Land Diving Ritual, Pentecost Island, Vanuatu

In 1974, Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain visited Vanuatu and observed the spectacle. The British colonial administration wanted the queen to have an interesting tour, and convinced the Anglican villagers of the Melanesian Mission at Point Cross to do so. However, the vines were not elastic enough because it was the wrong season, the middle of the wet season. One diver had both lianas broken, broke his back from falling, and later died in a hospital. Until 2006, when a diver broke his spine after landing badly and subsequently died in hospital, this was the only fatality in memory.
• Kal Müller
Kal Müller, a journalist, is the first white man to land dive. Müller waited two years for the villagers of Bunlap to invite him to jump. Before the jump, he spent seven months with the villagers. His experiences were recounted in the December 1970 edition of National Geographic Magazine, Land Diving With the Pentecost Islanders.