Free Republic

A mom of two has died in front of her son after slipping off an almost 300-foot-high platform while trying to take a selfie to celebrate completing a dangerous bungee jumping stunt, authorities in Russia said. Extreme sports fanatic Elizaveta Gushchina, 45, carried out the jump on Saturday — the same day she plummeted to her death in front of her 22-year-old son, Nikita, according to local authorities. Gushchina then returned to the top of the 289-foot chimney at an unfinished thermal power plant without her safety harness to take a selfie with her son when she lost her footing...

The Corinth Canal is a waterway that crosses the narrow isthmus of Corinth to link the Gulf of Corinth to the Saronic Gulf...It is believed that Periander, the tyrant of Corinth (602 BC), was the first to conceive of the idea of digging the Corinth Canal. As the project was too complicated given the limited technical capabilities of the times, Periander constructed the diolkós, a stone road which allowed ships to be transferred on wheeled platforms.Later on, Macedonian king Dimitrios Poliorkitis (c. 300 BC) tried to dig the canal, but his team of engineers warned him that if a connection...

A Colorado woman’s death remains a mystery after investigators said the device at the center of her bungee jumping accident was functioning properly. The Colorado Department of Labor and Employment worked with manufacturer Head Rush Technologies to test the device and is not investigating other potential reasons for the Jan. 4 fall that killed 20-year-old Ciara Romero, reports the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. Romero was participating in a 70-foot bungee-jump feature at Get Air at the Silo when she fell. Participants climb one of the silo’s towers, then transfer to a wooden platform and jump off while attached to a...

AN EXPERT has warned that bungee jump safety may be fatally flawed. Evidence from an inquest into the horrific death of a 22-year-old Welsh student at a charity jump raises safety concerns for jumpers across the UK. Chris Thomas, a 20-stone photographic technician from Llanelli, plunged to his death after leaping from a 180ft crane in the car park of a pub in Swansea. The appalling accident at the Old Barn Inn in Pontlassau, Morriston, was witnessed by onlookers at a family fun day including Chris's girlfriend Helen Perkins, 23, and his parents David and Yvonne Thomas who were filming...