12 ms·
Alex Honnold completes Taipei 101 skyscraper climb without ropes or safety net
- andsoitis 9mo agowatching in Live on Netflix was riveting
- peterldowns 9mo agoOne of the most incredible feats of strength and daring I've ever witnessed. The only thing at all comparable was watching Baumgartner freefall back to earth from the edge of space. Unbelievable!
- keepamovin 9mo agoYeah that was a great moment when that happened! I remember watching that, and then a couple weeks (?) later were the Snowden docs? That was quite a year, iirc.
- hahahahhaah 9mo agoAlso for daring: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_Petit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_Petit
- botacode 9mo agoWe had the privilege to watch at first from the SE corner of the building and later as he climbed by the the observation deck on the 89th floor. Hair raising stuff I'll never forget.
- keepamovin 9mo agoWow that's awesome! You saw him climb past your windows! Must be a Googler
- botacode 9mo agoNope! Startup founder who happened to be visiting Taiwan at the right time. The Googlers had way better views XD
- potamic 9mo agoI, on the other hand, had the privilege not to watch this. I don't know how one can without feeling sick to the stomach.
- kqr 9mo agoThere are many answers depending on what you meant by this, but in terms of actual risk this is probably not much worse to him than e.g. riding a motorcycle, and certainly better than what it would have been to be crew on the space shuttle.
- pcthrowaway 9mo ago[flagged]
- eric_khun 9mo agoDo you know if there was any guidelines to not "disturb" during his climb? Was shocked by how many people tried to distract him during that climb
- botacode 9mo agoThey kept most folks pretty far away, you needed a pass or to work in one of the offices to get really close. I was also terrified when ppl would engage with him directly lol
- adamredwoods 9mo agoHe needs the ultimate focus, there can be no mistakes. That's amazing you got to see the actual climb! Do you have any photos on social media?
- botacode 9mo agoTwo good ones my gf took here: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/gb-cc_my-desperate-attempt-to-get-the-coverage-activity-7421191377931235328-Yeh3 https://www.linkedin.com/posts/gb-cc_my-desperate-attempt-to... The second one is from the inside of the observatory (89th floor). Folks with media passes were allowed to get closer so that's the crowd you see pictured. He's climbing in the background.
- keepamovin 9mo agoYou can get a sense of his feelings about this how he talks with his wife at the summit afterwards. He says something like "There were lots of people taking pictures and waving. I was chill", indicating he felt he had done well in a situation he had anticipated may have been challenging. THey'd likely discussed this extensively before. Also, previously through the climb he makes efforts to be deliberate and chooses to interact positively with some of the people. Waving, offering a hand on glass for a high five, making a few jokes at the fans' expense over the headpiece "I offered him a high five. He was too busy on his phone. Kids these days" My feeling about all this is the presence of many people was something he had rehearsed a lot and decided he was going to stay relaxed and positive about, and that's what he did. He don't spook easy.
- mvdtnz 9mo agoVery impressive feat, no doubt about it. But the commentary on the Netflix broadcast ruined the spectator experience completely. It was utterly unbearable.
- cebert 9mo agoI thought the same thing. Half the time I wished they would just keep quiet.
- keepamovin 9mo agoThen again, there's always Mute. Turn up your favorite music/sound or just silence. Could be good
- kaptain 9mo agoThe Taiwanese live feed news channels on YouTube were great. Little to no commentary and you could hear the crowd engagement.
- shimman 9mo agoHonestly surprised that there was no audio option to disable the commentators.
- yourapostasy 9mo agoWith the Netflix infrastructure, I'm surprised they broadcast it so conventionally. Different channels running at the same time (with the crowd at the bottom, with the crowds as he passed each floor, with his wife watching, with pro climbers talking technical climbing stuff with simultaneous 8K online illustrating graphics, etc.), different audio tracks (with commentators, with crowd at bottom only, etc.*). Alex Honnold was paid only $500K for the event, so maybe there simply wasn't a lot of money allocated to the project to get fancy with the live broadcast.
- prein 9mo agoI know nothing about climbing. beyond the straight flex of "I could die if I make a mistake", is there a point to doing this without safety equipment?
