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35 Kilometers to the west of Mossel Bay along the N2 national road is the historical Gourits River Bridge. This is where Bungy jumping began in South Africa! Originated by Kiwi Extreme, which now operates under the Face Adrenalin banner. Gourits River Bridge is 65m high, and is the longest running bungy site in Africa.
Just as you thought you had done it all, the Gourits Bridge Swing looms ahead of you. This is the ultimate in flying without wings. Leap, fall, jump or dive off the platform while being securely attached to the opposite bridge - the ultimate swing.
Feel the rush of the air past your face as you swing over the riverbed below, underneath the bridge to the other side. Do it in tandem to get closer to that other person in your life than ever before. Alone or together, you can do it!
This is great for those who don't like to jump head first here you don't hang upside down but go off feet first ensuring that you are in an upright position at all times. This is a great activity for teambuilding and incentives. Large groupseasily catered for.
Media Release: Immediate. 5 December 2008 (Mossel Bay Tourism)
Face Adrenalin Suspends Bungy Jumping at Gourits River
Face Adrenalin - the oldest bungi jumping operator in South Africa - has temporarily suspended its bungi jumping operations off the old Gourits River bridge as a result of the condition of the bridge.
Their bridge swinging, however (which is anchored to the new national road bridge) will continue.
“This decision wasn’t taken lightly,” said Thomas Ngomana, a director of Face Adrenalin Sports and the operator of the Gourits site.
“But after the tragic boating accident during November’s heavy rains when we lost our friend and colleague, Lundi Tafeni, we decided to conduct a complete audit of the safety and integrity of our equipment and procedures.
“I must stress that Lundi’s death was a boating accident and that it had absolutely nothing to do with bungi jumping, but when something like that happens, you do take stock - and what we found was that parts of the old bridge were seriously rusted and in a very poor state of repair.
“Although we’ve been assured by engineers that there’s no chance of the structure collapsing, we’ve recently noticed that pieces of metal have started falling off the support frames, and this is where the risk to our guest’s safety could lie.
“I’d hate to think what would happen if even a piece as small as a coin were to fall from that height onto someone in the landing area in the river bed below.
“This is why we’ve stopped offering bungi jumping at Gourits,
“Our bridge swinging can continue, though, because the two operations have different landing areas. When you swing you land under the new bridge, which is in perfect condition - and there’s no chance of entering the zone of risk under the old bridge.”
Face Adrenalin CEO, Devon Tuohey, who introduced bungi jumping to South Africa, said that the company had been operating on the Gourits River Bridge - which belongs to the Western Cape Province - for eighteen years.
“We’ve sent more than twenty applications to the department concerned asking for permission to do things like improving spectator safety and crowd control - but we’ve never had any response. And, because they’re our landlords - and because we’re still operating on a month-by-month permit system even after all these years - we can’t be expected to incur the costs of maintaining the bridge and de-rusting and painting the struts that support the deck.”
“Now we have to wait and see whether or not we’ll be able to continue employing our full complement of 16 people in the present economic climate and with only one activity on offer,” said Mr Ngomana.
As the oldest commercial bungi site in the country, the Gourits River Bridge has become something of an icon, said the chairman of Mossel Bay Tourism, Neels Zietsman.
“Attractions, adventures and activities are the vital links in our tourism chain because every holiday and every business trip is planned around what’s on offer at your destination - and the fact that we have operators like Face Adrenalin in our area is one of the reasons why Mossel Bay has surged ahead in recent years,” he said.
“Mossel Bay Tourism is committed to ensuring the existence of an enabling environment in which every one of our members can continue to provide top quality products in a sustainable manner - because it makes good business sense in terms of the general economy of the town and because it means permanent employment for a great many people.
“We believe that solutions can be found in the case of the bungi jumping at the Gourits River and hope that Face Adrenalin can quickly restore this iconic attraction - both for their own business’ sake and for the sake of tourism in general,” he said.
For information on Mossel Bay, go to www.visitmosselbay.co.za.
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