Israeli dies in leap from Eiffel Tower

Published on 25/06/2012 20:53

A 25-YEAR-OLD man from Israel jumped to his death from the Eiffel Tower after by-passing security measures and climbing the Paris monument at twilight on Sunday, police said yesterday.

The man, who was not identified, mounted the tower’s western pillar after it was closed to the public on Sunday night. The man was approaching the third-level observatory deck of the tower, at 900ft, when rescue climbers made it to the scene, police said.

The rescue climbers starting talking to him but then he jumped, landed on the tower’s second floor and died on impact, soon after midnight yesterday. “He jumped into the air… It was not an accidental fall,” Paris prosecutor’s spokeswoman Agnes Thibault-Lecuivre said.

The company that manages the 1,063ft tower said it was the first suicide in two years.