variety.com: Later today (well, tomorrow in Taiwan), “Free Solo” climber Alex Honnold will start his ascent on the 1,677-foot Taipei 101 skyscraper — without ropes — by carefully making his way up the tower’s slab base. But that’s the easy part. From there, he’ll get on the building’s middle section, designed like eight-story “bamboo boxes,” which will require steep climbing over these overhanging sections.
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As someone who's been a rock climber for over a decade, I have many opinions on Alex Honnold. Free Solo came out when I was about 12 years old, and at the time, I have vivid memories of absolutely despising it. Free soloing is not a thing that is super popular in the climbing community, infact most people view it as quite dumb. So when I would tell people I rock climbed and they would say “oh have you seen free solo?” it can be upsetting that people think that’s all the sport is. My experience with climbing is mostly indoor, in the competitive world, but I have done some outdoor climbing as well, and there, you cannot play around with safety. At 15 I was at a camp in Acadia and one of my guides messed up her safety measures and went off the end of a rope while rappelling falling 15 feet. She ended up being okay, but we had to get her medivaced out, and she was quite injured but lucky she didn't get more hurt. Free soloing is taking on a million more times the risks, just for the sake of it, and the consequences are very real.
I remember watching Free Solo and thinking “wow, what an absolute freak of nature.” I remember something in that document talking about how abnormal his fear receptors are. And I do honestly think that his achievement in Free Solo (soloing El Cap) was harder (as I’ve seen climbing experts say online repeatedly in response to climbing Taipei 101), but you still really have to be a different kind of person to live broadcast an incredibly difficult free climb to the world. It was really interesting to hear about this from the streaming/entertainment point of view, though. The part about it being sort of like a play resonated with me as a theatre maker. When hearing all about Skyscraper Live on social media, I didn’t really think about all the insane behind the scenes that would be happening. But so much is dependant on the weather, on the timeframe, and on Holland himself.
Personally, if I was about to scale a building without a rope live on Netflix, I would appreciate it if I was not compared to a failed Evel Knievel stunt. This seems like such a stressful thing to try and document. I’ve been in production meetings where people say it's too dangerous for us to have a single glass cup on stage, but I suppose Alex Honnold might have a slightly different skill set than your typical actor. It's also interesting to see that Netflix is trying to break into live content, as they made their fortune on the exact opposite idea, but I guess time is a flat circle and all that. I do also wonder how they got permission to do this stunt in the first place, trying to convince whoever owns this building that a guy scaling up the side of it without a rope just because he really wants to has got to be a tough sell.
The idea of climbing an skyscraper is one I would never have. Especially on live television. I knew that this was happening, but I honestly don’t think I could watch it because I would have been anxious the whole time. This article brings up some details and points that I would not have imagened would effect the climb that day. Obviously, he would not have been able to climb the building if it was raining, but I never thought about moisture. As someone who has lived in a high humidity and moisture area, I know that if high enough things begin to condensate and get slippery. So thinking about the moisture in the air that day s a must for an event like this. The article also mentions how the live feed will be on a 10 sec delay and that is their so called backup plan if things go wrong. I really hope that there is some other safety measure that would have been put in place just in case he fell at an unimaginable height.
Man this is just crazy! I just heard about this! I can’t believe that he free climbed 1667 feet. I watched a sped up version of this, and it is really impressive. When people think of sports they don't usually think of climbing as one, but he is absolutely a top tier athlete! The upper body strength that he must have is out of this world! Additionally, the mental strength that he has is truly unimaginable. While I would never do anything like this, I definitely appreciate all of the hard work and dedication that Honnold puts into the things that he loves. I actually heard about this from a tik tok video that talked about the safe guards that were in place. They said that there was a 10 second delay on the stream, so if any accidents happened, they could cut the cameras off. Additionally, they said that even if he did fall, he would most likely not die. Because there are so many different ledges on the building. I have never been a person that is scared of heights, but thinking of this does make me nervous!
I never watched his climb, however, I never heard of him getting hurt either, so that’s a relief. I really liked reading about how both Alex and the production team had to both be comfortable with him climbing before they started. It’s nice that they also took into consideration the team that’s filming him. I wouldn’t want to be a part of a production team if I knew what we were filming was way too risky. It’s good that they’ll wait even if they have a broadcast scheduled, and that they’re willing to move it back to ensure that Alex was as safe as possible. I also like how they have prepared for almost anything during the broadcast, whether he’s tired and knows he can’t keep going, or that if he ended up falling off they would be able to cut the broadcast to prevent viewers from watching something like that.
I am very surprised that Alex Honnold is willing to try another incredible stunt like Free Solo again. I have rock climbed on and off throughout my life and have always thought of how insane and impossible it would be to climb an entire cliffside without any safety gear or help. Perhaps, I don’t have the same kind of mindset and perspective that Honnold has, but I am surprised that he wants to climb Taipei 101 and that there are networks that are willing to film and sponsor the event. I think what is most terrifying to me is the possibility of a mistake happening that is out of everyone’s control leading to fatal injury. Even the possibility of that happening deters me from the whole concept. I hope that they are able to pull the event off without a problem and that everyone is safe and comfortable. Despite all this, Honnold is an incredible athlete and climber, constantly showcasing his ability and I have little doubt that he is able to do this climb without any issue.
While my mother is not usually one to be drawn in by pop-culture events, I received a flurry of texts from her right before and during the showing of Skyscraper Live. Which I think just goes to show how much interest people had in this event. I have been climbing for a couple years now, so I am absolutely aware of who exactly Alex Honnold is. He is probably the most famous climber, especially after the success of Free Solo. It is always interesting to see his interviews online and see what his mindset is going into a free solo project like this. He has a particularly inspiring mindset when it comes to fear and moving past it. Although, after scaling a massive rock wall several thousand feet above the ground without any safety gear, I guess not much else scares you. I also always find it interesting how comfortable Alex Honnold always looks when he's climbing, even compared to those on ropes. He is truly an inspiring figure for climbers.
My hands are sweating just reading this. I mean, just imagining it, this sounds so interesting to plan around. The discussion that James Smith has about the amount of safety meetings he has been a part of sounds like a mountain of a task. I appreciate how much they have planned around the athlete’s safety. Especially when he mentioned that they have repeatedly told the athlete that he can back out at any time. The way they are approaching this feels very humanistic in a way that we as viewers do not get to see very often. I assume most anything on tv has a million fail safes behind the scenes. However, getting this sneak peak into that process is really illuminating. I also found the section where the athlete affirms that he feels fear very interesting. I remember in the past reading something about people who do these large climbs or anything that involves great heights as having something in their brain that negates fear. So, I appreciate that the athlete works through this fear and even uses it to push himself.
For an article that claims to explain what would happen if Alex Honnold fell during the Taipei 101 climb, it spent awfully little time saying would would actually happen if he fell. The only answer from the article is that they would have enough of a buffer to be able to cut the stream away before anyone watching saw anything to nasty.
I think it is pretty clear that while this summiting might be obnoxious or unwise, that the likelihood of Alex actually falling is pretty low. Climbing the hard corners of this building is a predictable problem that Alex has figured out how to achieve. That being said, there is always a risk of something going wrong. I am sure that Netflix has plenty of lawyers to make sure they are not legally responsible, but it would still be a PR mess if something went wrong. I do wonder what discussions have been had behind closed doors (and without Alex Honnold involved) to make a plan of what story to share if he fell.
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