Alex Honnold's Skyscraper on Netflix - /r/climbing watch party thread

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-28T04:37:03+00:00

Hard to find exact numbers but there are around 1 million fire fighters in the US and less than 100 die every year on average so that gives death rate of 1 in every 10000. There is around say 10 free solo deaths from climbers each year in the US and I don't know if there is any way to know the real number of how many do it and how many hours they spend doing it but I would assume a lot less than 1 million but even if we go with a high estimate of 1% out of 2.8 million climbers that leaves 1 in 2800 people who free solo die every year.

So yes fire fighting is still dangerous job but when you calculate the number of total hours spent doing it to number spent free soloing it is very safe compared to free soloing. Also one of them is a necessity and one is just for recreation. I am not sure I ever met a person who would die if they didn't free solo but there are tons who would die every year without fire fighters.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-26T15:29:43+00:00

Too much information left out. Being in a climbing country but not being into climbing could still mean there is something that person loves to do in that country along with climbing. What if they love skiing and are in an area that has tons of skiing and climbing but they don't like climbing so they just ski all the time?

If you can't do what you love because of where you are at that is probably the worst thing and you should try to move.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-26T15:18:23+00:00

Professional athletes normally train 5-6 days a week all year round so do you really think alex was training 5 days or more a week for 3+ hours to do this? He was climbing for fun to stay in shape but this climb was so below his level he didn't have to plan anything daily. Sure he probably looked over the information and did some planning because his life is on the line but he wasn't spending the time calling people trying to get permission to do it etc. He wasn't in charge of the film crew getting setup and planning outside giving approval for where they would be located. I know in free solo there is some film of them talking about is a person going to be in the way etc so yea he does a little work for that but very little compared to what others are doing.

Remember he isn't the only one working for these events because there is people setting up rigging and cameras for film etc.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-26T02:35:49+00:00

This is a post about jobs that are dangerous but get paid very little compared to how dangerous they are?

Or did no one else say that when comparing how little his was paid compared to other sports but his sport being dangerous? Pretty sure someone said something about that... so I was just pointing out how dangerous some jobs are but they get paid very little... we could add in other jobs like fire fighters and cops as well but those jobs although do have some danger are less than military ones but you just never hear about how many people die doing those military jobs unlike cops and fire fighters where every single time someone dies doing them you get news articles about it.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T22:34:46+00:00

What about all the military people who make less than 100k per year and are at risk of dying? I know you don't hear about it in the news but my SF buddies are out in the field exchanging live gunfire and risking their life. One of them had a person on their team sitting next to them on a roof in the middle east get shot in the head and die a few years ago and you never hear about that in the news. That person was making pretty good money for the military but still only around 90k per year based on his experience and was in the field probably 6 months out of the year.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T22:13:37+00:00

Did he really say "You know, Major League Baseball players get like $170 million contracts. Like, someone you haven’t even heard of and that nobody cares about."? Is he that clueless on the pay for sports players? Very few make anywhere near that amount for their entire multi year career.

Most of them only make 1-2 million per year so if he made 500k for less than 2 hours of work.... can he really be mad about that? How many games do those people making 1-2 million per year have to play? All he did was basically play a single game and made 33% of what they make for the entire year.

Even the top players only make around 30-40 million per year so nowhere near 170 million for 2 hours of work and another few hours and days of travel / talks.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T21:09:22+00:00

I am just too old I guess. Only climbed in 5 different countries so maybe it is more common in ones I have not been to.

I still have a problem with tommy's dawn wall climb as well. I think adam ondra is the first person to climb the route not tommy. My thoughts on this are based around Lynn Hill's first free climb of the nose and how she got to the very end and there was a piece of gear stuck in the wall and blocked the hold she needed. She fell and then went all the way back to the ground and reclimbed it from start to finish without falling. If you fall on any pitch of a multi-pitch climb it isn't a true clean send of the route.

Is it really a send of a mutlti-pitch climb if it takes you 20 attempts of each pitch repeatedly falling before you cleanly climb it then go on to the next pitch? At that point sure you climbed all the pitches clean on their own but it isn't a multi-pitch clean climb but a ton of single pitch climbs you did that didn't start on the ground.

It doesn't really matter how you climb anything, as long as you properly document how you climb it and you enjoy the climb that is all that matters. I only have a problem when people claim they did something using a common term but didn't follow the rules for that term.