- komali2 9mo agoHe's spoken about it extensively in interviews. Watch his El Capitan movie or recent interviews before this climb. He just finds it very peaceful and thrilling. "Just him and the climb" kind of language. Also I suppose clout has to be involved: only person to free solo El Capitan, as far as I know the only person to climb Taipei 101 let alone free solo (did the spiderman guy ever make it or was he arrested?)
- Insanity 9mo agoI guess watching the film ('free solo' is the one you mention) is the lowest effort way of getting his perspective and I recommend the film. For a deeper dive, the book "Alone on the wall" is a good read and I recommend it. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36531127-alone-on-the-wall https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36531127-alone-on-the-wa..., although that said the book might be less appealing to someone who 'knows nothing about climbing' and is more of a time investment than the short documentary :)
- abrookewood 9mo agoSecond person to climb it (Spidey got there first), but only one to free solo it.
- tempestn 9mo agoI believe it's also documented that he has an underdeveloped amygdala, so he literally doesn't experience fear in the same way most people do.
- kqr 9mo ago...which is easily misconstrued as "feeling less fear" which I don't believe for a second. If that was the case he'd be dead by now. But it's certainly time we admit everyone feels feelings diferently. Even something basal like pain experience is hugely individual with large variation.
- defrost 9mo agoIn other tower climbing events, some things cannot be free climbed (too smooth, fingers aren't made for window cleaning tracks, etc). The 1988 ascent of the Sydney Centrepoint was a technical climb with custom jumars for both the cables and the window tracks and a fun challenge for all, both the scouting, the climb, and the filming. Originally titled The Only Building I Ever Wanted To Climb, later released as A Spire, there's a documentary film that follows a climb at night of "only" 1,000 feet. ... with a massive overhang. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sydney_Tower https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sydney_Tower * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qch1Gd8VLK0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qch1Gd8VLK0
- UltraSane 9mo agoThis is a very irresponsible thing to do when you have children.
- hiddencost 9mo agoYeah I hope he made enough money to stop.
- Insanity 9mo agoI'm not saying money wasn't a factor in his decision to do this for a livestream, but it clearly wouldn't be the only factor and I doubt that would make him stop. (He free solo'd before, without cameras, although not this building). For people like Alex, it's much more about the thrill, the experience, and 'proving' themselves than it is about money.
- SilverSlash 9mo agoI think NYT said their sources claim he was paid mid 6-figures? Which is really shitty of Netflix. If I were him I would've asked for at least $5M.
- B1FIDO 9mo agoThat’s what life insurance is for! Come on, plenty of fathers and husbands have worked in coal mines, oil rigs; gone to war; served on ICE raids against armed insurgents. It is often hazardous to be a breadwinner. It seems that this dude is following his passion, for better or worse.
- iamcreasy 9mo agoIn his El Capitan climb (Free Solo), Alex was worried about cameras or presence of friends watching interfering with the climb. As oppose to that, this climb must have felt very different!
- komali2 9mo agoI wondered the same because there was a helicopter the entire time. Also the very tip top of Taipei 101 appeared to have many cameras mounted on it, at least through binoculars.
- mykowebhn 9mo agoI'm wondering if this is because El Capitan is a much more technically difficult climb and thus posing much more risk than Taipei 101.
- bmitc 9mo agoHe was able to practice El Capitan over and over, though. Was he able to in Tapei?
- andrew_lettuce 9mo agoI'd assume - unlike El Capitan - the pitches here are all pretty much identical, so by the time he got to the third or fourth floor he had it figured out
- dmazzoni 9mo agoIf you watch the climb you'll see that the skyscraper definitely wasn't quite so straightforward - there were some interesting challenges along the way. Of course, no question El Cap was technically far more challenging.
- iamcreasy 9mo agoHe must have. My impression from the documentary is that he practice the climb route many times with safety gear first.
- komali2 9mo agoI and some friends observed his climb from the base of Taipei 101. Thousands of people were present and it was very good fun how the crowd would react when he made it to another ledge, and when he made it to the top people were shouting and cheering. It was like a great big party. I imagine Threads and Instagram just got hit with like ten thousand vertical video clips of the climb if you're interested in seeing for yourself. For me it was almost scary how abruptly he started and made it up the first ledge. Dude just fuckin went for it. Made me realize, for the first time, how truly incredible the feat was to be. The observation deck level is often so windy I worry about losing my phone if I take it out. I can't comprehend how he managed that wind while hanging on by his fingertips. Then he stood at the tippy top for quite some time, which must be unbelievably windy. At some point he was tethered in for the rapelle down though so maybe he clipped in right as he got to the top.
- weird-eye-issue 9mo agoHe was not clipped in while standing at the top. That part actually made me the most nervous because you could see the wind blowing him around
- komali2 9mo agoAh I haven't watched the videos yet, just what I could see through binoculars. When did he clip in to rapelle down? Immediately before doing so? I wonder what he was thinking about up there.
- keepamovin 9mo agoProbably nothing, at least for a moment, and that's the point. Then maybe: Another summit, another view, another inspiration. What's next? while feeling immense gratitude for his life and his family, and like this is where he's meant to be. And probably wanting to get someplace warm.
- squigz 9mo agoStuff like this seems a bit... selfish? to me. Why risk falling, and people having to see that/having to clean that up? For a bit of adrenaline and publicity? Meh.
- komali2 9mo agoThe Taipei tourism bureau disagrees. Many here as well. The more eyes on Taiwan, the better. I'm grateful Alex was willing to risk his life for this spectacle, now potentially millions will have at least some concept of Taipei and Taiwan in their minds.
- squigz 9mo agoThat a government would be willing to risk this for publicity isn't really changing my mind. "Come to Taiwan; you may or may not watch someone plummet to their death while here" doesn't appeal to me, personally anyway. Anyway that guy that did it with safety equipment a few years back made the rounds in the news too, so not sure this was necessary in that regard.
- mvdtnz 9mo agoDon't watch then. Clearly enough people around the world found some kind of value in it. If you didn't, just jog on.
- komali2 9mo agoC'mon, didn't some guy do a skydive from nearly outer space? Do you criticize the country he landed in? Or red bull for sponsoring it or the many other extreme sports? Injury and death happens in rock climbing even when tethered. Not often but it does happen, that's the nature of the sport and it's the same as BMX, skateboarding, motocross, any kind of racing. It's also the same as just living - go look up Taiwan traffic deaths. There's so much more dangerous things happening here and wherever you live, it just seems silly to criticize someone for doing an extreme sport publicly. There's like one injury per NFL game ffs...
- rattray 9mo agoDoes anyone have a link to good video footage of the climb?
- jml7c5 9mo agoNetflix has a stream with close-up cameras, as they were the ones who arranged the whole thing. Unfortunately the commentary and color grading are both terrible: https://www.netflix.com/watch/81987107 https://www.netflix.com/watch/81987107 A YouTube search pulls up a stream filmed from the ground (a nearby building?) using a zoom lens: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vzthkg2ti2Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vzthkg2ti2Q
- fuzzythinker 9mo agoMy heart beats fast just watching him. I wonder if the path has been clean/power washed before the climb.
- drcongo 9mo agoNetflix have absoluely no taste. Everything they make has unbearbly bland cinematography.
- andsoitis 9mo agothis was a live stream... the camera work was incredible, did you see it?
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- Insanity 9mo agoWe watched the livestream together, such a stressful watch, glad he made it up there. As my partner and both do bouldering, it definitely gives another level of appreciation of just how insane this is. (I still get stressed at times when I'm just 2-3m up in the air lol).
- NedF 9mo ago[dead]
- torlok 9mo agoI thought he had freakishly large hands before, but that picture of him on the top with his hands in the air makes him look like the lawyer uncle from Always Sunny. He's built for free solo.
- EnPissant 9mo agoYou need to be specific! There are 2 lawyers with completely opposite hand sizes.
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- tylerflick 9mo agoThe one educated in bird law.
- EnPissant 9mo ago[flagged]
- burritosnob 9mo agoPeople often confuse severe consequences (a fall = death) with high probability. Alex, like most climbers, reduce that probability to near zero through obsessive prep. The travel to/from Taiwan was statistically riskier than the climb. Selfish? Not even close.
- EnPissant 9mo ago> The travel to/from Taiwan was statistically riskier than the climb. You just made this up.
