CHICAGO ¨C Daredevil Nik Wallenda, who last year completed a high-wire walk over the Grand Canyon, announced on Tuesday plans for an untethered tightrope walk between Chicago skyscrapers on a night in November.
¡°This is going to be the most incredible tightrope walk of my career,¡± Wallenda said in a statement, noting that he has fond memories of performing with his family in Chicago. ¡°Besides, it¡¯s the ¡®Windy City¡¯ and there¡¯s nothing like doing this during winter in Chicago.¡±
Wallenda will perform the Nov. 2 walk, without net or harness, in two parts. First, he will walk from Marina City¡¯s west tower more than two city blocks to the Leo Burnett Building at more than 50 stories above the Chicago River, going uphill rising to a 15-degree angle. The second part of the walk will span Marina City¡¯s west tower to its east tower.
The first part of the walk will be the highest skyscraper walk in the history of the ¡°Flying Wallenda¡± family, and the first time Wallenda has attempted it at such a steep angle.
The statement said the walk will take place at night in one of the windiest sections of the nation¡¯s third-largest city. The Discovery Channel will air the event.
Wallenda, 35, is a seventh-generation member of the ¡°Flying Wallendas¡± family of acrobats. He also has completed a high-wire walk over the brink of Niagara Falls.
Viewers watched the Grand Canyon walk live in 217 countries.
Wallenda¡¯s great-grandfather, Karl Wallenda, slipped and fell to his death from a high wire in Puerto Rico in 1978.
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