not for me, tower climber

[Jerry Lozier]

This looks about as much fun as helicopter transmission line repairman a few months ago

http://www.liveleak.com/e/07b_1284580365

[Robert Jones]

I got that little negative g feeling while watching the end of this lip. FREE CLIMB!!!

[Brandon Whitmore]

That is friggin' awesome.

Coolest part would be base jumping when finished, although the guy wires may be an issue.

[davidmcg]

These guys are insane, they don't even tie off. I don't care if it made the climb take longer or not. As a teenager we snuck in and climbed a 400 foot cable tv tower. Took forever to get up there. Spooky stuff, didn't expect the tower to be swaying at the top. And those red lights on there are a lot brighter in person than what you think.

[kurt]

Woof......

[:-shake]

[mgbinspect]

If I hadn't seen it, I'd have never believed it (free climbing).

[Jim Katen]

Does viewing this video make anyone else's feet hurt?

Whenever I look down from any really high place, the bottoms of my feet hurt. They feel exactly as if someone has slapped them really hard with a 2x4. When I was a kid, I thought that this was just one of those normal reactions that people have, like perspiring when it's hot out, or jumping when there's a sudden loud noise. But every time I've mentioned it to other people, they look at me as if I'd just grown tentacles out of my nostrils.

Has anyone else ever experienced this reaction?

- Jim Katen, Oregon

[mgbinspect]

Does viewing this video make anyone else's feet hurt?

Whenever I look down from any really high place, the bottoms of my feet hurt. They feel exactly as if someone has slapped them really hard with a 2x4. When I was a kid, I thought that this was just one of those normal reactions that people have, like perspiring when it's hot out, or jumping when there's a sudden loud noise. But every time I've mentioned it to other people, they look at me as if I'd just grown tentacles out of my nostrils.

Has anyone else ever experienced this reaction?

- Jim Katen, Oregon

No, but the video certainly does give me moments where I feel sensations as if I was actually up there. I don't know how those guys are able to ignore the setting and relax enough to do their work.

[gpdewitt]

Unbelievable. Too many natural variables to consider that safe. Sudden high speed wind gusts? I can understand not wanting to tie on and off many times on the way, but what would be so hard about installing a safety cable parallel to the ladder, attached in long stages. Then equip the climber with a harness that ties on with a set of bearings or wheels and an overspeed brake? Could probably take the whole mechanism from those Swiss aerial tramways, much reduced in size of course.

Here's another one I came across today, searching "inspection":

[kurt]

......................they look at me as if I'd just grown tentacles out of my nostrils.

Has anyone else ever experienced this reaction?

- Jim Katen, Oregon

No, but I've had folks look at me as if I've had testicles growing out of my nostrils.......

[hausdok]

I think it's uber kewl. I'd love to do it. My problem is that with the weight I'm carrying these days and the arthritis in my hands, I'd get a couple of hundred yards up that sucker and I wouldn't have any grip left and my fingers would stop working. That wouldn't be kewl. I needed to have seen that video ten years ago before the arthritis set in and I got so, er, uh,....stout.

ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!!

Mike

[kurt]

Yeah, I'd have been all over that a good while back. I don't know what it is; I never used to be afraid of heights at all; nowadays, just watching that video makes me vertiginous.

[Mark P]

Nothing happens when I click the link, is it just me?

[Erby]

C'mon, pay attention. They're only climbing 168 feet. They get an elevator ride to the 1600 foot level.

Like Kurt, it makes me vertiginous, especially when he starts flipping his head up and down.

By the way, anyone know who this character is. Found him running around on my screen this morning.

Click to Enlarge

19.35 KB

(Your website's down this morning, Jim.)

[hausdok]

By the way, anyone know who this character is. Found him running around on my screen this morning.

Click to Enlarge

19.35 KB

Isn't the answer obvious? That's the whiskered Oregon panther - jimbus dildous.

