A female base jumper died in what she had said was going to be her final jump before retiring.
Wioletta Roslan had pledged to give up the high-risk sport after falling pregnant, but decided to make one last jump which ended in tragedy.
The 37-year-old Swede was four months pregnant when she died after her parachute failed to open during a base jump near Stechelberg in Switzerland.
Her boyfriend Aleksander Domalewski jumped alongside her and could do nothing but watch as Ms Roslan realized her parachute wouldn’t open and spread her arms awaiting the impact of the 990ft drop.
The Via Ferrate cliff was Wioletta’s favorite spot for base jumping and she had been there many times before with her partner.
She was experienced in extreme sports after taking up skydiving as a 19-year-old in Malmo in southern Sweden.
Her mother Halina Zaniewska-Pettersson, 68, said: ‘I was always terrified every time I knew that she was doing the sport again and I kept expecting the worst – when she said that she was going to do one last jump while pregnant I begged her not to go.
‘But she always wanted to carry on. I couldn't force not to do it – she was old enough to make up her own mind about things.’
Wioletta had managed to build a successful career as an inspector working on oil rigs – and in her spare time traveled the world as a professional base jumper.
Ms Roslan said in a recent interview for Swiss television that base jumping made her feel alive and made her feel that there were no limits in life.
She said: ‘I only feel alive when I jump. I find normal life boring. I know that death always flies with me but we only have a certain amount of time on the earth. When the sun goes down then it's game over whoever you are.’
She had lived in the Berner Oberland region for two years doing odd jobs in order to spend every spare moment jumping from local cliffs.
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TXT 24
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