Acrobat who recently made history when he crossed Niagara Falls completes yet another feat, this time without a harness, adding to the legend of the Wallendas
Nik Wallenda, the American man who recently walked across a wire strung over the Niagara Falls, hit the beach for a stroll on Thursday – 30.5 metres above the sand.
The daredevil’s latest public stunt was less visually spectacular than his Niagara conquest on June 15, when he crossed a wire between the roaring falls’ US and Canadian banks in front of a worldwide television audience.
But his performance in the New Jersey resort of Atlantic City, 30.5 metres up on a wire stretching 396 metres, featured a crucial difference: no safety harness.
Mr Wallenda, from the Flying Wallendas family of tightrope walkers, was forced by ABC television, broadcaster of the Niagara event, to be attached to the wire, as it did not wish to risk showing Mr Wallenda’s possible death to viewers.
On Thursday, though, it was just the way a highwire act should be: Mr Wallenda, a wire and a six-metre balancing pole – a truly death-defying act cheered by thousands of beachgoers and fans.
About halfway across, Mr Wallenda stopped and raised his right index finger in salute.
“Nik!” people screamed from below, while a news helicopter whirred above to film the spectacle. Not that the fuss would have bothered ice-cool Mr Wallenda.
He says he’s been on wires since he could walk, the seventh generation in the family business.
The New Jersey wire was half the height of the one across Niagara. But while the beach walk may have appeared easier, compared to the terrifying-looking cauldron of water and spray in the Niagara Falls, Mr Wallenda offered a different perspective.
For him, walking on a wire is the same regardless.
“There’s no difference between 60cm and 305 metres. Anything over 18 metres or 21 metres is impressive,” he told the Philadelphia Inquirer.
And at 30.5 metres, he pointed out, “If you fall, you’re dead.”
Mr Wallenda was the first person to walk across the stormiest portion of the Niagara Falls. However, previous attempts on relatively easier sections were made with no safety harness, sometimes with fatal consequences.
After his triumphant feat there, Mr Wallenda said he hoped eventually to walk over the Grand Canyon, which is three times as wide as the Niagara Falls.
The acrobat’s achievement adds to the lore and legend of the Wallenda family, famous for astonishing audiences around the world with their jaw-dropping stunts executed at dizzying heights.
Their fame really took off in 1978 when they were made the subject of a popular made-for-TV movie, The Great Wallendas.
Nik Wallenda frequently pays tribute to the family patriarch, his great-grandfather Karl Wallenda, the German-born founder of the business who died aged 73 in 1978 while attempting to walk between two tall buildings in Puerto Rico.
The Flying Wallendas
• The Flying Wallendas is the name of a circus act and daredevil stunt performers, most known for performing high-wire acts without a safety net.
• They were first known as The Great Wallendas, but the current name was coined by the press in the 1940s and has stayed since.
• The name in their native German, Die fliegenden Wallenda, is a rhyme on the title of the Wagner opera, Der fliegende Holländer (The Flying Dutchman).
• The patriarch of the family was Karl Wallenda who was born in Madgeburg, Germany, in 1905 to an old circus family and began performing at the age of six.
• While still in his teens he answered an ad for a hand balancer with courage. His employer, Louis Weitzman, taught him the trade.
• In 1922, Karl put together his own act with his brother Herman, Joseph Geiger, and a teenage girl, Helen Kreis, who eventually became his wife.
• The act toured Europe for several years, performing some amazing stunts.
• When John Ringling saw them perform in Cuba, he quickly hired them to perform at the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus. In 1928, they debuted at the Madison Square Garden.
Tragedies
• In 1944, while the Wallendas were performing in Hartford, Connecticut, a fire broke out, killing over 168 people. None of the family were hurt.
• While performing a pyramid in Detroit, the front man on the wire faltered and the pyramid collapsed. Three men fell to the ground, killing Wallenda’s son-in-law, and his nephew. Karl injured his pelvis and his adopted son, Mario, was paralysed from the waist down.
• Wallenda’s sister-in-law, Rietta, fell to her death in 1963 and his son-in-law Richard (“Chico”) Guzman was killed in 1972 after touching a live electric wire while holding part of the metal rigging.
• On March 22, 1978, during a promotional walk in Suan Juan, Puerto Rico, Karl fell from the wire and died. He was 73.