Foot surgery success inspires woman to base jump during New River Gorge Bridge Day

WEST VIRGINIA (WOWK) – On Saturday, thousands of people will be traveling to the New River Gorge Bridge to celebrate Bridge Day , when the bridge shuts down to traffic from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. so that tourists can explore the bridge through a 5K race, rappelling from the bridge and base jumping.

One Oak Hill native who now calls Hurricane home, Kathy James, is on cloud nine because she will be the first person to tandem base jump off the bridge at this year’s event.

“I’m really excited. I can’t wait to get there and meet who I’m actually jumping with,” James said.

James has celebrated Bridge Day since she was a teenager.

“I opened the bridge with my high school band,” she recalled while looking through old photos from high school. “The next Bridge Day was a couple of years later, I think in 1980. Just have always been there and seen people jump and been a part of Bridge Day. Now it’s the 45th anniversary, and I’ll get to jump, so it’s pretty cool.”

James is just now getting back on her feet after a big setback: pain from bunions. She had multiple unsuccessful surgeries until one year ago.

“I worked with Dr. Dockery, and we were talking about it, and he said, ‘I think you’d be a great candidate for this because the Lapiplasty itself gets you up on your feet, and you’re back to doing your regular things a lot quicker than the other surgeries,” she said. “With this, they actually correct the deformity because they go down further on your foot and put plates in to keep them in place. It wasn’t very painful, and I was back up on my feet and able to do things very quickly.”

Now, she credits her Bridge Day ambitions to the surgery.

“My surgery enabled me to be able to jump this year,” James said.

Her younger self never imagined she would jump the New River Gorge Bridge.

“Because you know watching that from a younger version, I mean I always thought it would be really exciting to do that, but I never thought that I would. For some reason it’s just like it became a bucket list thing,” James said.

Her upcoming big jump will be a surprise to some of her closest relatives.

“My mom’s 94, and she doesn’t know. So, we’re trying to keep that under wraps,” James said. “I just feel that I’m very blessed that I’m healthy enough to do this and that I have a fan base that’s going to be there to watch me. That means a lot. Then I’ll tell my mom afterward.”

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