Base jumper killed in tower block leap had near miss just months before
A British base jumper who fell to his death from a Thai high-rise had previously thanked a skydiving instructor for saving his life.
Nathy Odinson, 33, spoke of his close call alongside a picture of a crumpled parachute canopy falling to earth, saying: ‘You saved my life again bro.’
Nathy had documented his exploits on social media, including what turned out to be his final jump from a 29-storey tower block in the coastal resort of Pattaya on Saturday.
One previous image shows the failed canopy with no person attached above a patchwork of rural land in the Far East country as he paid the ‘big thank you’ to the friend.
The daredevil had expressed his gratitude to the British skydiving instructor and examiner in a post attracting comments about his brushes with danger.
A second picture accompanying the post in October 2023 showed a white reserve parachute laid out on mats in a facility.
Another friend wrote: ‘Dude!!! So many close calls.
‘Good to hear you’re alright.’
Nathy, from Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, seemed unperturbed by the experience when a third friend said he had had ‘another reserve ride’.
The thrill-seeker replied: ‘5 in 5 k aint bad.’
He made what turned out to be his last jump after illegally climbing to the top of the 130-metre high building.
A video shows him counting down ‘three, two, one, see ya’ in the darkness before jumping off the edge. He then goes into a tailspin with the small pilot chute flailing through the air.
Nathy is thought to have landed on a tree, hitting a branch, before crashing into the asphalt.
Security guard Kanet Chansong said: ‘I heard the sound of the tree and I thought it was a fallen branch hitting the ground.
‘A woman screamed so I walked over and realised it was a person.
‘They were dead. I saw that they had jumped from the building.’
Kanet said Nathy had jumped from the building several times before, which posed a risk for people walking below.
He added: ‘They were making video content for social media. They had done this before and they knew it was not allowed.’
Nathy’s brother, Ed Harrison, explained how the footage shows Nathy’s mini pilot parachute was caught in his harness, so there was ‘no chance’ it could have been deployed.
Ed, from St Neots, Cambridgeshire, said his brother, who had significant experience and had made ‘5,000 jumps around the world’ had made the ‘simple’ error ‘without realising’.
The 39-year-old told The Sun his brother ‘will be missed by so many… He was fun-loving and joyful and great with kids. He was a hero to my three.’
Police lieutenant Kamolporn Nadee said: ‘The parachute that the deceased used to jump malfunctioned and was not centred as expected.
‘He was in a terrible state when we arrived.
‘The friend who recorded the video of him jumping was questioned and the video was examined as evidence. Forensics officers are investigating the case further. They are examining the parachute.’
The British Embassy in Bangkok is in contact with Nathy’s UK relatives.
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