By Daily Mail (U.S.) | Created at 2025-01-08 19:46:54 | Updated at 2025-01-09 10:29:29
14 hours ago
A professional freeskier recorded himself performing a death-defying jump off a cliff and over a highway outside of South Lake Tahoe in California.
Josh Daiek, 41, performed a similar stunt in February 2019, launching himself off a 90-foot cliff and doing a backflip before landing on the other side of the highway with ease.
This time around, he wanted to update his 'road-gapping' stunt by introducing a gas-powered winch and a parachute into the equation.
Filmed two springs ago, the roughly five-minute video shows Daiek holding onto a rope from the winch as it pulled him forward.
He then sped at 40 miles per hour toward an ice ramp built right at the cliff's edge.
Once in the air, it's estimated that Daiek was about 170 feet above the pavement of Highway 50.
The video then freezes - showing the other side of the road with virtually no snow.
'What the hell have I got myself into this time?' Daiek narrated.
Josh Daiek is seen skiing off a small ice ramp at the edge of a 170-foot cliff
The moment Daiek skied off the cliff and over Highway 50, hoping to glide into the valley below
His goal was not to just stick the landing on their other side of the road, but rather to perform a ski-BASE jump off the mountain with enough speed to parachute down into the bottom of Christmas Valley, he told The San Francisco Chronicle.
A BASE jump is when someone parachute jumps from a fixed object. BASE is an acronym for 'Building, Antenna, Span (bridge), Earth (cliff).'
Unfortunately for Daiek's stunt, the sun melted the snow a too much, preventing him building enough momentum and speed to complete the daredevil jump.
While airborne, he was able to pull his parachute, which slowed his descent into the muddy snow on the far side of the highway.
He said the landing was partly due to the poor snow conditions and his chute opening at the wrong angle.
'Well this is certainly not how I planned on this stunt going,' Daiek said in a voiceover.
'I got super lucky on this one. And to be honest, I'm pretty embarrassed to even be putting this out there.
'But I also think it's important to share failures and show that we're human and even with endless practice and training, s*** can still go wrong.'
The moment before Daiek crashed into muddy snow on the other side of the road
Daiek said he thought it was important to show the stunt, even though it failed
Daiek said he practiced the stunt numerous times and tested the conditions before fully giving it a go.
'I also know that my vision for this jump was completely right and this gap fully goes,' he continued.
'So next time, more speed, on-heading (parachute) opening, and I'm flying my canopy to the valley floor.'
By Tuesday afternoon, the video had nearly 290,000 views on YouTube.
