The man arrested last night for scaling San Francisco’s 60(ish) story Millennium Tower — that’s the big one that screws up your view as you come in over the bridge — is 54-year-old veteran climber and cancer survivor Dan Goodwin, a Lake Tahoe resident who’s also climbed the Sears Tower in Chicago. Here’s the story in the NY Daily News, the Examiner, KGO Channel 7, and definitely don’t miss the Chron’s slideshow, linked above.
Goodwin wasn’t exactly cynical enough to be doing it to promote his self-published book, which came out at the beginning of 2010, with a foreword by Stan Lee; Goodwin said on his website he does it to promote skyscraper defense against terrorist attacks, and to inspire other cancer survivors. But let’s just say the thing’ll probably sell briskly in San Francisco.
That’s the good news. The great news? Welcome to the digital age! KGO-TV streamed live footage of Goodwin climbing. I haven’t been able to find the entire ascent, or at least the entire KGO stream, online, so if anyone finds it, please post a link in the comments.
Goodwin climbed without ropes, using suction cups to make it up the side of the 645-foot apartment building. The feat took him about three hours, from 2:30pm to 5:30pm yesterday. He put up an American flag before authorities took him into custody. The Millennium Tower is either 58 or 60 stories, depending on whom you ask.
Goodwin, also known as SpiderDan or more commonly SkyScraperMan, has climbed a lot of buildings. Here’s some TV footage of him climbing John Hancock Center in Chicago — 100 stories, 1,127 feet:
And his legendary Sears Tower ascent in 1981:
In the 1980s, Goodwin also climbed the Renaissance Tower in Dallas, Simon Bolivar Center and Parque Central Complex in Caracas, Venezuela, the North Tower of the World Trade Center, Nippon Television Tower in Tokyo, the Bonaventure Hotel in Los Angeles and the CN Tower in Toronto. 1986 was his last major ascent.