. . . beats a slow death from cancer or heart disease, or deterioration by inches in old age.
BASE jumper died on 4th leap of day
Fiance, friends say she loved skydiving, was 'really happy'
Henry K. Lee, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
Shannon Dean of San Mateo spent her workdays in the picturesque Sausalito office of a wine importer. On weekends and at night, her view was even more spectacular as a fearless skydiver who also jumped off bridges.
The veteran free-faller died Monday after her parachute failed to open on her fourth jump that day, her fiance said, from a world-renowned bridge-jumping site in Twin Falls, Idaho.
She was on a special birthday trip arranged by her fiance of nine months, Bob Ash, 42, of San Mateo, just eight days before she was to have turned 35.
"She loved to live life to its fullest. She was never content with the status quo," said Ash, who met Dean three years ago while skydiving in Byron.
Many skydivers become BASE jumpers as well. Twin Falls is one of the most popular spots in the world for practitioners of BASE jumping, which stands for the buildings, antennae, spans and earth from which they leap.
"She loved the freedom she experienced through skydiving and BASE jumping and, I think more than anything, she loved the communal aspect to skydiving and all the friends and people she met along the way," Ash said Tuesday. "She's a very loving person, and she'll be missed."
Dean jumped from the Perrine Bridge on Highway 93 over the Snake River three times Saturday without any problems, Ash said. The couple were to leave Idaho on Memorial Day, but first Dean wanted to take one last jump from the bridge.
After leaping from a structure, BASE jumpers throw out a pilot chute into the air. The chute catches the wind and is supposed to activate the parachute.
But when Dean pulled her pilot chute, it got caught in an air-pocket behind her back, Ash said. Usually, skydivers can turn their bodies if the pilot chute gets stuck. Dean ran out of time, Ash said.
Dean fell 486 feet into the Snake River at 12:10 p.m. Monday, moments after Ash kissed her at the top of the bridge and told her he loved her.
The tragedy was caught on video cameras by other BASE jumpers, said Nancy Howell, spokeswoman for the Twin Falls Sheriff's Department.
On her MySpace.com page, Dean described how she had been out of commission for several months because of back surgery. "I'm finally back in the air now," she wrote. She described her fiance as "this amazing guy."
Dean's death has cast a pall on Northern California's skydivers and BASE jumpers. On a forum at www.dropzone.com, one mourner wrote, "Enjoy that eternal freefall Shannon." Many others wrote, "Blue skies" or simply, "Blues."
"I'm really sad, because she was a really good friend," skydiver Krista Lim, 22, of San Francisco, said of her former roommate. "She was doing what she loved, and she was really happy. It was a beautiful day for her to be doing what she loved."
Dean grew up in Costa Mesa (Orange County), where she attended Orange Coast College. A wine connoisseur, she worked at Vine Connections in Sausalito, an importer of wines and sake. Several years ago, she worked for a Sacramento-area company making rigs for BASE jumping.
She had recently moved to Ash's San Mateo home after living with Lim and her husband, Thom van Os, in San Francisco. "She was just a wonderful person, loved by all," van Os said.
Dean would sometimes go BASE jumping at night, said Lim, who declined to specify locations because such thrill seekers thrive on secrecy. She had gone on about 500 sky-dives, Lim said.
"She's a beautiful person," Lim said. "Her life meant so much to so many people. Sometimes you meet people and you feel awkward, but sometime you meet people and it just clicks." That was Dean, she said.
Dean's death came at a particularly perilous day at Twin Falls. Two other jumpers were injured within an hour of her fatal plunge. Paramedics were still at the site of one of the accidents when Dean fell, Howell said.
Two other people have died from jumps off the bridge, in June 2002 and October 2003, authorities said.
There have been about 100 BASE jumping deaths worldwide since 1981. Since 2004, about 140 skydivers have died around the world, according to unofficial statistics maintained by enthusiasts.
