Base jumping has a ridiculously high fatality rate (~1 in 60 people who try it die). I wonder if adding engines makes it safer or less safe.
My wife and I were pretty active jumping in the era of wingsuit videos on YouTube. In her first year we had one good friend die and 9 people we'd met or hung out with a short time. It is basically comparable in danger to spaceflight.
Unfortunately I share your same statistics: I was very active in the early 2010:s and in that period I lost about 10 friends/acquaintances. Since then even more people I've hung out with are gone.
So yeah: wingsuiting is dangerous. But BASE itself can be done "reasonably" safely I think: personally I was always more fond of slider down (low) stuff, like buildings, and in my mind that's a safer sport than wingsuit BASE.
in this vid he's jumping out at 10k ft which makes it closer to skydiving.