Alan McCandlish, the Taupo base jumper who died after falling from a cliff in Switzerland last weekend, knew his sport might kill him.
The 31-year-old extreme sports enthusiast, who died in a base-jumping accident in the Swiss mountain region of Berner Oberland on Saturday morning told New Zealand Geographic magazine last year that despite the danger, it was only by moving past his fears that he could feel truly free.
"All of my close friends and myself have been witness to a fatality. That's the reality," Mr McCandlish said. "We don't dwell on it or fear it. That sounds like a death wish or something, but for me, it's sort of a wish for life."
He is the second Taupo man to die base jumping in just over a year after former Taupo skydiving instructor Ted Rudd, 35, died in June 2011 after a failed jump off a mountain near his home in Norway.
According to New Zealand Geographic, a British Journal of Sports Medicine study found the overall fatality risk during a single year was 1 in every 60 participating in the sport.