An exchange student from Japan is presumed dead after being swept over Niagara Falls on Sunday night, authorities say.
The woman, in her 20s, who was studying in Toronto, climbed on to a pillar overlooking the Canadian side of the falls and slipped over, police said.
She then fell into the Niagara River about 80ft (24m) up from the edge of the falls and was swept over.
My first thought was: suicide. I next thought of that strange scene in the movie Tokyo Decadence, where a man fantasizes about virgins leaping into Mount Fuji. But my initial thought was completely wrong. This was no suicide or ritual. It was captured on CCTV.
The woman, who was visiting with a friend, had been taking a photograph, then climbed on to a pillar holding an umbrella before standing up for a clearer view, police said.
She lost her footing as she tried to climb down from a block pillar and tumbled into the fast-moving river, police said.
A slip of the foot, the fall, the impossible force of the river, the roaring horizon of her terrible end.
Good Morning Charles,
I just read that a minutes ago in the paper. Quite tragic.
Very sad. I think the Japanese want to get as close as possible to all the beauty in the world.
Trivia: Mudede is the one who came up with the phrase “A man, a plan, a canal: Panama”.
@2 – There’s a racist joke about eyesight in there, but I’m too much of a lady to make it. I’ll let one of the trolls do it.
They should totally build a statue to memorialize her poor judgement…
http://espn.go.com/dallas/mlb/story/_/id…
Well, at least she got a view of the falls that very few other people have ever had.
Her last words?
“Sugoi ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!”
@2: Charles, are you posting comments to your own posts with a different account?
Don’t go chasing waterfalls.
add this to the SE asian kids that got swept over Vernal Falls in Yosemite last month. tough year to be a gaper.
stay behind the railings. don’t cross that steep snow slope in flip flops. don’t tease tigers in their enclosures.
Those are good tips. Also, don’t grab the subway doors and try to force them open as the train rolls away. Don’t dive to to the bottom of the deep end of the swimming pool and see if you can fit your wrist between the slots of the grating on the drain, there.
But the best tip of all: Don’t ignore the very clearly worded and illustrated signs that say Keep Away From The Edge – Do Not Climb On The Railing – DANGER.
@12 not much help to a non English speaking tourist.
@ 13 – Indeed, how was she to know it was dangerous?
A lot of you have probably never been to Niagara Falls. When you’re standing there feet away from those billions of tons of water, the raw power of what’s happening there is simply breathtaking. Anyone with enough intelligence to walk and chew gum at the same time shouldn’t need a sign to tell them it’s dangerous.
Not to be disagreeable, but who knows it was a “terrible” end? We all end. If it’s a taxi, or a bomb, or a disease or a sword or age, we all -end-. No one reading this will be around in a century.
It might have been the climactic moment of a superlative day. How long must we live, how well, for our end not to be “terrible”? Is it “terrible” when the fox eats the rabbit “too soon” for the rabbit?
@16, yes, it is terrible when an enormous snarling fox tears out your entrails, killing you.