Base Jumper Dies Attempting Illegal Jump At The Grand Canyon

A man attempting to base jump from the South Rim of the Grand Canyon died on Thursday (August 1). Park officials said that rangers were dispatched to an area near Yavapai Point in Grand Canyon National Park after receiving reports that somebody had attempted to jump off a cliff.

Base jumping is an extreme sport in which a person uses a parachute to jump from a fixed location at a high altitude.

The area where he jumped was over 5,000 feet above the river below .

When the park rangers arrived, they found the man's body with a deployed parachute 500 feet below where he jumped. On Friday, recovery operations were undertaken to retrieve the body, which was transported to the Coconino County Medical Examiner's Office.

Officials said they are still trying to identify the body.

The National Park Service said base jumping is illegal throughout the Grand Canyon.

"BASE jumping, a high-risk activity involving parachuting from fixed objects, is prohibited in all areas of Grand Canyon National Park," officials said in a press release .