Balcony-jumping craze: Most are drunk Brits

They’re young, on holiday, drunk and sometimes high, and they decide to jump from their hotel or apartment balcony into the pool. But some miss and end up in hospital, ... or worse, dead.

The so-called balconing craze has taken off to such an extent in Spain’s Balearic Islands that doctors at the Son Espases hospital in Palma de Majorca — a major trauma center — decided to study the phenomenon.

“It’s endemic,” said Xavier Gonzalez, head of surgery at the hospital who participated in the study.

“It’s like an initiation rite for some tourists, whose parents already came here when they were young.”

The 2010-15 study only covers patients who were treated in hospital and not those who died while “balconing”— a term that refers to people who throw themselves into pools or fall while trying to get to another balcony or simply leaning over.

Altogether, the hospital treated 46 patients during that time, more than 60 percent of whom were British, followed by Germans and then Spaniards, the study found.

Only one woman was involved, all the others were men, aged 24 on average.

The fall itself was from an average height of eight meters.

Alcohol was involved almost every time, and in close to 40 percent of the cases, drugs also played a role.

Altogether, the craze has cost $1.7 million in hospital fees, Gonzalez said, as patients can remain in intensive care for a long time, some ending up paraplegic.

It is unclear exactly how many people have died from “balconing”, but Spanish media have reported more than adozen deaths in the past five years.

The craze also happens on Spain’s Costa Brava, but it is most prevalent in the Balearic Archipelago, which includes Magaluf and Ibiza among its famous resorts, Gonzalez said.

Further afield, Bulgaria has also been hit by “balconing”.

In a bid to curb the trend, authorities in the Balearic Islands have implemented measures — printing preventive leaflets and handing out fines to people caught trying to jump from balconies.