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Comment by jlarcombe | Hacker News Reader

This video did the rounds many years ago now, still quite an uncomfortable watch especially when he gets to the top! I understand they don't allow 'free climbing' any more... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgO4Gd4RhvM

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I free climbed radio towers on mesa's in the Pilbara as part of work experience in high school .. bit before health and safety was a thing.

The steeplejack work of Fred Dibnah is quite a thing to watch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3R3-YwDZrzg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3ma9iYx4rg

yes indeed, and any English person of the appropriate age will have seen children's TV present John Noakes climbing Nelson's Column and then going over the edge in a bosun's chair to clean it, with no harness, utterly terrifying!

https://youtu.be/tGZ-h70IK9s

More terrifying and yet unseen .. the cameraman had to hump his gear past the overhang to film Noakes arriving .. and those 50+ year old cameras weren't GoPro's or iPhones.

Yes! You do see him standing at the top in one of the long shots. Terry Doe, interviewed briefly in this documentary about Noakes: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6c72u3

The Fred Dibnah stuff is some of the most impressive stuff I've seen, not just the scaling heights but the logistics of building the ladders as he went, and the demolition of large brick structures with a minimum of tools.

This video was how I started to challenge my fear of heights, watching it over and over until I got desensitized, then found hundreds more similar videos and did the same, eventually getting obsessed with rock climbing movies, which taught me a lot. I haven't been able to actually climb since then due to injuries but the whole thing changed my life and made facing fears and working on myself in general a standard thing I just do now.

Check out the rooftoppers who climb cranes too btw. Beautiful views. Risky stuff.

Also a movie, Fall:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15325794/

Haha a lot like the flick where the guy is trapped in a phone booth for the entire movie.

This makes me physically very uncomfortable to watch. What a thrill.

Obligatory Man On Wire reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_on_Wire

Incredible and unusual documentary, not too much vertigo. It's essentially like a bank heist movie.

I am afraid of heights. I had to go back halfway through going up the Eiffel tower.

Jesus fuck this video has me on edge. I don't know what moved me to click that link, haha.

These people have balls of tungsten, that's for sure.

These people presumably aren’t scared of heights, so I’m not sure we can really comment on their balls

People who work at heights usually have just enough fear of heights to not do something stupid. Those with no fear of heights tend to make fatal mistakes.

Source: 35 years of climbing and 10 years of industrial rope access :-)

To quote Jim Whitaker, once upon a time a famous climber and founder of a well known mountain guide company, "If you're not afraid of heights, I don't want to be on the mountain with you".

Hi, I've considered changing careers to rope access or similar for a while now. Can I interview you about your job? Please email me, see profile. (This request extends to other RATs reading this too!)

No problem, I've sent you an email.

I'd say their balls have a relative density in between bromine and tungsten. Uranium = customer service roles.

Try watching this guys Insta videos: @alainrobertofficial

He's a French guy famous for free-soloing skyscrapers. I don't have a particular fear of heights but I nope out of some of his videos pretty quickly.

Is not the height that gets me, it is the edges!

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