David Blaine just accomplished his first death-defying ‘stunt’ in almost 18-years.
The magician/illusionist/balloon-enthusiast tied himself to 42 weather balloons, then released them and let them take him to almost 5,500 metres into the air. Then he pulled a cord and parachuted back to earth.
Now, you won’t find me strapping myself to weather balloons and heading into the stratosphere (heights and me don’t mix). But I am finding it hard to see the challenge in this particular David Blaine ‘stunt’.
Previously, the man has held his breath for 17-minutes (which is quite hard to do), encased himself in ice for almost two days, and stood on a metal column in times square while being electrocuted… those are all very hard things to do.
BONUS: These Top David Blaine Stunts will Terrify Mere Mortals
But this challenge seems to rely solely on the balloons going up, and then being able to pull a parachute cord. He didn’t even go particularly high.
In 2012, Felix Baumgartner attached himself to a weather balloon and travelled 39-kilometres into the sky. Now that sounds like a challenge!
Blaine originally wanted to use his hot air balloons to travel from New Jersey to New York across the Hudson river. Instead, he and his team moved it to the Arizona desert.
You can watch the whole ‘stunt’ below. You will have to skip to the last 20-minutes if you want to ignore hours of pre-amble.
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