofu In l.fr* Sntiict
appear.v bungee jumping in Oregon bus resulted in only a
tew minor injuries
Bungee jumpers take a ‘ticket to terror’
At least 300 University students
have plunged off a bridge, and lived
By James Vlahos
Emerald Contnbulor
"Today is a great day to
die." the Cherokee Indians
would say to greet each new
day. Init I doubt they had
bungee jumping in mind when
they said it.
I was perched on a tiny plat
form 140 feet above the omi
nous river, preparing to leap
and trying hard to think like a
Cherokee.
Reporter’s
Notebook
Ninety percent of facing your
first "leap of faith" is panic:,
and the other 10 percent is
sheer terror.
I had faith no more.
I did have four bungee cords,
or glorified rubber bands,
strapped to my chest, which
would let me fall 100 feet la
fore bouncing me out of death's
clutches, but that didn't seem
to help
Fear strangled any sense of
logic as the people on the
bridge shouted my countdown.
"Five, four, three ..." In the fi
nal moments. 1 felt strangely
alone.
"One."
My legs pushed mo off the
platform.
The next two seconds were a
blinding explosion of terror
and si>eed. The air thundered
by me and my body hurtled
downward, as if being sucked
through the hose of a gargan
tuan vacuum cleaner.
A long scream was ripping
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out of my chest
(lasev Dale ot Kugene, who
runs the only iaiiniiirru.il
hunger jump operation Hi the
state. drs< rilx-d the si ream as
"a primal, guttural sound The
sound of bungee
Then lining' the bungees
snapped me bat k upward tor
the first of four giant bounces
No longer did I fear an early
day oi reckoning with the big
guy upstairs, he was dribbling
me like a human basketball in
stead
I cursed and flailed through
the air with eat h Ixiunce, feel
ing like a foolish mortal who
defied the eternal laws in an
ancient Greek myth
My first bungee jump was ex
actly as jump emt.ee Dale had
warned: "a tit ket to terror "
I loved it
The bungee fad - at least the
best fad since streaking traces
its roots to the Pentecostal Is
landers in the South Pacifit
Males of the liunlap tribe prac
ticed "land diving' from 90- to
150-foot bamboo towers as a
rite of passage
Springy vines (low-tech
bungees) attached at their an
kles stopped their plunge just
short of the ground.
In 1970 the "Dangerous
Sports Club" of Oxford. Eng
land substituted bungee cords
for vines, and any high struc
ture for bamlxio towers, thus
creating a free-falling rite of
passage for the modern man or
woman: bungee jumping
Dale, who leads jump expe
ditions at various sites every
weekend, believes there is
more to bungee jumping than
attaching yourself to a giant
l*hot<> b% tir*| Sn»d»r
lames Vlahos says 90 portent of facing the first ' 'leap of faith' *
is panic; the other 10 percent is sheer terror.
rubber band and leaping from .1
bridge.
(Conquering your fears lo
make the jump is what Dale
calls an “empowering activi
ty."and an experience which
gives you inner power to face
other challenges in daily life
Assuming you walk away
from your jump intact
The basic nature of the sport
— leaping from a bridge — im
plies substantial danger, yet it
can lie quite safe with proper
equipment and set-up proce
dures.
Bungees have been indicted
for causing a variety of minor
injuries, from the common
"bungee burn” to the short
term trauma of ''bungee
groin."
No one has been seriously in
jured in Dale's oper.ilion. how
ever.
The key piece of equipment,
of course, is the bungee cord
Bungees, those oh-so-usefui
c ords dad used to sec ure lug
gage to the- roof-rack when the
family drove to Disneyland, are
now on the forefront ol human
Turn to BUNGEE. Page 12
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