I still remember the summer my Grandfather and a community-run self defense course taught me how to fall properly. My grandfather grew up when gymnastics and tumbling was standard fare for highschool phys ed and any decent martial arts course teaches falls during the first few sessions, and that's all it took for me to start finding excuses to jump off of things.
I spent a few months perfecting my jumping-off-roofs technique during dozens of games of "war" we played around the neighborhood. It got to the point that even when playing around 2-story houses, the other team wouldn't venture out around a corner without first checking the roofline, because on numerous occasions I'd come flying off the roof yelling *bang bang*, firing "aimed" shots on the way down, pull off a perfect rolling fall (sort of like a PLF but with more style), and pop to my feet on the run before they could get past the WTF! stage.
One guy tried to copy my technique, but he never made it higher than the 9 ft porch cover at my house. Wimp
I never did jump from the 30ish ft apex of our 2-story house but I had no problem hopping over the balcony rail on the second floor, for a fall height of around 20 ft. The worst injury I ever got was when the PVC pipe gun I was carrying shattered on landing, and I cut my hand a bit. We also had a canyon with a steep hill covered with brush and soft dirt, and we'd see who could jump down the hill the farthest. Nobody would ever leap as far as they could, although I managed a jump that was an approx 20 ft vert drop before I chickened out. Plus there was a rockpile at the bottom of the hill so if you really jumped hard, you'd probably land fine but tumble into the rocks. My brother accidentally let go of a rope swing that went over the same canyon over that rockpile, and that was a 50 ft drop. Most of the fall was through the full height of a large pine tree that was right over the rockpile (I think he was trying to let go of the rope and grab the tree) so he got away with only a broken wrist.
Fun times, glad I didn't cripple myself. It didn't hurt that I was already an athlete, spending a couple of hours a day swimming... I still cliff-dive into lakes and the ocean whenever I get the chance.
