Maybe, We Were Given Wings

Spence Bisley, A Third-Generation Pilot, Finds a New Way To Fly

Go Cranberley - Winter 2022/23

Kimberley’s Spence Bisley describes the moment before leaping from a cliff: “You’ve made all the necessary preparations. You’re confident you’ve done everything to mitigate the risks. Everything is heightened. In one moment, you push the fear down, right here, and turn it into energy,” he says smiling and calmly pointing to his chest.

“It’s glowing.” 

Somewhere—deep within his being—is the faith that everything is going to be ok, that he’ll fall through the sky and, moments later, land safely on earth. And, so far, he’s been right. Since 1999, Bisley has made 1090 BASE jumps—an acronym that stands for four categories of fixed objects from which one can jump: buildings, antenna, spans (bridges) and earth (cliffs).

When I first contacted Bisley—an ICU/ER respiratory therapist and paramedic, who recently relocated with his wife, Sarah, and their three-year-old daughter, Maddy, to Kimberley—he was in Italy, leaping from the top of Monte Brento’s 1200m cliffs.

I wrote Bisley, “If the world was going to implode tomorrow, this is what I’d dream of doing.” But, like most of us, I’m reminded of the cautionary adage: “If we were meant to fly, then God would have given us wings.” I’m too scared of taunting death, which eagerly awaits us. So, instead, awake or asleep, I dream of flying, of sprinting along a country road awkwardly flapping my arms. Think wild turkey, ostrich, dodo bird. But, eventually, I get there, hovering above the ground, and with the faith required of miracles, soon I’m soaring above foreign streets, fragrant with the scent of meat cooking on coals. Sometimes, I’m just below clouds, windlessly quiet, smiling as I soar effortlessly. When I wake, I’m wistful, more mortal than just moments ago. Less ethereal. Less godlike.  

But the man sitting across from me, quietly sipping a beer on a Platzl deck, doesn’t believe in these earthy constraints. His limbs are hollow bones. He doesn’t just dream of flying: Bisley’s one of 30 Canadian BASE jumpers who wingsuit soar through the sky, among birds and clouds and gusts of winds, until they pull their chute and float safely towards the ground. He’s made over 300 wingsuit flights around the world.

I’m curious and envious of Bisley,  a man who’s never had to feel what it’s like to wake from a dream. He knows what it’s like to fly, to arch his back or drop an arm to guide his flight, to avoid a granite cliff, just 30 metres from his right. 

Bisley, humble and soft-spoken, smiles when explaining his approach to what most of us dread and fear. He says it’s all about fear management and since having a daughter, his tolerance for risk has decreased significantly. But, it’s not something he feels that he can ever completely quit. “I just love to fly,” Bisley says. “It’s part of me.” As a third-generation pilot, flying is in his DNA.

At 18-years old, sick from Crohn's Disease, he thought I refuse to live like this. So, he decided to learn how to skydive.

Eventually, he progressed to a level where he could solo freefall, and twelve seconds after leaping from the plane reach terminal velocity, falling to earth at 200 km/hr. It was an experience of total freedom from fear. “The first few times, I went from a state of ‘Shit. I’m going to die’ to this hyper-aware state of calm.” He describes the zen-like state he found, where the sky and mountains became his church. Over the next twelve years, he made 350 skydives and although he loved it, skydiving still felt controlled, requiring a licence, payment and a litany of rules to follow. In 1999, he travelled to Auburn, CA, to learn BASE jumping. Still illegal at the time, he did four moonlit jumps to avoid detection. “With BASE jumping, I felt like I had more control,” he says. “It had an edge to it. I felt like a bandit in the dark, navigating the way with flashlights.”  

Following that training, he returned to Alberta with a jump in mind: Mount Yamnuska, a 2240m wall of stone, the last mountain on the north side of the Bow River Valley. “There was no one around to mentor me,” he says. “I was told, ‘Just don’t jump in the wind.’ It was the old days when we’d drop rocks and count to determine if we could jump it. We felt like gunslingers.” It was the first BASE jump made in the Canadian Rockies. After leaping, he freefalled for one second, then threw his pilot chute, triggering the release of his main chute. Two minutes later, he was safely on the ground. 

Following that jump, any object above ground became his base: bridges, silos, cranes, mountains, and antennas. At 2 am, he’d leap from cranes and office towers still under construction. He performed at Evel Knievel Days in Butte Montana, leaping from a crane, while an audience watched eagerly from below. He, and his thrill-seeking friends, would travel the world in search of new BASE adventures.

In 2008, while BASE jumping in northern Arizona, Bisley met wingsuit pioneers Dean Potter, Shane McConkey, and JT Holmes, who used wingsuits—webbed-sleeved jumpsuits that fill with air to create lift upon jump and form a wing to create flight—to double their freefalling time. Now, they no longer had to descend vertically; instead, they could fly away from the rock face. 

Having previously wingsuit flown from airplanes, this seemed like a natural progression for Bisley. “There wasn’t much to wingsuits back then. Flying wasn’t very efficient,” he says describing the original materials that let wingsuit pilots fly two feet for every foot they fell. Eventually, he was BASE jump wingsuit flying, reaching speeds of up to 160 km/hr for 30-60 seconds before pulling his chute.  

In 2018, Bisley and a friend were the second and third to wingsuit BASE jump from Mount Bryce (3,507m), the biggest wingsuit flight base in North America. As they crouched and pushed straight out from a 2400m ledge, they plummeted along the face, until their acceleration allowed their wing cells to inflate and become pressurized, resembling the shape of an airplane wing.  Bisley smiles as he describes the process. “At that point,” he closes his eyes and smiles, “it’s fun time. I’m flying. That’s when your body relaxes.” Bisley flew for just over two minutes before reaching 150m above ground and pulling his chute. 

As we finish our beer, I’m still obsessing over what Bisley’s accomplished and the risks of, arguably, one of the world’s most dangerous sports. I ask Bisley, “Aren’t you afraid of dying?”

Bisley smiles and says his approach is, “a combination of solid training, good equipment and the right conditions. It’s never reckless.” He explains the physics of flight, how gear is constantly improving, and how fastidious he is when packing his chute. “Yet, still there’s an element of risk,” he says. “We’d be careless to assume otherwise.” Despite how cautious Bisley is, he’s broken bones and kneecaps. He’s lost 12 close friends. Now settled in Kimberley with his family, Bisley is much more cautious than in his younger days. Although he's drastically reduced his jumps and flights, he still can never imagine quitting the sport of flying. It’s too much a part of him.

IG link: Biz_McTangles