BFL
French

BFL416 · 17.9.2021

Sylvain Michel

37-Year-Old French

Read more

8

BASE seasons

500

BASE jumps

WS BASE jumps

700

Skydives

WS skydives

Incident

Incident category:
BASE Fatality
ID:
BFL416
Object:
Earth
Cause of death:
Impact in terminal freefall
Date:
17. 09. 2021
Time:
15:00
Exit point:
Italy › Arco › Pilastro

Other incidents at this location: BFL318, BFL432

Exit type:
Vertical

Personal

Name:
Sylvain Michel
Gender:
Male
Nationality:
French
Age:
37
Experience:
Intermediate

Equipment & Setup

Canopy:
Atair Aerodynamics › OSP
Canopy size:
Container:
Suit:
Intrudair › Half A
Packing:
Slider Up
Deployment:
BOC

Circumstances

Weather:
Sunny
Factors:
180 Offheading Line twists Altitude awareness Not enough separation from object

Description

Sylvain had called his wife minutes before the jump and then no communication was received. A member of the public had called rescue services after noticing a canopy hung up on the wall.
Due to Sylvain jumping alone we are still awaiting video evidence after police finish their initial enquiries into his death.
Update as of 4th Oct 2021
Sylvain went to jump Pilastro in the afternoon after shitty weather in the morning.
The next are guesses and assumptions that are based on my own experience in jumping one piece tracking suit at this exit and with the FlySight data his wife gave me looking for answers.
Sylvain had a very good start (less than 300/300) and from there his glide is almost all the time between 3 and 3.5 until is suddenly goes down before he impacted.
I've experienced the same kind of conditions on this exit like in the video linked and it's very fun. I think Sylvain did not realize that he was flying slower than usual.
My guess is that at some point the thermals/winds giving him lift suddenly stopped and in that kind of situation the feeling is that you fall without any power to make a turn to bail out. He was probably too close to the edge of the cliff (if not over it) and when it happens he tried to turn with no chance of something happening, I don't know if he pitched or not but seeing where the parachute was hanging on the cliff I would guess he did and probably impacted during the opening.
Lesson to be learnt: Thermals are nice, but they can disappear in a fraction of second so when we are flying in them we are gliding more than usual flying at an opening height from the ground is the minimum we should have in the one piece tracksuit as we do not have the power a wingsuit can give,
but as a friend of mine experienced the same kind of situation over the same talus last year in a wingsuit, we shouldn't do terrain flying in case of wind or thermals even with over speed. Be safe !
P.S.: https://skyderby.ru/tracks/9305/video
I'm turning left at the 30th second and I guess Sylvain did not, also I got the lift all along the flight, there are some places where if I had lost it suddenly I would have been in a very bad spot
Please note the media have this name incorrect
https://www.rainews.it/.../tnt-volo-tuta-alare-base...

Gallery

Lost, but not forgotten...