Nik Wallenda was back on TV with his latest stunt in Chicago. He did two tightrope acts in downtown across skyscrapers.
The first was an inclined walk that, with the slope of the cable, turned up to a 19 deg incline. The second was a 94 ft horizontal walk while blindfolded.
The blindfolded one was the one that had his family most worried. Sight is a very important part of maintaining balance.
Leading in to it, Discovery Channel actually had another special on Saturday night, detailing two other big walks. One was a trip to IIRC the Bahamas and doing a bicycle ride and then walk between hotel towers above the resort - the longest walk he’d done at the time. (That might have been filmed before the Grand Canyon - I didn’t get the dates from the show.)
The second was even more interesting. Nik went back to Puerto Rico to recreate the walk that killed his great-grandfather. That was an emotional experience for the family. His father was supposed to have been the rigger but didn’t make the trip, and bears a lot of guilt over it.
What was really interesting was they took the opportunity to explore the cause of Karl Wallenda’s fall by setting up an experiment in the back yard. Paul, Nik’s father, was convinced it was bad rigging. Nik felt age might have played a factor. The film from the event shows the rigging, and they demonstrated how the rigging was faulty - it’s clearly evident.
The cable is secured by guy lines that anchor it from side-to-side as well as up-down vibration. The guy lines were ropes knotted to U-bolts over the cable. What Nik demonstrated was that the knot should have been tied right at the U bolt, so that it secured the cable. But you can see in the film that the knot on at least one guy line is about 8 inches below the U bolt. Nik showed us that leaves the cable a lot of play while the knot is rock-solid.
For the demonstration, they wrapped Nik’s knees with bandages to simulate the stiffness of joints with age, and put a weight on his chest to throw off his center of gravity. Then even pulled out an airboat to provide wind gusts. He tried walking once with the rigging as shown in the film, but he couldn’t make it. They fixed the rigging and repeated the test with all other factors, and Nik walked with ease. So they confirmed fairly solidly that the rigging was the cause of the fall.
Looking at it, it’s possible that age played a role in Karl’s attempt to bend down and grab the cable, and not being able to get down. That’s not entirely clear. But certainly the rigging would mean the cable was a lot more wobbly than it should have been.
Anyway, they went to the site and rigged up the cables - correctly. And then Nik’s mom said she wanted to walk, too. That was a surprise - she hadn’t performed in a long time. But she did, and they did a crossover on the cable, her lying down and Nik stepping over her. Went off smoothly.
I also found out that Wallenda is actually his mom’s maiden name. I assume he’s using it as a stage name for the family legacy aspect.