Chad's Gap is a 120 foot (around 36 meters) backcountry gap located in the Wasatch Mountains, near Alta Ski Area, in Utah

Utah

Utah is a state in the Western United States. It was the 45th state to join the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80% of Utah's 2,763,885 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering on Salt Lake City. This leaves vast expanses of the state nearly uninhabited, making the population the...

, United States. Chad's Gap is a part of extreme skiing

Extreme skiing

Extreme skiing is skiing performed on long, steep slopes in dangerous terrain. The sport is performed off-piste.The French coined the term 'Le Ski Extreme' in the 1970s...

 lore and facts about its exact location and the circumstances around its discovery have been reported but have not been fully substantiated. One version of the structure's discovery has it that Chad Zurinskas, a local Utah cook after whom the gap was purportedly named, discovered it as a gap between two piles of mine tailings in 1999 and arranged with filmmaker Kris Ostness to make the first successful jump. Other versions have that Travis Rice

Travis Rice

Travis Rice is an American professional snowboarder. He is #13 on Snowboarder magazine’s list of the Top Twenty Most Influential Riders, He has been considered "the Paul Revere" of the big mountain freestyle movement....

 or Candide Thovex

Candide Thovex

Candide Thovex , is a French professional skier.- Biography :Thovex was born in Annecy, Haute-Savoie, and grew up in the village of La Clusaz. Thovex learned to ski in the Aravis region of the French Alps. La Clusaz is where his childhood friends and girlfriend live and where he perfected his big...

made the first successful jump.