Erekere Master : Man To Walk Tightrope Over Active Volcano

A man who has previously tightroped walked over the churning waters of Niagara Falls is now set to perform a similarly bowel-clenching feat, this time crossing an active volcano full of fiery lava.

Nik Wallenda, who holds numerous records for his highwire and tightrope acts, has announced he is to take on his “most dangerous walk yet”, when he crosses the Masaya Volcano in Nicaragua during a live TV broadcast.

The volcano has previously been described as a “ticking time bomb” and a “volatile inferno… so fierce local crusaders once tried to exercise the devil out of its heart” in a National Geographic documentary.
The overall size of the volcanic caldera is around seven miles across. And the active volcano cone, which Mr Wallenda will cross, has risen up in the centre of it.

The large double vent continually emits large amounts of sulfur dioxide gas, which mixes with the moisture in the air to form highly corrosive sulphuric acid.

The crossing of the volcano “has me truly challenging and facing any limitations that I may still have in my mind,” Mr Wallenda wrote on Twitter.

In a statement, Mr Wallenda said: “After spending years scouting and researching volcanoes, I fully realise why no one has ever attempted this feat: Mother Nature is extremely unpredictable.
“It is by far the most dangerous walk I have EVER attempted, and that alone makes it very intimidating.

“I am pushing myself beyond my comfort zone by the feat itself, but I know that I am up to the challenge. I must admit, it is scary.”

The broadcast will be the latest in a string of feats including Mr Wallenda’s walks across a Grand Canyon gorge, across Niagara Falls and between skyscrapers in Chicago.

A Year Before, he and his sister Lijana carried out a highwire walk 25 stories above Times Square in New York.

Mr Wallenda is a seventh-generation member of The Flying Wallendas family – a daredevil troupe famous for performing aerial feats without safety nets.

It reads: “See them before they die: In person, Evel Knieval and the Great Wallender. For the first time together, defying death.”

His great-grandfather, who ultimately fell to his death in 1978, at the age of 73, fell from a highwire during a walk between the two towers of the ten-story Condado Plaza Hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico.