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Snapped: Cameron Cox is caught taking a nap on an 11th floor of a Gold Coast highrise building - Source: Instagram
A Gold Coast teenager has been evicted from the holiday apartments he was staying in after he decided to sleep off his hangover on a narrow ledge on the 11th floor of a highrise buidling.
Somerset College graduate Cameron Cox, 18, is currently celebrating the end of the school year with thousands of other 'schoolies' in party hotspots including the Gold Coast, Byron Bay and Bali.
But Cox became an internet sensation yesterday after a photograph of him lying on the Gold Coast ledge was uploaded on social media site Instagram.
The photo, taken by another schoolie on Sunday afternoon, showed Cox positioned perilously close to the edge of the 11th floor of the Surfers Hawaiian Holiday Apartments in Surfers Paradise.
His risky nap came despite repeated warnings from police and schoolies organisers about a number of balcony deaths on the Gold Coast.
'For the thrill'
"I didn't think anybody saw me except for the guys in the unit next to us who took the photo," Cox told the The Gold Coast Bulletin.
"I was drunk and climbed out there through the window for the thrill and to get some fresh air. I was out there for about half an hour until a security guard came to do a room check and I didn't want him to know I'd been out there.
"The window slides open. There's no security screens."
The photo, which went viral on other social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, led to Cox being branded "dumb" but he said he was more worried about how his father would react.
"I knew in past years there had been problems with balconies but I didn't think it would get this much attention. My dad might be angry when he finds out."
Evicted
But the prank has ended his celebrations, with the Hawaiian Holiday Apartments at Surfers Paradise telling AAP he has been ordered to leave.
It came amid renewed fears in Australia about the dangers of schoolies celebrations getting out of hand.
The chaplaincy group Red Frogs, which supports schoolies, said Cox was extremely lucky.
Red Frogs national director Mark Gourley said the group had been working to head off high-risk behaviour, including warning young women not to encourage young men to do stupid things.
"Guys don't grow a brain until they're 30, so don't egg them on, particularly when they've got the happy juice in them. They make dumb decisions to show off," Gourley told AAP.
"For the girls, don't yell off the balcony encouraging the boys to do dumb things ... there's an artificial hype around schoolies that you get caught up in ... don't sacrifice your future for a week."
He said it was up to schoolies to look after their mates.
"We really put the onus back on the mates that aren't drunk to be looking after friends in case they do something silly like that."
Balcony falls have resulted in at least five deaths in the past 12 months on the Gold Coast, including three incidents in October.
Gourley said that despite the controversy surrounding Cox's high-risk nap, schoolies so far had, on the whole, been well-behaved.
Queensland Police Minister Jack Dempsey is proud of the way school leavers are behaving this year and said Cox's friends were the exception.
"Whether it be in the sand pit at preschool or sands of the beach at Surfers Paradise, it's quite simple ... you bring forth the values of looking after your mates," he said.
"Obviously this person's mates let him down."