One Cape Bretoner’s leap of faith
Bridge jump only part of Glace Bay man’s love of extreme sport
A Glace Bay man who gained online viral success with his back flip jump off the Seal Island Bridge isn’t planning on stopping his extreme sport lifestyle and hopes to make a career out of it.
“I do skateboarding, snowboarding, bridge jumping, every extreme sport — I am super into it,” explained Logan LaTulippe, owner of the Cape Breton Collective social media channels.
The jump off the bottom part of the Seal Island Bridge has had more than 123,000 views on Facebook and more than 18,000 views on YouTube. It has resulted in the Cape Breton Collective YouTube page doubling in subscribers and its Facebook page receiving 1,500 more likes and followers. “It’s pretty crazy.
It’s a lot more than I thought it was going to be. I knew when I did it, it was going to get a lot of response but I didn’t expect this much,” LaTulippe said, a hint of awe in his voice.
RCMP said they do not condone jumps like this.
“Given the obvious dangers associated with such thrillseeking activity, you are also putting first responders at risk if something were to happen to an individual who chooses to jump from such heights,” said RCMP spokesperson Dal Hutchinson, via a written statement.
“Far too often we respond to incidents that are preventable. This is an example of a preventable activity that has the potential to become a tragic one involving death or injury.”
Hutchinson also pointed out the jump involved trespassing, which is illegal.
While LaTulippe said he is respectful of what law officials have said, he doesn’t plan on stopping his jumps and said he does take time preparing for the jumps to make them as safe as possible.
“It was definitely something I planned out,” he said, explaining he practised the specific landing for entering the water from the height of the Seal Island Bridge by jumping off smaller bridges and 50-foot cliffs.
“I tucked everything in, closed my legs, brought my hands up over my head and pointed my toes,” he explained.
“It still hurt when I hit the water. I have heard anything over 80 feet is going to hurt, no matter how you land. But for the most part, I was fine … I was sore for five or six days but have completely recovered now,” he added.
LaTulippe credits his friend, Brandon Boland, for getting him interested in extreme sports.
“I pretty much just sat in my room all day and played Call of Duty. Then I became friends with Brandon, who did this stuff, and he got me into it. So I thank him for getting me started because it’s what I do every single day of my life,” he enthused.
While LaTulippe has no plans for any bigger jumps at the moment — mostly because he doesn’t know of anything bigger in Cape Breton — he does think something will come along in the future.
For now, the photographer/ videographer is going to continue making videos of himself and other Cape Bretoners doing cliff and bridge jumps, skateboarding and snowboarding and posting them to his social media channels. He hopes eventually his channels will start making money and he can make this his full-time job.
And if he gets any fines from doing bridge jumping, LaTulippe said he thinks the money he will have to pay will be well worth the thousands of views his channels will get, bringing him closer to his goal of having his YouTube channel be his career.