US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday.
Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement.
Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo.
Photograph by Corey Rich for Netflix
Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos shared on Taiwanese social media in September showed Honnold practicing for the climb, waving to people from outside Taipei 101’s observatory and even ascending the tower’s spire.
In an interview published with the statement, Honnold said that while he had spent 30 years climbing rock faces, Taipei 101, his first major structure climb, would feel a little different.
Honnold said that climbing a building involves more repetitive movements, which make it a little bit less tricky technically, but more physically demanding.
The hardest part of the climb would be what he called the “bamboo boxes” — the eight segments comprising 64 floors in the middle of the building that are overhanging, he said.
In each section, there is overhang of 10 or 15 degrees, and then a balcony every eight floors.
This means that you do “quite a hard effort for around 100 feet” (30.5m) and then reach a balcony several times, he said.
Asked about his aspirations for the climb, Honnold said his goal was similar to the trail-running events he had done, namely to “not injure myself and comport myself with dignity.”
While some viewers might feel nervous watching the broadcast, Honnold said he hoped they would appreciate the fun, the beauty and the joy of the experience.
At 508m, Taipei 101 was the tallest building in the world when it was completed in 2004.
It is now the world’s 11th-tallest building, remaining the tallest building in Taiwan.
Alain Robert, known as the "French Spider-Man," praised Alex Honnold as exceptionally well-prepared after the US climber completed a free solo ascent of Taipei 101 yesterday. Robert said Honnold's ascent of the 508m-tall skyscraper in just more than one-and-a-half hours without using safety ropes or equipment was a remarkable achievement. "This is my life," he said in an interview conducted in French, adding that he liked the feeling of being "on the edge of danger." The 63-year-old Frenchman climbed Taipei 101 using ropes in December 2004, taking about four hours to reach the top. On a one-to-10 scale of difficulty, Robert said Taipei 101
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