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Second Chances: ‘I survived jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge’
– ABC7 San Francisco
SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — On Baker Beach, it appears a pair of tourists are talking like old friends, just trying to take a perfect selfie with the Golden Gate Bridge in the background.
In fact, Kevin Hines and Ken Baldwin are little more than strangers who happen to share an incredible connection. Both jumped off of the Golden Gate Bridge -and survived.
They want you to know the overwhelming emotion they both had the moment their fingertips left the railing.
“The millisecond my legs cleared it, the millisecond of true free fall, instant regret for my actions,” said Kevin.
Ken had a startlingly similar experience: “I just vaulted over, and I realized, at that moment, this is the stupidest thing I could have done. Everything could have changed.”
“It was a split-second decision, my thought was, ‘Absolutely nobody cares. Nobody.’
I took these hands, and I catapulted into free fall,” said Kevin.
It only took about four seconds for Kevin to hit the water, and he says it felt exactly that fast. But he remembers his few, fleeting thoughts and a flood of emotion.
Instant regret, powerful, overwhelming. As I fell, all I wanted to do was reach back to the rail, but it was gone,” said Kevin. “The thoughts in those four seconds, it was ‘What have I just done? I don’t want to die.
God please save me. ‘” Boom.
Ken Baldwin said, “I saw my hands leave the bridge,” he recalled. “I knew at that moment, that I really, really messed up. Everything could have been better, I could change things. And I was falling. I couldn’t change that.”
He says that as he fell those four seconds, his saw the faces of the people he loved and didn’t want to leave behind. “It was like your life flashing before your eyes, it was everybody I was going to hurt: my wife, my daughter, my mom, my dad, my three brothers,” said Ken. “I’ve never felt anything like it, that profound sadness.”
If you need support, please reach out for help:
Call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255
Text CNQR TO 74174