- tempestn 9mo agoIt's not 25% per climb, but it's not near zero either, especially in aggregate. It only takes one mistake. A fairly high percentage of famous free soloists (I'd say over 25%) have died prematurely, either while free soloing, or during other extreme sports.
- Barrin92 9mo ago>A fairly high percentage of famous free soloists (I'd say over 25%) have died prematurely Yes but I'd also say Alex is a bit of a different beast. He's clearly not a thrill seeker who attempts climbs he isn't sure about. And as he has once said, there's a very real risk of dying when you get in your car, play football, are a boxer, and so on. People have a stark reaction to the visual of a guy being 200 meters above the ground but the reality is if you're a circus acrobat and you're 10 meters up the air you're also likely dead or maimed if something goes wrong. It doesn't get more dead than dead and in many ways he's probably more calculated and less reckless than people in other sports or performances.
- EnPissant 9mo ago> People have a stark reaction to the visual of a guy being 200 meters above the ground but the reality is if you're a circus acrobat and you're 10 meters up the air you're also likely dead or maimed if something goes wrong. No, it's the large number of free soloists that have died. And the small number of circus performers who have died. People's intuitions about the relative risks are actually very accurate here.
- SilverSlash 9mo agoThis was far more thrilling and exciting to watch than I thought it would be. Which feels wrong when I say it, but I don't mean it was a good watch because of the consequences of failing. Rather because it was amazing watching a human perform at such a peak level.
- keepamovin 9mo agoIt was amazing. But when it concluded I realized how watching it had made it seem, in retrospect, easy, inevitable, safe. Crazy as that sounds, but watching it updated my perspective. It was "easy", and "safe" if you had trained and worked for it. The possibilities of humanity!
- cindyllm 9mo ago[dead]
- lordclayton 9mo agoGreat feat of strength, determination and athleticism! I also hope Netflix stays as far away from this as possible.
- smi-nvidia 9mo ago[flagged]
- eric_khun 9mo agoshameless plug for folks in taiwan: we do regular meetup in Taiwan - join us! https://taipeidev.com https://taipeidev.com
- TheAceOfHearts 9mo agoI need to share a video [0] which helped contextualize Alex Honnold for me by contrasting him with another climber I've watched for years: Magnus Midtbo. In this video they're solo climbing a fairly simple and safe mountain, and Magnus is visibly stressed out while Alex calmly shouts encouragement all while recording. When watching Alex Honnold in Free Solo, I understood there was a exceptional aspect to him, but it took me seeing him climb with other people to really grasp the magnitude. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cyya23MPoAI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cyya23MPoAI
- kqr 9mo agoI suspect a lot of this is habituation due to repeated practise. As long as one climbs well within one's abilities, the actual level of danger is comparatively low. But the fear is still there and needs to be trained away.
- padjo 9mo agoI don't think it required much training for Alex, I think he just has an under active amygdala or something
- e40 9mo agoThat’s the impression I got: he doesn’t feel fear like the rest of us.
- parthdesai 9mo agoThat’s not true, he has debunked that. It’s due to repeated practice and his confidence in his skill set that he doesn’t feel fear under those conditions
- hackeraccount 9mo agoWhen I go out running a might feel a twinge in Achilles. Or a pain in my knee. Maybe I'm just tired. When that happens I have to do a mental inventory and ask myself, "Am I better off finishing the run or should I just bag it and take tomorrow off?" Two things; firstly every run hurts a little bit - especially the first mile. I usually get into a groove and sometimes, very rarely, I really have gotten to that place where I'm feeling no pain and a run seems like less effort then a walk - mostly though the nice part of a run has an undeniable unpleasantness bound up with it. I like being able to go out for a run though so I put up with the bad. Second thing. I'm an unreliable source. For all the reasons I just talked about I don't trust my ability to take stock of my physical state. I do occasionally take off or skip for days at a stretch but it's like candy - I don't trust it because I like it so. Here's the thing. If I get that balance wrong I end up walking in the middle of my run. I imagine Honnold has to do that same self assessment. If he gets it wrong he plunges to his death. Which - to my mind - is totally crazy. Takes all kinds though.