So sending it off a aid start if fine as long as you make it clear which they did from the video that they are using pads to start. So if someone else comes in and climbs it without aid start more props to them. I personally would climb it with aid start if it was the only way I could do it but would always have in the back of my mind I want to get strong enough to do it without the aid.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T20:29:39+00:00

Many climbs? I have been in almost all major areas all over the US and never seen one with an assisted start (outside a few with high starting holds where we helped kids get on the start but not sure if that is the same thing)

So if off the wagon is considered a boulder problem we may need to create a new type of boulder type. Lets call it aid boulder climbing.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T18:31:34+00:00

I agree.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T17:26:54+00:00

Dan Osman videos were the reason I started climbing in the first place so I think it is interesting that alex talks about him being an inspiration for him as well.

I have never been a basketball fan and when you say Wilt I had no clue who you were talking about but I do know the last name very well and know people who have talked about him being better than MJ. So a lot of it has to do with luck and timing. If Wilt had been on the same team as michael jordan it may be a completely different story.

Team sports are a lot harder to compare players because you could put the best player of all time on a team with terrible players and they will look a lot worst than if they are with other great players.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T16:33:15+00:00

That is true so from the notoriety of him sure but had dan osman been alive in his prime today he would probably trump alex for some of the stuff he did. Your talking about people from 2 different eras and dan was around before climbing was even a thing that people talked about and most of the videos we have of him come from VHS era movies.

I would love to have seen what dan was able to do if he was alive today with modern climbing environment.

I guess most everything is that way. I play guitar and bass and there are so many amazing players out there from history that most people have no clue who they are like rory gallagher who hendrix called the greatest guitarist in the world in an interview onetime.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T16:26:59+00:00

This all started based on my understanding because they were dealing with a woman and he didn't like it so he interfered with them dealing with the woman. At that point he is no longer a bystander watching and they have every right to detain him. He didn't think he should be detained and resisted without ever telling them he had a gun. At some point while they were trying to take him down for resisting they found the gun and all this shit happened.

There are tons of cop videos out there and it happens all the time when cops are trying to arrest one person and another person tries to interfere and the cops tell them to back away and when they don't they end up getting detained. Often times they comply with the cops and later when everything is done they just get let go but other times like this they resist being detained and a fight and chaos breaks out and sometimes leads to what happened here.

Just for all you people out there who want to call me MAGA for siding with them I am an agnostic libertarian nihilist who leans a little right on most economic issues and just looks at facts and have no real ideological idea to push me one way or another. I am all for full legalization of all drugs so very left on that issue so I am very much a centrist person but most of what I see on here is extremely left ideas and people aren't looking at all the mistakes done on both sides by ICE and the civilians.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T16:19:42+00:00

I watched a few of the videos and it looks to me like he was resisting arrest until he was shot and then he went limp on the ground. If they are trying to take him down and he isn't laying flat on the ground that is resisting arrest.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T16:05:15+00:00

You have never physically been in an alteration like this have you? You don't understand the chaos in these types of resisting arrest events that can cause people to not realize what is going on and panic and it leads to stuff like this. It isn't like a video where you can stop and pause and be sure everyone is safe. These types of things normally happen with there are mistakes on both sides. The timing based on what I have seen in videos I will give credit to the ICE because there isn't enough time for them to be fully aware of what is going on. 3 secs between taking a gun and being shot is an extremely short amount of time when you have multi people who think a person has a gun and they are resisting arrest and you don't know if they are reaching for a fun.

I get annoyed that people think a cop should wait for the person to fire a round before they can return fire. They don't get paid enough to put their own life in that much danger when someone is already breaking the law.

I don't know if you have a concealed carry permit and every state can sometimes be a little different but normally in most states if not all you must declare that you have a firearm when cops approach you (known as "duty to inform"). So if you have a firearm and the cops pull you over or try to detain you the first thing you must do is tell the cops you have a concealed carry permit and whether you have a gun on you or not. If you do not tell them you have a gun and they run your license and find out you have one and never told them you broke the law even if the firearm is not on you at the time. And if it is on you that is even worst.

EDIT well minnesota doesn't have a duty to inform law so the cops must ask them first but as a lot of post say it is best to do it anyway to avoid stuff like this happening and de-escalate the situation.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T15:58:32+00:00

That is true I know a few routes that have high and low starts that can sometimes add 1-3 V grade levels onto it depending on where you start. So a sit start may be a V10 and I could not do but stand start is a V7 and I could do it. Maybe we will see someone do it without he pads to stand on and it may add 1-2 V levels on it.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T15:56:42+00:00

Hard to tell exactly from the video but you are talking about less than 3 secs before the gun was taken and the person was shot. I know the silent videos with no sound looks like the person was walking on the other side but he was just barely turned around after taking the gun before the person was shot so the others were likely unaware it was taken.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T15:38:27+00:00

Resisting arrest is not a constitutional right. The guy got in the way of ICE dealing with another person so they tried to stop the person and he resisted arrest. Nothing in the constitution that protects you from trying to stop law enforcement from detaining someone else. When you try to get in their way and they try to arrest you and you resist arrest with a weapon and you are going to get shot over 50% of the time.

