NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. -- In 2003, Kirk R. Jones became the first person to survive going over Niagara Falls without protection.

Two weeks ago, Jones' body was found downriver from the falls after he apparently tried again, according to police.

Jones, then 40, became the first person in recorded history on Oct. 20, 2003, to survive a plunge into the falls without being inside a barrel or other device. He was wearing only his clothes that day.

His body was discovered June 2 in the Niagara River, at the mouth of Lake Ontario, said Det. Sgt. Brian Nisbet of the New York State Park Police. The location is about 12 miles from the falls.

"That's the guy,'' Nisbet said when asked whether it was the same man who'd survived the falls 14 years ago.

It appears Jones had gone over the falls again, Nisbet said.

The U.S. Coast Guard discovered Jones' body in the Niagara River in the village of Youngstown, Nisbet said.

Investigators determined Jones had been in the Niagara Falls area on April 19 and "may have been attempting a stunt by going over Niagara Falls in a large inflatable ball," Nisbet said.

The stunt failed, resulting in Jones' death, Nisbet said.

Police spotted the 10-foot ball, which someone could get inside, spinning in the rapids above the falls April 19, Nisbet said. It went over the falls and was recovered by the Maid of the Mist boat, he said. The ball was unmanned, he said.

Police have been unable to locate Jones' relatives, Nisbet said.

Jones was living in Canton, Mich., when he went over the falls in 2003. His family told reporters then that he'd planned it as a daredevil stunt. But Jones said he was trying to kill himself.

He pleaded guilty in Canada to a criminal charge of unlawfully performing a stunt and mischief and was fined nearly $3,000. Canada banned Jones for life for the act.

"I'm feeling very happy to be alive," Jones told reporters after appearing in court in 2003. "I ask that no one ever try such a terrible stunt again."

He said then that he was done with the falls.

"I understand what I did was wrong," Jones told reporters. 'You'll never see an action in Niagara waters with my name written on it again."

He suffered broken ribs and a bruised spine in the 180-foot fall into the Horseshoe Falls that straddle the U.S.-Canada border. He jumped into 150,000 gallons-per-second of rushing water.

Jones appeared on ABC-TV's "Good Morning America" a week afterward and described going feet-first over the falls, staring into a sunny sky. He heard people screaming that there was a man in the water, he said. He felt the river moving fast toward the falls, with the sound of the rushing water getting louder.

"I felt like and heard a suction -- a suction that, like a large vacuum cleaner, you suck up an insect on the counter," Jones said in the interview. "And I was actually sucked inside, immediately, inside the curtain of the falls. Inside it. And enveloped in it, actually."

He recalled spiraling as he fell at a tremendous speed. He felt an "unbelievable" pressure on his head, he said in the TV interview.

Jones recalled feeling pain when he crashed into a granite table at the bottom of the falls, then blacking out temporarily. When he came to underwater, he swam up to the surface and took his first breath, he said.

Jones and his brother, Keith Jones, planned to write a book, tentatively titled, "You're Kidding Me: A Knucklehead's Guide to Surviving Niagara Falls." There's no evidence the book was ever published.

Kirk Jones joined a Florida-based circus soon after his plunge, using his fame to get a job as a stunt performer.

Jones, 53, had recently been living in Spring Hill, Fla., according to public records. His relatives could not be reached for comment.

Since Jones survived in 2003, three other people have lived after going over the falls without protection. The most recent was in 2012.

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