By ,
Published January 13, 2015
The father of bungee jumping is planning the ultimate swan dive.
A.J. Hackett, the 48-year-old New Zealander who pioneered the extreme sport, is planning a nearly mile-long plunge from a helicopter above Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, later this year, the U.K. Daily Telegraph reports.
At 4,920 feet, the stunt would double the existing record for the world's highest bungee jump.
The extreme jump is possible due to advances in technology made at a training facility in Macau, Hackett said.
"We developed this new technology which is a tapered bungee cord, fatter at the top than it is at the bottom," the Telegraph quoted him as saying. "It means you can stretch them a long, long way.
"With standard cords that you have today you just can't do that because they break," he continued. "They just get stretched too much at the top."
The Dangerous Sports Club at Oxford University is credited with the early beginnings of modern-day bungee jumping in the 1970s, basing it on the ritual jumps of Vanuatu island residents in the South Pacific, according to the Telegraph. But it is Hackett, who first found fame in 1986 plunging from the Eiffel Tower in Paris, that is credited as the father of the sport.
Click here to read the Telegraph story.
https://www.foxnews.com/story/bungee-jump-pioneer-plans-ultimate-swan-dive