Wingsuit Flying
Watch: An epic wingsuit first in the Drakensberg
See the Drakensberg as you never have before...
Part of this story
Renowned for its dramatic peaks, pinnacles and valleys; importance as a haven for wildlife, and, for its wealth of rock paintings; the Drakensberg is a revered range. Now, watch the backstory behind the first-ever wingsuit flight from one of its most alluring landmarks.
Watch BARRIER OF SPEARS here>>
14 min
Barrier of Spears
The Red Bull Air Force take to the skies in South Africa. On their journey they'll be attempting to BASE jump and wingsuit various iconic locations around the beautiful country.
“We love showing people really unique amazing locations around the world in a way they’ve never seen,” says Jon DeVore, who, along with fellow Red Bull Air Force members Mike Swanson and Miles Daisher were recently in South Africa to fly wingsuits in the Drakensberg.
To launch off a few sites which had never been flown by wingsuit before...
“A lot of people have seen images of the Drakensberg region but most have never seen it from a birds eye view,” Jon says.
Looks so small distilled in 2D
© Wayne Reiche / Red Bull Content Pool
The Drakensberg, with its towering basalt peaks, dramatic pinnacles and shear rock walls forms part of the great eastern escarpment of South Africa and is the most iconic range in the land.
What forms the spine of Maloti Drakensberg Transboundary World Heritage Site was named ‘uKhahlamba’ - meaning ‘massed assegais,’ or, more colloquially ‘the barrier of spears’ by the Zulu nation centuries ago. To the ‘Voortrekkers’ (a group of Dutch descendants who trekked out of the Cape in the late 1800s this seemingly insurmountable barrier looked like that of a dragon’s back, so they called it the Drakensberge, or ‘Dragon Mountains’.
Part of the great eastern escarpment of Southern Africa
© Tyrone Bradley / Red Bull Content Pool
This dramatic mountain range has drawn adventure seekers and professional athletes for years - climbers, hikers and trail runners have explored the many wanders of the escarpment, testing themselves against the highly variable elements.
The team – which included South African wingsuit pilot Julian Boulle and local mountain expert and guide extraordinaire, Gloei Cilliers – planned to get a taste of what the region had to offer, with the goal of flying wingsuits off the iconic Eastern Buttress, which rises some 3000m above mean sea level and features a vertical rock wall before sloping down into a scree slope punctuated by dramatic stream-carved valleys.
Time, however, was tight, and the weather window in this unpredictable alpine region, small.
Toward the flow
© Tyrone Bradley / Red Bull Content Pool
“There are a lot of emotions that run through our minds when we’re faced with bad weather,” Jon says. “After planning for months and traveling for over 27 hours the energy is high and everyone is excited that it’s finally happening.”
“Then reality sets in and you realise all this effort might have been for nothing and we’re just going to sit in the rain for a week and get skunked. It’s something you have to be ready for though. Whenever you’re planning anything in the mountains you better be ready to sit and wait!”
There’s the moment you commit to pushing off the cliff. This moment is when everything slows down and a pure calmness comes over you… You are basically forced into the flow state of mind… You notice everything from a small insect buzzing by you to the colours of the rock wall that is racing by. It’s pure freedom!
Fortune favours the patient it seems, and the crew got that 'lucky' weather window and got in their jumps.
But then, there is always another pinnacle, somewhere... Says Jon: "We could barely control ourselves in the helicopter. Everywhere we looked where amazing locations. All we can say is that we will definitely have to go back."
Part of this story