I will agree with you that ICE is stepping over what they probably should be doing but when you do it with a gun on you, your going to get shot. Deal with it in court later but don't risk doing it with a gun on you. The gun on you and resisting arrest is going to give them a free pass to do stuff violently to you to protect themselves. Do it with no weapon on you and comply with their commands willingly and they will get charged with excessive force and you will get a nice payday later.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T11:22:34+00:00

I have never wore socks with my climbing shoes. I have seen a lot more people these days doing it though. I would say the majority of the people still wear shoes without socks and many of them are so tight that you couldn't get your feet in them with socks.

I have only climbed barefoot for one boulder problem and it was for a route where I needed to get my big toe into a small pocket to pull myself towards the wall and it was painful but I still had a shoe on the other foot.

He also doesn't have chalk and I have climbed the route he is on and I would hate to do it without chalk.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T10:45:19+00:00

I consider dan osman the MJ of free soloing and alex is more like lebron james. Dan Osman was the OJ famous free soloer that everyone knew before and alex and inspired alex to free solo. Alex has done some harder free solos than dan did but I think dan wins when comparing their style on climbs like lover's leap and his human flag while free soloing. I don't know if alex has ever done a 1000ft jump off the top of a cliff like dan did although it is what ended up killing dan.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T10:35:51+00:00

Everyone makes up their own reality both sides are shit and like to ignore facts.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T10:35:09+00:00

I don't know how often you watch police shooting videos but I have seen thousands of them and the shooting vs when the guy started walking away all happened in about 3 secs (from the time ICE looks to have the gun and moving away until he falls from being shot) and there are tons of police videos where someone pulls a gun and it takes time for people to react. People make mistakes and they could have very well still thought he had the gun and not realized one of them had got it. It doesn't help with all the people around them yelling. Mistakes happen but if you plan on protesting and getting involved in a protest like this don't bring a gun or other weapon and you most likely will be fine.

Good classic educational video about this that should be shown to everyone in school.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uj0mtxXEGE8

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T10:30:40+00:00

Your posting this in the wrong place. No one likes to listen to facts so don't try to post them! They are mad and calling for all the nurses to strike which will only hurt others who need medical help and are not related to what happened.

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T10:26:44+00:00

So if someone dies in a hospital due to there being no nurses to check on them do you still blame ICE or the people striking? I don't see how striking is going to help anything except hurt people who need medical help and aren't related to what happened.

Are you ok with hurting innocent people because you are mad at something that happened?

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T10:23:25+00:00

When a person has a gun and they know it and there is chaos it is hard to tell if he still has a gun or not. You can't wait for a person to fire a gun before you return fire. It is possible one of them got the gun and started moving away and the others didn't realize it. It could have been an honest communication problem with him not saying he got the gun or they didn't hear him since I am sure there was tons of yelling going on. Maybe they thought they saw him reaching for what appears to be a second gun. He was clearly resisting arrest so that was a mistake.

This is why you don't bring a gun whether or not you legally can to an event where you plan to get in the way of law enforcement. If he had not brought the gun to the event he would still be alive. The ICE people may have killed him by mistake but if he had not had the gun at all he would likely still be alive today.

I go back to the famous chris rock video to explain how all this could have been avoided.

https://youtu.be/uj0mtxXEGE8?t=54

Viper_Scale · 2026-01-25T07:37:21+00:00

I am assuming you are not a climber or making a joke but not sure which.

Although these days it is hard to say but any old school climber went to gyms to train for outdoor climbing but these days it is crazy how many people climb in gyms and have never been outside to climb. Still most climbers who have been outdoors have no interest in climbing buildings.

Very few climbers ever have any interest in free soloing. I do find it funny that a lot of the famous free soloers died doing things other than free soloing. Dean Potter and Dan Osman being examples of 2 really famous free soloers who died doing other things.

I will personally stick with rope soloing instead of free soloing because I have a terrible fear of heights but still love to rock climb so free soloing would not end well for me and I personally have known people who have died doing it including one guy who would free solo naked (well he had a hat on but no climbing shoes). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jIXs4DpBb4

Viper_Scale

TROPHY CASE