A 21-year-old woman reportedly died Saturday when staff at a bungee-jumping event pushed her from a bridge without her being strapped to a safety rope, dropping her about 130 feet into a ravine.
The incident occurred on the “Skeleton Bridge” in Limeira, in the state of São Paulo. Six people connected to the event have been taken into custody: five men and one woman.
Maria Eduarda Rodrigues de Freitas was carried onto the platform by two men, then shoved from the edge, according to a video of the fall that surfaced online, as bystanders yelled that she didn’t have a rope tied to her and plummeted some 40 meters into a canyon. Medics pronounced her dead at the scene.
Local reports of what happened say that witnesses told Military Police that workers apparently forgot to tie her to a safety cord before pushing her over, said The Sun.
Freitas had posted images on social media from the bridge showing the event, its setup, equipment, and other participants; among the pictures were pictures of a banner for Entre Cordas, the business responsible for the bungee jumping, according to reports.
“Who was the crazy person that let me jump off a bridge???” the woman wrote in a post.
Her fiancé, who had also been at the event, was receiving medical treatment after becoming ill on hearing of her death, according to a local news account that tracked rescue operations.
Some organizers reportedly ran from the scene shortly after she fell, and authorities later located two who had fled with the aid of a police helicopter that surveyed a patch of woodland next to the bridge, local station Rpido no Ar reported.
The Civil Police department is investigating the incident and will decide whether the arrested suspects will be charged with crimes.
