{"id":34913,"date":"2021-07-01T06:59:22","date_gmt":"2021-07-01T06:59:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.skydivemag.com\/new\/?p=34913"},"modified":"2021-07-12T13:10:52","modified_gmt":"2021-07-12T13:10:52","slug":"catching-up-with-amber-forte-and-espen-fadnes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.skydivemag.com\/new\/catching-up-with-amber-forte-and-espen-fadnes\/","title":{"rendered":"Catching up with Amber Forte and Espen Fadnes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A chance to learn more about this cool power couple in love with human flight…<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Amber and Espen at the beginning of their journey
Photo courtesy of Amber and Espen<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Espen Fadnes is one of the few people that evolved in the VKB golden era, with more than 20 years of continuous BASE jumping and wingsuit proximity flying. Some will say \u201cold school\u201d\ud83d\ude42.\u00a0 Amber Forte is just the opposite, fully new school, from the tunnel to the sky and then to BASE.\u00a0<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

We were privileged to have the chance to get in their heads and find out how their dynamic works.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Espen grew up near the Troll Wall, the son of a rock climber, so he found himself standing on many Norwegian exit points from a young age \u263a. He says that he felt BASE close to him, but he never really contemplated starting skydiving \u2013 and when he did he had no expectations. \u201cI was coming from an upper middle class family and it was expected to have a very good education and a meaningful job after, so skydiving was not expected to be anything else but a hobby. And it was scary! I remember I was so scared when I did my first jump, a static line. I let go of the plane and I was almost immediately under the canopy\u2026 and I was like \u201cnow what?!?\u201d\u2026 But I liked it. I liked the feeling of losing a bit the control. I came from a tradition of very organized sports so jumping out of planes was a bit wild and interesting and I was completely shit at it. It was fun \ud83d\ude42. All the instructors were my age and that was really weird for me. We used a shitty plane back then, a small Cessna, the weather was bad\u2026 But I loved it and I loved the community. If we wanted to jump back then we had to call the pilot and beg him to come, and we had to find an instructor with the proper license, then talk to the farmer and ask his permission to land on his field\u2026 it had a bit of a \u201ccowboy\u201d feel\u201d.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Amber the road to Voss was interesting. She left England at 18 and set on a journey to travel the world. She was on a quest for a place that she could call home, a job, and a passion that would give her meaning in life. She started her journey in Australia, then moved to New Zealand, then back to Australia and this was the time she started working in skydiving and jumping. She loved it from the beginning, going to work became pure fun and she pushed herself as much as possible to get better at it.  In 2014 Amber got a job at the tunnel in Sydney. \u201cThat was the moment the journey toward being a more professional coach and tunnel person started, but things really got going when I moved to Norway\u201d.     <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cStarting skydiving and deciding to get good at it brought a focus and dedication in my life that I really didn\u2019t have before.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Team OneCall with Amber and Espen
Photo by Andreas Hemli<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

BASE jumping in the VKB era               <\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Espen is part of the very small group of people that have been constantly base jumping and flying proximity for more than 20 years and it all started with the VKB golden age [VKB<\/strong> is an acronym for V\u00e6rdal’n<\/a> Karsk<\/a> og BASE, a BASE jumping group based in Trondheim, Norway. They specialize in high-speed tracking and proximity flying<\/em>].<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe years between 2001 and 2005 were probably the wildest ride I was going to experience in my life. I think I was incredibly lucky to be in the right place at the right time to live through the complete change of BASE jumping. The sport basically went from jumping off and falling straight down to proximity flying in 3 years. I remember I was young and immature but I had a lot of guts and interest, I understood the mountains and I was there with some of the most inspiring and interesting people of this sport. There were a couple of key figures, the most important one being Hans Lange, who changed things and I think the mentality of VKB was highly important because they approached the issue with no limits. They were science people. They did all the math, all the calculations and they realized that there are more things that are possible to do, you just need to know what you are doing, through gathering data and understanding how far you can actually fly. And in the middle of these calculations Lo\u00efc Jean-Albert came\u2026 He was quite young, but already a World Champion in 4-way and 8-way. He was a super-talented and highly-motivated second generation skydiver from Reunion Island. He basically invented proximity flying. He had his own wingsuit and he already knew so much about flying that while other people, BASE jumpers and VKB flyers were still trying to figure things out, he just looked at the whole picture and started flying next to the terrain. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I never felt uncomfortable with Espen’s extremely fast progression. He got it all; a skilled mountaineer and climber with motoric talent and an ability to control stress. Perception was fully on from exit to landing. A fast learning person that listens. One of the very few…<\/p>Hans Lange<\/cite><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Espen and friends in the early BASE jumping days
Photo from JT Holmes’s Facebook page<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I met Lo\u00efc in 2004 and I think 2 or 3 months before I had an epiphany. I was jumping with a friend and I could not keep up with his tracking, he was better than me, and I got a bit annoyed and I was like \u201cscrew this fancy tracksuits and how far you can fly from the wall\u201d… I just took a deeper angle and dove into a canyon in freefall and flew through the canyon pretty close to the terrain and I was absolutely shocked by the view. It was just ridiculous. Everything happened so fast and things were passing by so quickly. I had a camera; after I landed we watched the video and it was way cooler by far than anything we had done before. And then Lo\u00efc came \u263a. What he showed the community then was just the most badass, amazing proximity flying you could ever imagine. It was a complete game-changer. He was flying for 5 minutes above the ground, with an intercom system, talking to the photographer, wearing smoke \u2013 everything was so next level. It was insanely cool. He was pushing so much because of his skills. He was like a combo of skills and balls\u2026 I knew instantly there and then that this was the path. Of course the difference between him and I was that he had a lot of skills and I didn\u2019t… but I had a lot of guts and I was willing to do it anyway. Lo\u00efc went on his journey and we basically learned proximity flying by watching his movies, testing things ourselves and listening a bit to the old VKB guys that said: \u201cOk, ok, we see what you are doing. But remember the numbers!\u201d\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen I met Lo\u00efc again, some years later, I knew how to do it \ud83d\ude42\u201d Espen smiles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I remember flying with Espen in Norway back in 2006. At that time proxy flying did not really exist. When I came back the year after to fly with Shane and the boys, I saw him sending some high speed proxy and realized the boy was super skilled and had been training hard in his perfect playground: Norway. It was an honor to host him and his crew in Reunion. I am always super happy to see his videos and achievements and to see he is safe and in good shape\u2026 which is not so common in our sport!<\/p>Lo\u00efc Jean-Albert<\/cite><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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“Superterminal” movie by VKB<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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