There’s a moment almost every bungy jumper experiences when pure survival instinct screams “absolutely not”and that is right where the AJ Hackett Bungy NZ team steps in. Part safety expert, part hype crew, and part therapist, crew members Casey, Kelly, and Jaan reveal what it takes to guide jumpers from terror to total exhilaration across Queenstown, Taupō, and Auckland, giving a behind-the-scenes look at the people, wild stories, and unexpected career paths behind New Zealand’s most iconic leaps.
You’re standing at the edge, your heart is pounding, and every survival instinct you possess is asking one very reasonable question: Why am I doing this?
Then someone beside you cracks a joke. They explain exactly what’s going to happen. They remind you to breathe, and somehow, you jump.
Behind every AJ Hackett adventure is a crew of people who have become very good at turning “Absolutely not” into “THAT WAS SO SICK!”
They’re part safety experts, part hype crew, and, occasionally, part therapists.
Trust us, they’ve seen it all: from nudity to the most creative excuses not to jump… We caught up with three of them to find out what life looks like on the other side of the platform.
Meet Casey, Frontline Crew Member & Content Creator, Queenstown
For Casey, working at AJ Hackett came with a piece of family history.
“My dad used to tell me growing up how he did the bungy jump back in 1988 in the first month of the Kawarau Bridge being open. I always thought he was crazy, and I would NEVER do that, but here we are two years on.”
After completing a Film and Photography degree in Wellington, Casey struggled to find work in the industry she loved. When an opportunity came up with AJ Hackett’s Photo and Video team back home in Queenstown, it felt like the perfect combination.
It turned out she loved capturing people.
“I love the emotion that people go through from the fear and contemplation at the top of the bungy before the jump to the pure elation of achievement once they are lowered into the raft.”
Today, Casey’s role spans Frontline and Content, meaning no two days look similar.
One day she might be harnessing jumpers at Kawarau or Nevis and delivering much-needed pep talks. Another she might be taking photos, helping people book, filming content, hosting influencers or livestreaming.
And yes, working here meant eventually confronting the thing she’d spent her childhood insisting she’d never do.
“It was my induction day. I thought it would be like any other job (the more I work here, the more I realise this isn’t a normal job). I thought I was going to go around the sites, introduce myself to a few people, and that’s it, but no, they had other ideas.”
First came Kawarau, then Nevis. Her motivation was: “If my dad did it when it first opened, surely I can do it now”
Meet Kelly: Bungy Jump Master & Content Creator, Taupō
Some people accidentally find themselves working in adventure tourism, but Kelly was practically campaigning for the job before anyone offered it to her.
As a youngster, she would visit AJ Hackett whenever she passed through Taupō and jump repeatedly simply because she loved it.
Eventually, somebody noticed.
“One random day, one of the crew asked if I’d be interested in coming to work a summer job because they could see how enthusiastic I was about bungy. I thought, why not? So I packed up my belongings and moved to Taupō for the job.”
What was supposed to be a summer job became something much bigger.
Kelly became fascinated not only by the technical side of bungy, but by the psychology behind it: meeting someone terrified, understanding what they need in that moment and helping them find the confidence to leap.
Kelly decided she wanted to become a Bungy Jump Master. So, she worked her way through the roles. Five years later, she’s still here.
“What started as a summer job has turned into a career and something I’m genuinely passionate about.”
From Tears to “THAT WAS SO SICK!”
Kelly’s description of her job might be one of the best we’ve heard.
“On the outside, my job is basically being the person on the edge helping people go from tears, nerves and screaming to “THAT WAS SO SICK!” in the space of a few minutes!”
But behind the fun is serious responsibility.
Every jumper is different. Some need reassurance, some want jokes, and some need information. Others probably need someone to stop them thinking altogether.
Kelly has to read the person standing in front of her while maintaining the safety standards behind every jump.
Sometimes that means surprisingly deep conversations with people she’s only just met.
“I’ve had hundreds of heart-to-hearts with strangers.” Kelly laughed. “Which then results in them walking away absolutely stoked with themselves. That’s definitely the best part.”
Kelly understands the fear because she still remembers her own first jump.
“I remember my first jump; it was amazing. I was nervous, but in my brain that was the whole point! If it weren’t a little scary, it wouldn’t be fun, and no one would do it! As soon as my feet left the platform, all that fear disappeared, and I felt like in that moment nothing else in the world mattered. (I ended up coming straight back up and jumping 4 more times).”
Making Adventure Possible
One of Kelly’s most memorable jumpers was a man who had completely lost his vision as a teenager. Bungy was on his bucket list, but he wasn’t sure whether it would be possible.
Kelly’s response was immediate:
“Sure ya can! You’re ticking that off your bucket list today!”
The two linked arms and walked towards the platform together.
Kelly described the Waikato River 47 metres below, talked him through every stage of the process and encouraged him to ask as many questions as he wanted.
His heightened hearing meant he could hear all sorts of noises from the operating system, allowing Kelly to indulge in what she calls full “Bungy-nerd mode” and explain exactly what was happening around him.
Then he jumped.
Afterwards, he told Kelly how much it meant that the team had taken the time to accommodate him so thoroughly.
Her response says more about the people behind AJ Hackett than anything else.
“But to me, it should be common sense. Moments like that are exactly why I do my job.”
