In a breathtaking display of gravity's triumph over ambition, a Brazilian rope-jump instructor plummeted to his demise this week, leaving the global adventure tourism industry shuddering with the kind of existential dread usually reserved for airport lounge G&Ts. The tragedy unfolded when the poor fellow, presumably having misplaced his decimal point, miscalculated. His rope went slack. His life went short. The rest is silence, except for the shrieking of international regulators demanding that Britain impose its iron grip of Health and Safety Executive forms upon the entire planet.
Now, I have nothing against rope-jumping. It seems a perfectly sensible activity for any self-respecting lunatic who wakes up and thinks, 'You know what my day needs? A sudden stop at the end of a terrifying freefall.' But the safety protocols in many sunny climes appear to be written in invisible ink on a napkin. In Brazil, it transpires, the industry's motto may as well be: 'Eh, close enough.' The poor chap's harness was probably designed by a committee that met once in a bar, and the anchor point? Possibly a palm tree with a note saying, 'Fingers crossed.'
This, naturally, has prompted the usual cacophony of voices demanding that Britain swoop in like a caped crusader with a clipboard. After all, we are the nation that has turned risk assessment into a competitive sport. We regulate the height of birthday candles, I'm told. We once spent three hours debating the safe distance between a toast rack and a marmalade pot. Our adventure tourism standards are less guidelines and more holy scripture, embossed in gold leaf and locked in a vault. The British Health and Safety Executive could summon a health-and-safety inspector from thin air within seconds of any incident, and he would produce a form with more sections than the Amazon.
But here's the rub from my perch at the end of the bar. You cannot export our standards. They are steeped in centuries of damp drizzle, queuing etiquette, and a pathological hatred of anything that might cause a bruise. Brazil is a country where chaos is a feature, not a bug. It's the land of samba, carnival, and a devil-may-care attitude that makes me reach for a second gin. Their rope-jumping industry is run by blokes with a handshake and a smile, not a laminated certificate. And while that cost a life, the solution isn't to globalise our empire of boredom.
Take it from me, as a man who once interviewed a man who claimed to have invented the safety banana; you can't legislate against every stupid mistake. You can only hope that the next instructor doesn't confuse his own weight with his enthusiasm. The real scandal is that the dead man's family will get a payout somewhere between a shrug and a 'sorry mate'. Meanwhile, I'll be in the corner, ordering another drink and writing a strongly worded letter to the universe.
So let the headlines scream. Let the MPs call for committees. But remember that the only thing worse than a dangerous rope-jump is a world where every thrill is preceded by a 47-page waiver and a five-hour training seminar. I'll take my chances with the chaos, thank you very much. At least until my next Tenerife trip.
