Dennis RomeroJeb Corliss, the insane Venice base jumper who calls himself “fearless,” lived up to that adjective this week when he told ABC News that he will “jump again” following a caught-on-video (after the jump) accident in South Africa that left his leg bones in pieces.
He's expected to get out of the hospital today, more than a month after he slammed into a rocky ledge as he flew in his wing suit at an estimated 120 miles an hour.
The collision prompted a quick-thinking Corliss to …
… pull a chord on his emergency parachute, which opened and slowed him down. But Corliss was apparently so low by that point that he still landed hard enough to break his legs.
The 35-year-old told ABC News via bedside phone that base jumping, a sport he helped advance with a specially designed wing-suit and elaborate stunts featuring jumps from the Eiffel Tower and the Golden Gate Bridge, is “what I live for:”
Corliss does Rio.; Credit: Jeb Corliss / Facebook
The only reason I'm getting better is so that I can jump again. That's what I do. There's absolutely nothing in this world that's going to stop me from jumping.
Guess the only bad news here is that South African authorities say he didn't have a permit to jump at Table Mountain National Park and that Corliss could be fined or even charged for his Jan. 16 jump.
Probably won't hurt as bad as those legs, regardless.
[@dennisjromero / djromero@laweekly.com / @LAWeeklyNews]
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