- emilbratt 9mo agoAbout to watch the film now. I know there are controversial aspects to this, but in my opinion this is something I myself need to allow happen. Alex know it himself, that there is a risk of ending it, but most people will not understand the feelings he get before, during and after a climb. So who am I to judge from my couch in my livingroom whether he should be allowed to pursue his lifestyle or not. He is not actively hurting anyone.
- sph 9mo agoThe issue with moralistic people is that they feel they have a duty to preach their opinions unto everybody else. One should be free to do whatever they want with their own life, provided they don’t hurt anyone else.
- eudamoniac 9mo agoHe has a young child.
- tasuki 9mo agoMany people do. He mentioned he considers partying more dangerous than climbing. I can't tell how dangerous his stunts are, but he's still alive, so perhaps he knows what he's doing?
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- giacomoforte 9mo ago[flagged]
- thefz 9mo agoAfter watching the documentary about him I don't really like the person, but here's my take: will he be doing the same if there was no TV, nor social media?
- kqr 9mo agoHe's been doing this since he was a child, much of it without TV and social media. But this specific tower? Doubt it.
- physicles 9mo agoHe’s said in multiple interviews (like on his own climbing podcast, Climbing Gold) that he’d do it for free with no publicity. He’s been trying for a very long time to get permission to do something like this, just because it’d be really cool. The fact that Netflix was behind it might’ve made it possible to get permission to climb this specific tower though.
- clickety_clack 9mo agoI think anyone who’s ever worked in construction would balk at the idea of hanging your life on pieces of building facade. Except for the the pieces stopping people falling through the outside windows and walls themselves, most of the outside decorative stuff is only designed to hold itself onto the building and not much more. He’s potentially hanging his 200lbs on something that’s intended to hold 0lbs.
- rurban 9mo agoNo, you forgot that architects count the wind forces in, not just the weight of pieces hanging onto the facade. Give them dynamic spikes of factor 10, so it looks more like 1000lbs. Only once you can get your engineers to agree on only factor 2, you can build much much lighter structures.
- clickety_clack 9mo agoNo I didn’t, you’re talking about big sheets of stuff, which probably won’t have anything to hold onto on it. I’m talking about the fiddly little bits that he’s likely to be holding onto. A little bit of flashing around a window has a wind load approaching zero.
- xraypants 9mo agoYou can see him testing pieces as he goes - tapping with his fist.
- dpc050505 9mo agoWhen I'm cleaning highrise windows I put a looot of force crimping window frames to move laterally. I haven't broken anything yet. I've also done a facade inspection on a building where massive sheets of metal had been badly installed. The vast majority of them weren't connected to the structural steel beams, they were just held together by single screws (with no nuts!) that were falling off due to wind making the screws bore a bigger hole. A sheet had fallen off the 12th floor right onto the busy boulevard below.
- 9mo ago
- rurban 9mo agoI've watched a lot "Shiey tower climbs" in the last decade to overcome my sudden fear of heights, it didn't help. https://www.google.com/search&q=Shiey+tower+climb https://www.google.com/search&q=Shiey+tower+climb Alex is just a bit too crazy to follow him. I don't like suicidal tendencies
- SolubleSnake 9mo agoI'm going to be controversial and say that this is an interesting spectacle but it is not even remotely comparable to the difficulty of what was going on in Free Solo. This is a circus trick by comparison to that. For example I think a lot of 'good' climbers with several multi pitch climbs behind them could do this building fairly comfortably with ropes and really the only thing interesting about this is he did it without safety equipment which is frankly just a bit daft. (I have climbed pretty extensively in the UK and also in Yangshuo China). I was kind of 'intermediate/good' at one point.
- defrost 9mo agoIt's not contraversial at all - buildings are extremely predictable ( to a point, see: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46750654 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46750654 and consider that the initial overhang pass failed due to not finding an open bottomed window cleaning track to slot into, they backed up, tried another spar, and success ) this was an exercise of focus, indifference to exposure, and fitness to complete the 1,660 odd feet of ascent. > he did it without safety equipment which is frankly just a bit daft. People vary a lot, I had spent a few years climbing before someone pointed out that you could use ropes and protection .. indoor climbing gyms were fun for a while but never really became a thing of great interest for myself.