Hackett breaks his own world record Monday by bungee-jumping slightly less than 600 feet

In this story:

• Jumper nearly reaches the ground
• Related stories and sites

AUCKLAND, New Zealand (CNN) -- Using only a rubber bungee cord and two steel guide cables, A.J. Hackett dove off Auckland's highest building Monday, plunging 591 feet (180 meters) and claiming to set a world record in a jump shown live on the Internet.

Traffic halted as crowds gathered to watch Hackett's eight-second jump from the Sky Tower casino. The event also was broadcast live to a national TV audience.

Hackett, a New Zealand entrepreneur and promoter credited with popularizing the extreme sport, said he broke his own record for a bungee jump from a fixed structure.

The Guinness Book of World Records does not recognize bungee jumps because of their danger.

Hackett jumped 377 feet (114 meters) from the Eiffel Tower in Paris in an illegal 1987 leap.

In Monday's leap, Hackett used a rubber bungee along with two steel guide cables to prevent himself from bouncing or drifting into the building on the way down.

The rings on the steel cables slowed his takeoff, causing Hackett to curl out shortly after leaving the jump point, before plunging headlong to within yards (meters) of the ground.

"It didn't slow me down, it just knocked me around a little bit," he told reporters afterward.

A thrilled crowd of 8,000-10,000 people shouted and whistled as Hackett jumped and as the bungee cord ended his plunge just above them.

He punched his fists into a bunch of yellow balloons as the bungee tightened, halting his fall.

On the ground, he told a reporter: "It was certainly rocking tonight. Something weird happened up the top there but we got it under control halfway down. There was nothing that could go wrong.

"You accelerate very fast off the top and then coming down into the bottom going like mad and I could feel the bungee coming on, and yeah, the brakes are working, great."

Among bigger bungee jumps are one of nearly 3,300 feet (1 kilometer) from a helicopter, and one of 700 feet (200 meters) off a dam in a stunt for the 1995 James Bond movie "Goldeneye."

Bungee jumping is a modernization of a traditional tribal test of courage in the Vanuatu Islands, north of New Zealand, in which villagers plunge headfirst from high platforms with vines tied to their ankles to break their fall at the last moment -- they hope.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.