Going “Over the Bridge” at the New River Gorge

 

FAYETTE COUNTY, W.Va. — The iconic New River Gorge Bridge in Fayette County looks much different from below the busy bridge deck while suspended on ropes somewhere in the 270 feet between the Bridge Walk platform and the road below it.

“It’s not as scary as I expected,” Levi Powell, 17, a Boy Scout from Charleston, told MetroNews soon after rappelling on Saturday, a trip he took down more than 23 stories with no previous rappelling experience.

During the “Over the Bridge” fundraiser for the Buckskin Council of the Boy Scouts of America on Oct. 29, participants will rappel from the Bridge Walk platform located directly under the New River Gorge Bridge.

“I felt like I was really in control. It was a nice view and I just lowered myself down.”

Powell, other Boy Scouts like him, Venturer Scouts, Scout executives, media members and others clipped in for a special event Saturday at the New River Gorge Bridge ahead of a planned October fundraiser to benefit the Buckskin Council of the Boy Scouts of America.

Created in partnership with Over the Edge, a nonprofit rappelling company, the fundraiser is called “Over the Bridge.”

With it, the first 70 people who register and raise at least $1,000 through the Buckskin Council’s website will secure a rappelling slot on the New River Gorge Bridge for “Over the Bridge” coming up on Oct. 29.

“Every year, we have boys come into Scouting. They do pay a registration fee, but it doesn’t really come close to covering the costs of all of the camps and everything that we do for them, so we have to have funding to help,” said Dr. Glenn Harrison, program vice president for the Boy Scouts of America’s Buckskin Council.

 

 

The only other sanctioned event annually for rappelling off the New River Gorge Bridge is Bridge Day when a team and training is required.

For the Oct. 29 “Over the Bridge” event, no rappelling or climbing experience is necessary.

“Our adventure gives the perception of risk, rather than risk-taking,” Harrison explained, likening it to some of the activities Boy Scouts, Venturer Scouts and Cub Scouts participate in throughout the year.

“That is, this looks really risky to jump off the New River Gorge Bridge. It was much more risky to drive here today if you came from Charleston. You were much more likely to get in an accident on the road than you were to have any problem coming off the Bridge here because there are so many safety things in effect.”

Eliza Wunderly, 16, a Venturer Scout from Kanawha County, had no fear about her rappelling trip. Scouting, she said, had already given her an opportunity to do a lot of different things.

“I went to the Summit (Bechtel Reserve) and we did the skate ramp and rock climbing and they’ve got the canopy tour and the ziplines and the big zip that goes over the lake. That’s really cool,” she said.

“They’ve got this ‘leap of faith’ thing, where you kind of, like, run and jump off a building and you freefall for five seconds and then it catches you.”

Off the New River Gorge Bridge, the first steps were the hardest, Powell said. “I was a little bit scared when I was standing up on the Bridge and had to kind of jump over the edge, but on the way down it was fine.”

Based in Charleston, the Buckskin Council of the Boy Scouts of America serves Scouts in 32 counties in West Virginia, Virginia, Kentucky and Ohio.





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