Saturday, August 4, 2012

Tightrope Walker in Inner Harbor Today

Tightrope Walker in Inner Harbor Today

To celebrate the announcement of the launch of Ripley's Believe it or Not!, the museum is bringing high wire walker Nik Wallenda to the Inner Harbor later today. Beginning promptly at 5:15 p.m., Wallenda will walk on a high wire from the new location of Ripley's Odditorium out over the water to a platform moored in the harbor. He will cover nearly 300 feet, all on a tightrope without a net or any safety device.

Wallenda is a seventh-generation member of the Wallenda family, who are famous for high wire acts. High great-grandfather Karl Wallenda wire-walked over the Baltimore harbor in 1973. After wire walking in Baltimore today, Wallenda will leave for Niagra Falls in Canada, where he will begin extensive training for a dangerous history-making walk across the falls in June. Wallenda set a Guinness World Record in 2008 for the longest distance and greatest height every traveled by a bicycle on a high wire when he walked 150 feet out on a high wire from the roof of Newark, New Jersey's Prudential Building, suspended 20 stories over the street.

Photo by Roller Coaster Photography, Flickr.


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