page_title: Bungee jumping
section_title: Early tethered jumping
hierarchical_section_title: Bungee jumping / History / Early tethered jumping
caption_attribution_description: English: Land Diving -- Pentecost Island, photo by Christopher Hogue Thompson
context_page_description: Bungee jumping, also spelt bungy jumping, is an activity that involves a person jumping from a great height while connected to a large elastic cord. The launching pad is usually erected on a tall structure such as a building or crane, a bridge across a deep ravine, or on a natural geographic feature such as a cliff. It is also possible to jump from a type of aircraft that has the ability to hover above the ground, such as a hot-air-balloon or helicopter. The thrill comes from the free-falling and the rebound. When the person jumps, the cord stretches and the jumper flies upwards again as the cord recoils, and continues to oscillate up and down until all the kinetic energy is dissipated.
context_section_description: The land diving (Sa: Gol) of Pentecost Island in Vanuatu is an ancient ritual in which young men jump from tall wooden platforms with vines tied to their ankles as a test of their courage and passage into manhood. Unlike in modern bungee-jumping, land-divers intentionally hit the ground, but the vines absorb sufficient force to make the impact non-lethal. The land-diving ritual on Pentecost has been claimed as an inspiration by AJ Hackett, prompting calls from the islanders' representatives for compensation for what they view as the unauthorised appropriation of their cultural property.
  A tower 4,000 feet (1,200 m) high with a system to drop a "car" suspended by a cable of "best rubber" was proposed for the Chicago World Fair, 1892–1893. The car, seating two hundred people, would be shoved from a platform on the tower and then bounce to a stop. The designer engineer suggested that for safety the ground below "be covered with eight feet of feather bedding". The proposal was declined by the Fair's organizers.
caption: Land diving is a rite of passage for boys of the South Pacific island of Pentecost
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