BOZEMAN (AP)
In the name of summer fun, people have been jumping off 50-foot cliffs into the Jefferson River, and many have sustained significant injuries. Doctors and nurses at Bozeman Deaconess Hospital have treated dozens of serious injuries this summer including three broken backs related to cliff jumping. “We’ve just seen a rash of people, mostly in their 20s, who’ve been jumping off cliffs into the Jefferson River and sustaining serious injuries in the process,” said Diana McFeters, a registered nurse in the hospital’s emergency room. McFeters, a member of the hospital’s trauma committee, said just this month three victims required emergency back surgery to keep them from being paralyzed for life after leaping into the river. The three, all injured during the weekend of July 14, and all at the same spot on the river, had to be flown to Billings for their surgeries, as the Bozeman hospital’s only spinal surgeon was out of town. “My concern is people really don’t understand how dangerous this is,” McFeters told the Bozeman Daily Chronicle in a story Monday. “We’ve seen significantly more injuries this year than we have in years past. We’re all concerned by the increased number of injuries we’ve seen from this activity.” Why these injuries occur is really a simple lesson in physics. Sure, water is softer than concrete, but only to a point. Do a belly flop into a pool from a three-foot high diving board and you’ll walk away with a sore tummy and a bruised ego. But the higher the fall, the faster a body travels and the more energy the impact has. A 50-foot tumble into a river can be as damaging as falling onto asphalt from the roof of your house. “Water is just a lot harder than people think it is,” McFeters said. “It’s simply a matter of how long the fall is.” Jumping feet-first can spare the leaper injury if he or she enters the water perfectly vertically, like an Olympic high diver. If not, even a slight deviation can be disastrous, said Dr. Charles Fritz, an emergency room physician at Bozeman Deaconess. “We’ve seen any number of injuries, from concussions and serious bruises to compression fractures of the spine,” Fritz said. “When you hit the water vertically with your feet, legs or butt, the force travels up into your vertebrae, which are stacked up on top of each other like ice cubes, and they just get crushed.” McFeters said she believes July’s three broken-back cliff jumpers escaped paralysis; but they face months in an itchy, uncomfortable back brace and possible lifetime complications. “It’s not uncommon to be in a back brace for three or four months,” she said. “And it sets you up for serious back problems and possibly even back surgery farther down the road.”
