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BALCONING

Balconing in Spain: New computer game promises all of the ‘fun’ of the leap without the risk

A new computer game turns the dangerous craze of balconing into a low-risk experience.

Balconing in Spain: New computer game promises all of the ‘fun’ of the leap without the risk
A computer simulator allows players to find out if they could make it to the pool unscathed. Photo: Humber Bundle

It is a question that most (sane) people ask themselves when they read about a trend in Spain – especially Balearic Island resorts – that sees tourists injured each year when they leap from a hotel balcony.

The dangerous craze has been dubbed “balconing” and has cost dozens of lives of mainly British tourists who plummet to their deaths from hotel rooms.

Balconing was first identified as the ultimate drunk holiday challenge, after videos showed young  men leaping from balconies several storeys up into the resort’s swimming pool below.

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But the term has also broadly come to mean any of the dozen incidents involving holidaymakers falling from balconies that occur during each tourist season.

Sometimes these deaths, or incidents resulting in severe injuries, come about when a holidaymaker attempts to climb from one balcony to another, either because they have lost their way, or lost their key or in the pursuit of some amorous encounter.

But sometimes they occur in purely accidental circumstances, although more often or not, the victim is inebriated.

Now a computer simulator has been developed to offer gamers the “enriching experience” of jumping from a hotel window into a pool “with practically no risks for your safety.”

The game involves a player attempting to guide his somewhat inebriated avatar through a hotel room full of obstacles to reach the balcony and from there launch over the precipice to the pool below.

It is designed to answer the question that it claims we all ponder when we return to our hotel room after a night on the tiles.

“If I jump, will I reach that pool?”

Balconing Simulator 2020 is released on December 6 from developer Fancy + Punk and will form part of the Humble Trove collection of indie games.

 
 

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BALCONING

British tourist dies and kills another man in Marbella balcony fall

A British tourist who fell from his hotel balcony on Saturday in the southern Spanish city of Marbella has died, landing on and killing a local businessman dining below.

British tourist dies and kills another man in Marbella balcony fall
Meliá Don Pepe Hotel in Marbella. Photo: Melía

The tragedy took place in the early hours of Saturday at Meliá Don Pepe Hotel in Marbella when a fifty-year-old British tourist fell from the balcony in his room on the seventh floor.

The man, reported by local police sources as weighing 100kg, landed on a local gym businessman who was having dinner outdoors at the hotel restaurant with his friends and wife.

Both men were instantly killed in the impact.

Spanish National Police are currently investigating the incident, with initial evidence suggesting the British man had consumed alcohol.

A similar freak accident took place in Marbella in 2010 when a 20-year-old woman attempted to commit suicide by jumping from her balcony on the 8th floor, surviving the fall but killing an 89-year-old woman when she impacted against the ground.  

Saturday’s accident is the first balcony fall involving a tourist since Spain ended its lockdown and reopened its borders to foreign visitors.

Some of Spain’s main holiday hotspots have been affected by similar tourist deaths in recent years.

Often they’ve come as result of what the Spanish press has dubbed “balconing”, the extremely dangerous practice of attempting to jump from a hotel balcony into the swimming pool down below, usually from a considerable height.

Rather than a jump it ends up being an accidental fall in 85 percent of cases, with victims – mostly young British tourists – usually if not always under the influence of alcohol and drugs. 

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