Sibu BASE Jump

It is very sad news that Sibu BASE jump is cancelled this year.
But it is also a very wise move by the new building managers if they are not comfortable with BASE jumpers smashing into their building, or the many other types of serious incidents that we regularly see at BASE jumping events.

Almost all BASE jumping events off buildings around the world this year have resulted in BASE jumpers crashing into the building. Not many building managers in the world are willing to take on these risks, which often result in serious injury and sometimes death. Only an insane building manager, or one that has been greatly misinformed would be willing to allow BASE jumping events that are conducted in the naive and reckless manner that Malaysian BASE event managers have re-adopted in the last few years.

The first time Malaysian BASE jumping event managers discarded all BASE jumping knowledge and insisted on organising their events in a naive and reckless manner was back in 2009 and 2010. After strong warnings given about the guaranteed results did not deter event managers, everyone eventually gave up their warnings and adopted the same carefree complacent attitude. As expected, it quickly resulted in a novice BASE jumper losing their life, which happened at Alor Setar Tower in 2010. While event managers learnt the error of their way due to this fatality and attempted to reintroduce acceptable standards and precautions back into BASE jumping events, there were always local event contractors embedded in the event who continued to undermine these efforts and ensured the flow of preventable incidents continued. It was a multi-year battle to neutralise their negligence and start to step up event safety to a minimum expected level.

A few years ago it was horrifying to see the previous Sibu Resident join forces with new KL Tower managers to again discard all the hard learnt knowledge and adequate safety precautions from Malaysian BASE jumping events, reinstalling the negligence that we had worked hard for many years to neutralise. These managers strangely maintained a strong denial that going back to organising BASE jumping events in a naive and reckless manner would achieve the same tragic results. But in reality, such erratic and misguided decision-making was literally condemning another person to death. As expected, it soon produced another fatality, this time at Putrajaya in 2020.

It was wonderful last year in 2022 that the new Sibu Resident returned Sibu to the very welcoming and friendly place it used to be, after the previous Sibu Resident had driven most of us away from Sibu BASE jumping events in 2019. However, it remained extremely concerning that Sibu continued with the naïve and reckless approach to BASE jumping events that the previous Sibu Resident installed.

Kuantan BASE Jump 2022 and Sibu BASE Jump 2022 were the first BASE jumping events in Malaysia after the fatality in Putrajaya. It was clear that Malaysian organisers had learnt absolutely nothing and were continuing to charge towards further tragedy.

All the knowledge learnt from past events had been taken away from the Sibu BASE jumper's safety briefing. The briefing consisted purely of the BASE organiser promoting himself as someone who had been organising successful events for many years. This gives a very misleading impression. In reality, we have mostly known this person to constantly undermine BASE jumping event standards and safety precautions set up by experienced organisers. The only way we eliminated various regularly occurring accidents that should have never happened at other events, was by removing him from all his areas of negligence and replacing everything he was incapable of properly providing for events. It was very strange to see managers determined to bring back all the negligence at such a high-risk event.

With absolutely no technical information about the jump being provided at the safety briefing, the BASE organiser was prompted to educate everyone about all the common issues BASE jumpers have regularly experienced there, and the mistakes BASE jumpers regularly make. This is very important information to help prevent a repeat of the many types of serious accidents that have been experienced there. The BASE organiser seemed oblivious to all the known issues and precautions required to prevent them. All he could only state was that “BASE jumping accidents just happen”. He failed to realise that most BASE jumping accidents happen due to a lack of knowledge, experience, or skills, or becoming complacent and not properly applying standard BASE jumping knowledge. All these points particularly apply to the BASE organiser who has a high accident-to-jump ratio for the relatively low number of BASE jumps he has done.

The Sibu BASE organiser, who was also responsible for the previous BASE jumping event in Putrajaya, was asked at the Sibu briefing what issues led to the fatality in Putrajaya, and if the same issues that led to the building strike were possible in Sibu. He seemed to have no knowledge of the factors that led to the fatality, and why a person he brought into BASE jumping had died. He seemed bewildered when I stated that the same issues that led to the fatal building strike in Putrajaya had been seen before in Sibu. The BASE organiser just did not have the knowledge or care to educate people and help them avoid or prepare them to deal with all the known issues.

The most concerning thing was people with zero BASE jumping experience were brought to jump from Wisma Sanyan and falsely told it was impossible for them to hit the building. The fatality at Putrajaya was due to the person hitting the building. A solid building is no place for anyone to attempt to learn to BASE jump. Not being trained with the required skills to deal with the known potential issues, being given false and dangerous information, and being taught to make bad decisions and take high risks, only continues to set up the new generation of Malaysian BASE jumpers to charge towards further tragedy. They are being taught to LUCK jump, not BASE jump. The luck they are relying on always runs out eventually, and often it does not take too long for that to happen.

During the event, I was also directed by event personnel to jump in conditions known to lead to building strikes. He seemed oblivious to the potential issues and dangers. Most BASE jumpers at events become like sheep and just follow dangerous directions by event personnel that have no knowledge.

I encourage the new building managers to look past the misguidance and spin given by novice Malaysian BASE organisers who like to falsely claim they have a high level of knowledge and experience. Instead of charging towards further tragedy, set up your BASE jumping events with reasonable standards, provide the best education for participants who often come to events with the same level of complacency and denial as novice organisers, and maintain adequate safety precautions. Seek out people who have thousands of building jumps, who have the best knowledge of what can really be expected at building events.

BASE jumping is not about pushing sensible limits to see how quickly you can get someone killed. It is about applying knowledge, skills, and an appropriate level of caution to do it repeatedly without incident.