56-year-old man ‘could never walk’ so he tried flying instead. See ‘best thing ever’
A man who “could never walk” decided he’d give flying a try instead.
Steve Wampler, 56, known as @the.wampler.way on TikTok, has cerebral palsy and went skydiving over the San Ysidro district of San Diego, his son Joe said in a Jan. 31 phone interview with McClatchy News.
“Oh yeah it was nerve wracking,” Steve Wampler told McClatchy News in a phone interview. “I was dared by TikTok to do something, and they came up with skydiving. My nerves were shot.”
The video shows Wampler suited up, ready to jump tandem out of a plane before a crew member asks him “What did you think?,” upon hitting the ground, according to the Jan. 29 TikTok that’s been viewed over 3 million times as of Jan. 31.
“It was a great experience, but I wouldn’t do it again,” Wampler, who lives in San Diego, said.
TikTok users were in agreement that the video was the “best thing ever.”
“This made me happy,” one person said.
“This is so wholesome,” another added.
“Ugh I love people that are positive,” someone commented.
But this wasn’t the first milestone Wampler has accomplished.
In 2010, he became the first person with cerebral palsy to climb and reach the summit of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, according to ABC News.
“It was six days of just absolute torture and I would say awe-inspiring too,” Wampler told the outlet.
Before the skydive
The entirety of Wampler’s TikTok account was actually a Christmas gift from his children, Joe Wampler said.
“In November of 2020, I didn’t know what to get (my parents) for Christmas, so my sister and I collaborated and knew what they wanted to was to raise awareness at the biggest scale possible for their camp for kids with disabilities, Camp Wamp,” Joe Wampler said. “We had a month and a half and asked people to give them as many followers as possible before we turn the account over to them.”
By the time gift-giving came around, the account already had 200,000 followers.
Since then, Wampler has shared snippets of his life with those followers, including videos of his wife and kids.
He met his wife, Elizabeth Wampler, through friends in 1994, and they got married in 1995 and had children in 1999 and 2000, he said.
A video posted to Steve Wampler’s TikTok that’s garnered over 26.9 million views as of Jan. 31 shows a photo compilation of the two captioned, “The life we’ve created.”
Users were grateful that Wampler was sharing his story, with one person commenting, “I am a mother with a cerebral palsy son. My wish for him is to find someone who’s going to love him.”
“Such a beautiful family,” another person wrote.
“Brought a huge smile to my face--Im a sucker for seeing true love. what a beautiful life you’ve created for yourselves,” someone said.
Camp Wamp
Wampler said he likes to meet “disability with positivity,” so he created a summer camp in Lake Tahoe called Camp Wamp where children with disabilities can go and experience a “real outdoorsy summer camp,” Joe Wampler said.
“We have camp fires, we roast marshmallows, everything that’s part of that classic outdoor summer camp experience, the only thing we do a little bit different is maneuver to make sure everything is accessible,” Joe Wampler said.
The kids can even sleep outside under the stars, with no tents, Steve Wampler said.
“A huge part of the experience is pushing the kids, a lot of them have never experienced stuff like this before, a lot of this is outside of their comfort zone so even if a kid really wants to sleep inside one of the nights, they sleep under the stars because they wake up the next morning knowing that they can,” he said.
As for the love he’s received on TikTok, Wampler and his son are grateful for the support and are always looking for more camp counselors and campgoers for Camp Wamp, they said.
“It’s crazy, I never thought any of this would be possible,” Wampler said.
This story was originally published January 31, 2025 at 7:09 PM with the headline "56-year-old man ‘could never walk’ so he tried flying instead. See ‘best thing ever’."