As a suicide prevention initiative, signs on the Golden Gate Bridge promote special telephones that connect to a crisis hotline, as well as a 24/7 crisis text line.

An unidentified person falling from the South Tower of the World Trade Center during the September 11 attacks.

Jumping from a dangerous location, such as from a high window, balcony, or roof, or from a cliff, dam, or bridge, is an often used suicide method. The 2023 ICD-10-CM diagnosis code for jumping from a high place is X80*, and this method of suicide is also known clinically as autokabalesis.^[1] Many countries have noted suicide bridges such as the Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge and the Golden Gate Bridge. Other well known suicide sites for jumping include the Eiffel Tower and Niagara Falls.^[2] Nonfatal attempts in these situations can have severe consequences including paralysis, organ damage, and broken bones.^[3]

Jumping is the most common method of suicide in Hong Kong, accounting for 52.1% of all reported suicide cases in 2006 and similar rates for the years before that.^[4] The Centre for Suicide Research and Prevention of the University of Hong Kong believes that it may be due to the abundance of easily accessible high-rise buildings in Hong Kong.^[5]

In the United States, jumping is among the least common methods of suicide (less than 2% of all reported suicides in 2005).^[6] However, in a 75-year period to 2012, there had been around 1,400 suicides at the Golden Gate Bridge. In New Zealand, secure fencing at the Grafton Bridge substantially reduced the rate of suicides.^[7]

Suicide method

Survivors of falls from hazardous heights are often left with major injuries and permanent disabilities from the impact-related injuries.^[8] A frequent scenario is that the jumper will sit on an elevated highway or building-ledge as police attempt to talk them down. Observers sometimes encourage potential jumpers to jump, an effect known as "suicide baiting".^[9] Almost all falls from beyond about 10 stories are fatal,^[10] although people have survived much higher falls than this, even onto hard surfaces. For example, one suicidal jumper has survived a fall from the 39th story of a building,^[11] as has a non-suicidal person who accidentally fell from the 47th floor.^[12] Suicidal jumpers have sometimes injured or even killed people on the ground whom they land on top of.^{[13][14][15][16][17]}

There is limited information surrounding the demographics of those who die by jumping. However, some studies find differences between those who jump from high-rise residential buildings and those who jump from a suicide bridge. There is some evidence to suggest that younger males are overrepresented in those who jump from bridges, while age is not a notable factor in suicides from high-rise residential buildings.^[18] However, other studies have not found the same patterns.^[19]

The highest documented suicide jump was by skydiver Charles "Nish" Bruce,^[20] who killed himself by leaping without a parachute from an airplane, at an altitude of over 5,000 feet (1,500 m).^[21]

Prevention strategies

Multiple intervention strategies have been applied for these types of suicides. Some of these strategies take physical forms, such as installing barriers to restrict access at suicide sites or by adding a safety net.^[27] In 1996, safety barriers were removed from the Grafton Bridge in Auckland, New Zealand. After their removal, there was a five-fold increase in the number of suicides from the bridge.^[28] Other sites have installed signs continuing telephone hotline numbers or incorporated surveillance measures such as patrols and trained gatekeepers.^[27]

In addition to these measures, there has been a push to more closely monitor media coverage of suicide, especially suicides from well known sites, which typically involve suicide by jumping.^[27] Numerous studies have researched the impact of media coverage on suicide rates.^[29] Guidelines for media sources on how to cover the topic, such as the "Recommendations for Reporting on Suicide" (developed in collaboration with organizations such as the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, the National Institute of Mental Health, and several schools of journalism) attempt to reduce the risk of suicide contagion via responsible reporting, informing on the complexities of suicide, and publicizing resources and stories of hope.^[30]

Terminology

In the United States, jumper is a term used by the police and media organizations for a person who plans to fall or jump (or already has fallen or jumped) from a potentially deadly height, sometimes with the intention to die by suicide, at other times to escape conditions inside (e.g. a burning building).^[31] It includes all those who jump, regardless of motivation or consequences. That is, it includes people making sincere suicide attempts, those making parasuicidal gestures, people BASE jumping from a building illegally, and those attempting to escape conditions that they perceive as posing greater risk than would the fall from a jump, and it applies whether or not the fall is fatal.

The term was brought to prominence in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, in which two hijacked airliners―American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175―were deliberately crashed into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, trapping hundreds in the upper floors of both buildings and setting the impacted floors ablaze. As a direct consequence, more than 200 people plummeted to their deaths from the burning skyscrapers, primarily from the North Tower with only 3 spotted from the South.^[32] Most of these people―especially those in the North Tower―deliberately made the decision to die by jumping as a quicker alternative to burning alive or dying from smoke inhalation; however, a small percentage of these deaths were not jumpers but people who accidentally fell.^[32] Many of these victims were inadvertently captured on both television and amateur footage, even though television networks reporting on the tragedy attempted to avoid showing people falling to avoid further traumatizing viewers.^[33]

See also

• The Bridge (2006), documentary film about jumpers on the Golden Gate Bridge
• The Falling Man, iconic photograph of one of the hundreds of casualties of the September 11 attack victims who fell or jumped from the burning World Trade Center^[34]
• Lover's Leap, nickname for many scenic heights with the risk of a fatal fall and the possibility of a deliberate jump
• Suicide barrier, access-control fence erected at certain high places to deter jumpers
• Suicide bridge, particular bridges favored by jumpers

References