Harrowing video captures base jumper leaping to death

News

By Yaron Steinbuch

DISTRESSING CONTENT WARNING

Chilling video captured a British daredevil unknowingly leaping to his death as his parachute failed to open during a base jump from a 29-story building in Thailand.

Nathy Odinson, 33, who posts videos of his stunts on social media, climbed atop the building in the coastal resort of Pattaya on Saturday night, the Daily Mirror reported.

A friend captured him smiling as he checks and adjusts his equipment, including a camera that he realizes is not recording so he takes off his helmet to press a button.

Odinson then checks his chute, says, “Three, two, one, see ya!” — and takes the fateful plunge.

In the shocking video, he can be heard hitting a tree and landing on the ground after the green pilot chute he was holding failed to deploy.

Paramedics pronounced him dead and an investigation into the tragic accident has been launched. Police suggested the parachute merely “malfunctioned,” while Odison’s brother blamed “user error.”

Kanet Chansong, 33, a security guard who was nearby during the incident, said: “I heard the sound of the tree and I thought it was a fallen branch hitting the ground.”

“A woman screamed so I walked over and realized it was a person. They were dead. I saw that they had jumped from the building,” Chansong added, according to The Mirror.

He said Odinson had had jumped from the building several times before.

“They were making video content for social media. They had done this before and they knew it was not allowed,” Chansong said.

Police Lt. Kamolporn Nadee said that the parachute “malfunctioned” and was being examined.

“He was in a terrible state when we arrived,” the cop said,

“The friend who recorded the video of him jumping was questioned and the video was examined as evidence. Forensics officers are investigating the case further.”

The British Embassy in Bangkok was notified of the tragedy and was contacting Nathy’s family in the UK.

 “We are supporting the family of a British man who has died in Thailand,” a Foreign Office spokesperson said.

Odinson’s brother Ed Harrison, 39, told The Sun that the harrowing video showed how the small pilot chute got caught in his harness.

He said simple “user error” led to the tragedy.

“Looking at that video, any skydiver would immediately tell you what is wrong,” Harrison told the outlet.

“As he is standing, he is holding a white mini parachute called a pilot chute that has a cord going to the main chute, which is the bridle,” he said. “You throw the pilot chute into the relative wind flow and that deploys the main chute in his bag on the back.

“What you can clearly see is that the bridle is routed through his harness so there is no chance it could have opened the main chute,” Harrison told The Sun.

“It was a simple mistake he had made without realizing. He looks hurried which is a bad thing, perhaps worried someone might have stopped the jump,” he said.

“It’s a really simple thing and you can see he has tried to rectify the bridle but he hasn’t looked and no one else has done a check for him. Base jumping is dangerous because you don’t have a second chance,” the brother said.

“The equipment was checked after he died by a professional rigger and it was in good working condition. There was no problem with his kit,” he added.

Harrison said his brother had more than 500 jumps under his belt from all over the world.

“He had jumped in America, Spain, New Zealand, Thailand and the Philippines and had made friends in all of those places,” he said.

“He was fun-loving and joyful and was great with kids. He was a hero to my three children. They spoke to him frequently as I video-called him every other day. They still can’t believe this is real,” Harrison said.

He noted that Odinson had been using the same chute as Rowan Atkinson’s character in the 2011 James Bond parody “Johnny English Reborn” – and even still had the word “spying” on it.

Harrison said another skydiver who worked as a consultant on the flick gave his brother the chute about a year ago.

Base jumping derives from the acronym BASE, which stands for four categories of fixed objects from which a person can jump: buildings, antennas, spans and earth.

The sport is significantly more dangerous than skydiving because jumpers have just a few seconds to react in case something goes wrong and typically have no backup.