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VIDEO: Wingsuit flyers jump from Jungfrau and land inside a plane

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VIDEO: Wingsuit flyers jump from Jungfrau and land inside a plane
The pair jumped from the Jungfrau mountain. Photo: Jungfrau.ch

With its mountainous terrain and stupendous views, Switzerland has long been popular with basejumpers, who fling themselves from cliffs and ‘fly’ through the air using a wingsuit before landing in a field.

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Now two Frenchman have taken this extreme sport to an even more extreme level by jumping from the top of a Swiss mountain and landing... in a plane. 
 
Frédéric Fugen and Vincent Reffet jumped from the Jungfrau in the Bernese Oberland and landed in a Pilatus Porter light aircraft flying at altitude.  
 
The pair’s stunt was sponsored by Red Bull, which regularly backs extreme sports. 
 
Interviewed for the company’s website, Reffet said he and Fugen wanted to reproduce a 20-year-old stunt in which wingsuit flyer Patrick de Gayardon jumped from an aircraft and then flew back into the plane – except this time they wanted to start with a basejump. 
 
The duo trained intensively for the jump and had successfully landed in the plane several times. During the stunt itself they were able to communicate with the plane’s pilot. 
 
 
“We're used to jumping from the plane, but here you have to enter into it,” said Reffet. “You're falling down and all of a sudden there’s no air anymore. 
 
“When you're in the plane and you see your friend flying closer and closer, it's incredible. It was very emotional for us because we worked hard to make it happen.”
 
Switzerland’s most popular location for basejumping is the Lauterbrunnen valley, also in the Jungfrau region, which has seen many tragedies as well as success stories.
 
 
The alpine country has long been a location of choice for daredevils trying incredible feats.
 
Swiss climber Ueli Steck, who tragically died in Nepal earlier this year, set several speed climbing records on the Eiger, near the Jungfrau. 
 
Elsewhere in Switzerland Lazaro Schaller made the highest recorded cliff free jump (without a wingsuit or parachute) in 2015, jumping 58.5m down a waterfall in the Maggia valley in the canton of Tiicino.
 
 

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