It's indigenous to Oregon and can be found in very dark deep crawlspaces. The panther uses it's extra long whiskers to gage the width of the holes it crawls through in order to ensure it doesn't get stuck. It craves quiche and drinks chardonnay and is particularly partial to party sausages wrapped in little bits of baked dough..

ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!!

Mike

[charlieb]

Yeah, I'd have been all over that a good while back. I don't know what it is; I never used to be afraid of heights at all; nowadays, just watching that video makes me vertiginous.

Well, that's one word I did not have to look up. The root gave it away. As far as the tower climb, once the pucker factor sets in the hips would allow no vertical movement.

[Jim Katen]

. . . (Your website's down this morning, Jim.)

Website? I have a website?

- Jim Katen, Oregon

[Erby]

Heck if i know, but your Active Rain profile says you do.

http://activerain.com/benchmark

says it's http://www.benchmarkinspections.com/

You'd know better than me!

"

What Others Have Said To Me

"Jim, you rock so fierce!" Jason, a home buyer from McMinnville. (Actually, I have no idea what he meant by this, but he assured me that it was a compliment.)

"Are you married?" Joan, a home buyer from Beaverton. (I am.)

"Are you happily married?" Also Joan from Beaverton. (I am.)

"

[Phillip]

Just call me a wuss. There is no way I would make that climb

[Ben H]

No way I could even think about that. Tied off or not, just no way. Makes me nervous just watching it sitting on my couch.

[mgbinspect]

During my bricklaying days, I worked on some fairly tall stuff. Building chimneys always made one the most aware of the height, because the scaffolding tended to merely be two frames with cross-bracing. Three to fours stories of such scaffolding, with a half ton of workers and materials atop it, swayed like nobody's business, which took some getting used to. Finally though, the grim reality set in that "sway is good". If you ever didn't feel the sway, you had to wonder which way you were going over, because that's what's probably happening.

Now, I happily rode all the rides atop the Stratosphere in Vegas, but at 1100 feet, it's 650 feet shorter than this tower.

To put this video in perspective, the tower is a full 500 feet taller than the Empire State Building and secured by cables, so that tower probably has an UNGODLY sway to it - probably more than a foot or two, and a head mounted camera can't possibly demonstrate that added dynamic to their climb. Since they're swaying along with the tower, there's no point of reference. The level of sensations those guys are dealing with is off the charts.

I'm betting that 99.95% of the folks fully intent upon climbing that thing (Me included), would step out of the elevator climb about twenty feet up and come right back down totally petrified. Lol...

Tied off, for a million bucks, I'd give it a go, but there's no way I'd stand on top of that light base, like he did - that's unfathomable...

[esch]

Does viewing this video make anyone else's feet hurt?

Whenever I look down from any really high place, the bottoms of my feet hurt. They feel exactly as if someone has slapped them really hard with a 2x4. When I was a kid, I thought that this was just one of those normal reactions that people have, like perspiring when it's hot out, or jumping when there's a sudden loud noise. But every time I've mentioned it to other people, they look at me as if I'd just grown tentacles out of my nostrils.

Has anyone else ever experienced this reaction?

- Jim Katen, Oregon

Jim you're the first person to know what im talking about =)

It feels to me kind of tingly but hurts, almost as if a limb has been asleep and is waking up, same reaction for me when I would explain it to others.

Matt

[davidlord]

There has never been nor will there ever be a time in my life that I would do that.

[Terence McCann]

I've never minded heights however I do prefer the bucket truck.

WJ8IM (a good friend) & myself finishing some work my R-7000 vertical. I'm on the left. I've aged a few years since then.

Heavy WX moving in.

[Garet]

If you look close at 7:18, you'll see him let go with both hands while clipping in at the very top. At the same time you can see the top shaking back and forth from the movement of his partner below.

In my younger days I spent a week solo climbing El Cap in Yosemite (twice the height of this tower). Once you get more than a few hundred feet up, the actual height becomes meaningless. The wide angle distortion and jerky movement of the helmet cam greatly amplifies the feeling of vertigo in the video.