Meet Jaan: 
Jaan’s AJ Hackett career began, appropriately enough, with a bit of sibling interference.
He’d travelled to Cairns for his OE because his older brother was working there. Jaan had lined up a job as a waiter at the casino when his brother—who had gone on to work at an AJ Hackett site in Mexico—put his name forward elsewhere.
Then the phone rang.
“The boss called me quickly asking if I wanted a job – two weeks before I was meant to start at the casino! Haven’t looked back since!”
Today, Jaan is Auckland Operations Manager.
That means his weeks can include office work, maintenance, training, equipment, and…
“Some days it’s throwing people off in the bungy pod! (The most fun part).”
Even the Staff Were Once Terrified
Here’s something worth remembering when you’re standing on the edge feeling decidedly less brave than you’d imagined.
Even the people who now throw people off things for a living were once terrified beginners.
Jaan remembers his first bungy very clearly.
It was at Kawarau. And, according to him, he cheated.
“My brother came over from Cains and he suggested we do a tandem because I was freaking the f**k out. I was real young, and one of those jumpers that grabbed onto absolutely everything.”
Which perhaps explains why AJ Hackett crew are so good at dealing with frightened jumpers: They’ve been there.
They know what that edge feels like. They also know exactly what tends to happen once you get past it.
The Jumpers You Remember
Ask the crew about their most memorable customers and it isn’t necessarily the celebrities or fearless adrenaline junkies who come to mind.
Often, it’s the person who almost didn’t jump.
Casey remembers a teenage girl arriving on the Kawarau Bridge already crying. She desperately wanted to jump, but fear had completely overwhelmed her.
Her dad asked Casey for advice, and here’s what she said:
“I told her the truth, that I cry every time I jump and that quite a few of us that work here do. It’s the exact response that your body should be making, and if you weren’t scared, then you’re crazy.”
That’s something the crew understands better than most.
Being scared isn’t failure. You’re standing somewhere your brain has spent your entire life telling you not to jump from. Of course, your survival instincts have something to say about it.
“The part before the jump is always the hardest on the jumper. Every time you walk across a bridge, not an ounce of you has wanted to jump off of it, so you have to fight these survival instincts and remind yourself it’s safe.”
The teenager took a deep breath, and then she jumped.
Her family returned afterwards to thank Casey for helping her through the anxiety.
Those are the moments that stick.
Although Casey has also heard plenty of creative attempts to delay the inevitable.
Her favourite excuse is:
“People always ask to wait until the sun comes out. I’m sorry it is winter in Queenstown; the sun won’t return for a few months.”
Jaan has also collected his fair share of stories over the years. When asked about his most memorable jumper, one particularly unfortunate wardrobe malfunction came to mind:
“Back in my younger days, there was a girl who jumped in a bikini top. As she jumped I accidently grabbed the back-string of her bikini, and it undid it – complete accident! Sadly, the video caught everything!”
Jaan’s also seen the creative ways jumpers try to delay that inevitable step off the edge.
“I’ve heard of a guy at the Nevis (an old English guy), who insisted on singing the entirety of “I had it my way,” before he jumped. He kept on messing up the lyrics halfway through and insisting on restarting the song before he jumped!”
We have to give him points for ingenuity.
“They Made It”
Spend enough time around an AJ Hackett site and you’ll see the same little transformation play out again and again.
Someone arrives nervous; they walk towards the platform and hesitate, but the crew talks them through it, and then they jump.
Suddenly, the person who could barely look over the edge minutes earlier is laughing, shouting and asking when they can go again.
That’s perhaps the most important part of the crew’s job. They’re not there to magically remove fear.
As Casey says, fear is a “perfectly normal response.”
They’re there to help you move through it. To make sure you understand what’s happening. To keep you safe. To crack a joke when you need one. To talk you through the moment when your brain starts screaming.
Could This Be Your Office?
There’s something else all three stories have in common. None of these careers followed a particularly conventional path.
Casey followed her love of photography back home to Queenstown.
Kelly turned an obsession with bungy into a summer job, then into a career.
Jaan nearly became a casino waiter.
Instead, now they’re helping people experience some of the biggest, scariest, and most exhilarating moments of their lives.
If your idea of a good day at work involves incredible locations, interesting humans and considerably more adrenaline than the average office can provide, perhaps it’s time to meet the crew from the other side.
Explore careers with AJ Hackett Bungy NZ and discover where adventure could take you.
Or, if you’d rather meet the team while they’re standing beside you on the platform…
There’s another way.
Book your AJ Hackett adventure, meet the crew, and let them help turn your “absolutely not” into “I absolutely nailed it!”
FAQs:
How does the crew help jumpers who are too terrified to step off the edge?
The AJ Hackett crew acts as part safety expert, part hype crew, and part therapist. They recognize that fear is a completely normal survival instinct, since many crew members were once terrified first-time jumpers themselves! By reading your body language, validating your nerves, cracking jokes to break the tension, and explaining the technical process step-by-step, they help you move safely through panic to total exhilaration.
What skills and training make the AJ Hackett crew more than just high-energy motivators?
Beyond building up your confidence, the crew possesses deep technical expertise in rigging, harness systems, and safety protocols across dynamic environments. They are also trained in jumper psychology, allowing them to tailor their communication on the fly, whether that means giving a firm pep talk, having a quiet heart-to-heart, or adapting the process for jumpers with specific needs or disabilities.
