Thrill Jumper’s 876-Foot Fall to Aid Youth Club

Some people run laps around a track for charity, while others peddle chocolate bars. Frank Ricketson will jump off a bridge.

Next Saturday the Ventura business owner will leap from the 876-foot New River Gorge Bridge, in Fayetteville, W.Va. The beneficiary of this father of two’s daring feat is the Boys & Girls Club of Ventura.

Ricketson, a participant in such “gravity-powered” sports as skydiving and bungee jumping, will raise the much-needed funds performing what is known as a BASE jump. BASE is an acronym for a parachute jump off a building, antenna tower, span, or earth formation, usually a cliff.

BASE jumping is illegal in just about every state on almost every day of the year. But on the third Saturday of October, officials in Fayetteville close both northbound lanes of U.S. 19 across the bridge for one day of legal jumping.

Bridge Day attracts hundreds of jumpers, about 1,000 concessionaires and more than 70,000 spectators, and brings in about $1 million to Fayette County, according to a West Virginia State University study.

Ricketson, 32, said he chose the Boys & Girls Club as beneficiary because the nonprofit organization is neither religious nor political, and because his children use the club.

Directors at the Boys & Girls Club were relieved to discover that a BASE jumper’s gear includes a parachute. “This is definitely not the typical fund-raiser,” said Doug Caldwell, director of development.

Ricketson, whose Ventura-based Oblivion Graphics manufactures sporting goods and apparel for the extreme-sports set under the Gravity Rules logo, made the first of his five BASE jumps in December 1995, from a bridge in Placer County, Calif.

“BASE jumping is like a roller coaster ride. You can feel yourself falling,” he said. “The feeling of falling and the ability to keep your composure as you’re experiencing this euphoria is totally gratifying.”

While admitting the sport can be dangerous and in most cases illegal, Ricketson said jumpers are not out to cause harm to themselves or spectators.

He said the success of Bridge Day shows that BASE jumping is becoming more popular. “Everybody wants to do this, but it takes a lot of nerve to jump off an object,” he said.

For those who don’t have the nerve but want to become involved in the sport and at the same time support the Boys & Girls Club, Ricketson will gladly do the jumping for them. He’ll be making three jumps on Bridge Day, and sponsors can pledge money for each. One hundred percent of the donations will go to the club.

For a pledge of $15 or more, the donor will receive an official Bridge Day T-shirt; $7.50 from each T-shirt pledge will be used to pay for the shirt and the remainder will be presented to the club.

To make a Bridge Day donation, call Ricketson at 658-0217 or the Boys & Girls Club at 641-5585.