The video’s here. It made me go funny watching it, especially when he “went outside” the tower without tieing himself on to anything.
Fantastic. My fingers still hurt from clasping the table…
Remember to watch in full-screen mode, by the way.
Finally saw it on a friend’s Facebook page, watched it full-screen (all 10" of my EeePC!) and…still not afraid and kind of want to try it one day! Though I totally do not have the strength needed to climb that high, and probably not to climb onto the top platform. It looks like such a trip!
A friend of mine climbs towers to service cellular and wireless broadband transmitters. I know he’s not climbing anything nearly as tall, (think he said most of his towers are about 500 feet) but I do wonder how they manage, especially in the dark or in bad weather. It may not be ideal to climb in such conditions, but if a whatchamahoozilator has failed, people will call and complain and not care if it’s raining or snowing.
So think about him and his fellow “tower monkeys” when your cell phone works or you can see your local TV stations and the weather’s bad.
Even when he does “tie off”, it looks like his hook could slip right off the ends of the rungs.
I’ve had to do this several times, though not nearly as high. It was to install temporary transmission antennas on ships’ masts.
American ships have a tether system called a rail rider - this runs in the middle of the ladder and basically acts as a sliding ratchet. This allows one to climb with both hands without having to stop and clip on. Most of the installations I was doing, though, were on older South American ships without this system - they just had a bare ladder - one that was generally slick from stack exhaust.
The worst time I had was installing antennas on a Peruvian frigate - the ships were at anchor in rough seas and were taking 10 to 15 degree rolls. I had to climb the mast when the ship rolled me forward and hold on for dear life when it rolled me back - I couldn’t clip on because then I wouldn’t have time to climb when the ship rolled again. I finally reached the top and clipped to a railing.
Fun times.
Wow…in general, I have next to no fear of heights (in fact, I have a great love of them in controlled environments), but I seriously felt like I was about to puke while watching that. I made it as far as the “rest break” before I had to turn it off.
And in case some of you didn’t bother with the math, 1768 feet is about a third of a mile.
Straight up.
Weeeeell, I guess I could make it up to the top of the lattice structure, after all it would be baby steps from the ground up to get used to the increasing height. But no way in hell I’d get out of the lattice and climb those extra meters on the side of the antenna; when the guy got to the top and stood on that tiny little platform several sphincters along my digestive tract clenched solid.
The climb would be a bitch. Other than that, I’d love being up there. Must be an awesome view.
I don’t see what the big deal would be though. If the top little platform was on your yard, you could climb on it all day without falling, and without getting nervous. No different than if it were 1700 feet up.
But you’ll barrel down a highway 3 feet away from opposing traffic without batting an eye.
(Now if that thing was made of spiders, you’d have to put a gun to my head to go up)
Well, yes, in theory is the same thing standing up on top of that platform waaay up there than a similar platform at ground level. But in my experience standing in high places, for example on the very edge of a 400 meter or so vertical cliff is that (at least in my case, others my chime in if it’s common), looking into the distance without any close object to use as a spatial reference I begin to lose my balance. It’s like a creeping vertigo and soon I start to wobble or at least it feels like I’m wobbling, I couldn’t say if it’s just a figment of my imagination or I’m actually swaying. In any case I wouldn’t trust my sense of balance in keeping me from falling of a platform like that.
I’m pleased to see that the workers were wearing safety helmets – because, of course, if you fall all the way to the ground, you want to protect your head.
There has to be some sway way at the tippy-top on that thin pole. Nope, not all the Valium in the world could get me up there. My body would just physically refuse to obey.
Very different, IMHO. Fear is not merely a state of mind, it’s a very real thing. In a situation like that, my muscles would absolutely refuse to obey my mind. If I got up on that thing high enough, I’d never be able to get down. I have nightmares about that stuff.
As horrible as that is, last night I was watching a show in which people were caving. In some areas they were just barely squeezing through passages. Every bit as scary to me.
For me, being on your own at that height is almost incomprehensible, so I didn’t have much of a physical response to the clip. It’s vertiginous when he looks down at his feet and when he gets to that last platform, though. The view up there is really incredible!
I guess falling from 1700 feet would be no more deadly than falling from 80 feet.
You have more time to squeeze every drop of sheer terror out of the experience though.
Heck, you may have enough time to finish the Sunday crosswords on the way down…
I’m not sure if that’s a whoosh or not, but the helmet is there to protect them from bumping their head into something. Bottom guy get’s hit with a dropped tool, someone standing up into a part of the structure, gust of wind knocking them into the ladder etc… Being hundreds of feet in the air isn’t the time for a head injury.
The lower guy must watch out for the upper guy’s swaying huge balls of steel.
I have seen the video (it’s in the wild on YouTube).
Holy fucking fucking fucking fuck. I’m not particularly scared of heights, but I had a real, visceral fear reaction to watching it. A tingling in my feet and stomach.