Climber delays rope-free skyscraper ascent over rain

An American climber has postponed scaling the Taipei 101, one of the world’s tallest buildings, rope-free for another 24 hours due to wet weather.

Alex Honnold, who scaled El Capitan in California’s Yosemite National Park without a rope in 2017, said on Saturday: “Sadly it’s raining in Taipei right now so I don’t get to go climbing.”

The skyscraper in Taiwan’s capital measures 508m (1,667ft) and is made of steel, glass and concrete. It contains eight sections, each with a slight overhang designed to resemble joints on a bamboo stick.

Netflix – which will stream the event – says there will be a delay on the live feed should the worst happen.

“It’s obviously a conversation that everybody has,” Netflix executive Jeff Gaspin told Variety magazine. “We’ll cut away. We have a 10-second delay. Nobody expects or wants to see anything like that to happen.”

The climb is now due to take place on Sunday. Announcing the delay, Netflix said: “Safety remains our top priority, and we appreciate your understanding.”

Taipei 101 has been conquered before. In 2004, France’s Alain Robert, who called himself Spiderman, climbed it in four hours using a safety belt and rope.

Netflix said there will be three stages to Honnold’s rope-free climb.

First, there is an initital 113m section of sloping steel and glass followed by the eight “bamboo” boxes before reaching the final stage which includes scaling the spire at the very top of the tower.

Honnold, 40, who is married with two children, said it was “a lifelong dream” to scale a skyscraper.

His historic 2017 ascent of El Capitan without a rope was documented in the film Free Solo, which won an Academy Award.

An enormous sheer granite rock face of approximately 3,000 feet (915m), El Capitan is a major landmark in Yosemite and entices big-wall rock climbers from all over the world.