Safety isn’t a concern for tourists, RCMP or Capilano Suspension Bridge staff after a 30-year-old Ontario man fell 200 feet to his death off the site’s Cliffwalk attraction Saturday afternoon.
The site was open for regular hours Sunday and while most tourists were unaware of the incident, hearing about the fatal fall didn’t faze them.
Visiting from Minneapolis, Kim Menk felt “completely secure” on the Cliffwalk – all the while manoeuvring the narrow walkway with a cast over her broken leg.
“I’m in this boot and I was feeling fine walking across the bridge,” she said.
The man fell around 5:30 p.m. Saturday near the end of Cliffwalk, a 200-foot high narrow bridge that hugs the winding cliff face.
While RCMP have not released the man’s name, they said he was visiting from St. Catharines, Ont. with extended family. Family members were present when he fell.
North Vancouver RCMP and the coroner’s office are investigating and reviewing witness statements and surveillance videos to determine exactly what the man was doing at the time.
On Monday, surveillance video shows the man climbing over a metre-high fence to retrieve something he dropped onto a lower ledge when reaching for his camera.
The RCMP said the man then lost his footing, plunging over 66 metres to the canyon floor.
According to Cpl. Richard DeJong, the incident doesn’t indicate a safety concern.
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“We’re hearing that he dropped something and that’s what we’re hoping the tape will show,” he said. “There are reports showing that he dropped something, couldn’t reach it, so he tried to climb over.”
Visiting from Ohio with his family, Patrick Zerillo felt completely safe walking the bridge.
“After the incident it still doesn’t bother me – you just have to use common sense,” he said.
Indianapolis resident Beverly Smith agreed and said a lot of the safety measures are up to the individual.
“It seemed like it’s a very protected area and that you would really have to knowingly go outside of the safety features they had put in place to put yourself at risk,” she said. “I felt very safe and secure.”
Capilano Suspension Bridge spokeswoman Sue Kaffka said guest safety is their top priority.
“The safety of our park is still very, very good – we would never ever compromise our safety for our guests,” said Kaffka.
“When you come into the park the first thing you see are safety signs and there’s a safety sign right at the entrance and all of our attractions have safety signage.”
The company also regularly conducts safety reviews.
“Just through our normal business process we review safety issues every month regularly and if anything ever came up we’d certainly review it and after an incident like this there will be a review – there always is,” said Kaffka.
Kaffka said grief counsellors were also brought in for staff.
Visiting from California, Julie Lieber believed the precautionary measures were enough.
“I think he should have followed the signs,” she said. “There’s no concern for safety. The sidelines are shoulder height – you can barely lean over to see the water.”
In June 2010, 17-year-old Daniel Cho fell from a cliff while visiting the bridge on a class trip from the San Francisco area. The coroner’s investigation found the young man was high on LSD at the time and it was not deemed a safety issue.
In 1999, 17-month-old Kaya Hama fell from her mother’s arms and plummeted 50 metres from the suspension bridge into the rock canyon. She survived after tree branches broke her fall. This incident also wasn’t found to be a safety issue.
Barb McLintock of the BC Coroner’s Service noted a disturbing pattern of deaths of out-of-province visitors who fall victim to a false sense of security in dangerous situations.
“Every summer we get tourists or non-residents who seem to have unfortunate deaths in the B.C. wilderness,” McLintock told The Province.
“But that which makes British Columbia’s scenery so spectacular and beautiful also tends to make it a lot more dangerous than a lot of other parts of the world.”
She suggested nresidents take time to explain this to friends and family who come to visit.
“Make sure they understand that things in B.C. can be much trickier than they seem, although they might look the same at home,” she said.
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