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Grand Canyon’s Most Daring (and Foolish) Stunts

December 8, 2025·1 hr 14 min·5 clips

Robbie Knievel cleared a 228-foot Grand Canyon gorge at nearly 100 mph, then broke three ribs crashing into hay bales after landing.

1. National Park After Dark examines the history of daring live stunts staged at the Grand Canyon, from a 1922 biplane landing to a 2006 skateboard base-jump. 2. Host Cassie researched and narrated the episode; co-host Danielle has never visited the Grand Canyon and reacts as a newcomer to each stunt story. 3. The episode's core question is whether audiences watching live stunts are marveling at mastery or waiting to witness the potential fall. 4. In August 1922, World War I pilot RV Thomas landed a Lincoln Standard biplane on a 60-by-450-foot strip at Plateau Point, stopping just 50 feet from a 1,200-foot drop to the Colorado River. 5. Aerodynamics experts in 1920 declared Grand Canyon flight impossible, citing turbulent eddies and whirlpools that had torn apart test balloons—Thomas defied this consensus with a tailspin plunge from 4,000 feet. 6. Thomas and photographer Ellsworth Kolb, hired for $100, had to hike out by donkey after landing because winds prevented an immediate takeoff, and Thomas later repaired wind damage with an automobile spring and wire. 7. The National Park Service, established as the Grand Canyon's authority in 1919, now denies permits for commercial stunts, base jumping, and flights below the canyon rim, but tribal nations holding adjacent land operate under different rules. 8. The Hualapai Tribe developed attractions including a glass-bottom lookout and below-rim helicopter tours on their sovereign land, and has repeatedly approved the commercial stunts the NPS refused. 9. In September 1980, professional stuntman Dar Robinson drove a white Bradley GT sports car off a Hualapai reservation ramp into the canyon for the TV reality program That's Incredible, leaping out mid-air and parachuting to safety while the car was destroyed. 10. Evel Knievel sought a Grand Canyon jump permit in 1973 but was denied by the U.S. Department of Interior; his alternative 1973 Snake River Canyon rocket attempt failed when the parachute deployed prematurely and he crashed near the canyon floor, surviving with a broken nose. 11. Robbie Knievel, Evel's son, negotiated with the Hualapai to jump a motorcycle across Quartermaster Canyon on May 20, 1999, using a ramp that required 10,000 hours and a quarter-million pounds of steel to construct. 12. Traveling at nearly 100 mph on Fox News live television before 500 spectators, Robbie cleared 228 feet—5 feet beyond the existing world record—before crashing into hay bales and suffering three broken ribs and a severely sprained ankle. 13. Skateboarder Bob Berkwist attempted a first-of-its-kind skateboard base-jump on March 23, 2006, on Hualapai land above a 1,500-foot vertical drop for Discovery Channel's Stunt Junkies. 14. Berkwist missed the mega-rail on his first attempt and flailed in free fall dangerously close to the canyon wall before pulling his parachute; his children and family watched from the rim. 15. Undeterred, Berkwist went back up the same day for a second attempt, successfully riding down the ramp, balancing the rail, and deploying his chute—prompting his child to shout "Yeah, dad" on camera. 16. The episode notes that the Grand Canyon's geology spans 1.8 billion years, the canyon is 277 miles long and up to 18 miles wide rim to rim, and holds over 3,391 documented ancestral sites. 17. The tone is conversational and lightly comedic, with Cassie narrating detailed stunt research while Danielle offers genuine reactions and the two frequently digress into personal anecdotes—including Cassie's college dorm story and motorcycle crash memories. 18. Digressions are a deliberate feature of the format, making the episode feel more like a conversation between friends than a documentary narration. 19. Best suited for true-crime and adventure podcast listeners interested in extreme sports history and national park regulations. 20. Likely to frustrate listeners seeking a tightly edited, narration-only format without host banter and personal tangents.

As heard by us

A Grand Canyon stunt story that keeps the spectacle in view but never lets the recklessness off the hook.

National Park After Dark frames the Grand Canyon stunt as a quick look at how people dress risk up as spectacle. It opens with the familiar showmanship of Houdini, Copperfield, and Criss Angel, then moves into the 1922 airplane attempt and the plain details that make it stick:…

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Why you'd press play

For when you want a Grand Canyon stunt story that gets somehow more absurd the higher it climbs.

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