MTV’s Nitro Circus star Erik Roner died in a tragic skydiving accident on Monday, Sept. 28, in Lake Tahoe, Calif., the Placer County sheriff’s office confirmed to The Los Angeles Times. The action sports star and professional skier and BASE jumper was killed after hitting a tree and getting tangled while attempting to land. He was 39 years old.
The reality personality was part of a group conducting a skydiving performance at Squaw Valley Alpine Meadows Resort as part of a golf event hosted in Olympic Valley by The Squaw Valley Institute.
Roner had been skydiving and BASE jumping for well over 15 years.
"Every time you travel, your true colors come out…growing up [I] wanted to travel the world on skis and see what there was out there," he said in a 2011 interview with Freeskier Magazine. "It's a great life. I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world."
The Nitro Circus star was known for extreme sports and stunts, including the time he tied himself to 90 helium balloons and flew through the air sitting on a lawn chair a la the movie Up.
Roner is survived by his wife and two kids.
