The daredevil in the clouds
In 1974, Philippe Petit pulled off the ultimate high-wire act atop the World Trade Center. He was writing his story when the Twin Towers fell
 
Sarah Lazarovic
National Post Monday, September 09, 2002
DON'T LOOK DOWN: It took Philippe Petit six years to orchestrate his balancing act on a cable suspended between the twin towers. He was 24 and he doubled the world record.

NEW YORK CITY - Philippe Petit enters the South Street Seaport Museum with a flourish. He is springy, high-stepping and more than a little excited to be here to launch his new book, To Reach the Clouds: My High Wire Walk Between the Twin Towers. Indeed, Petit looks very much the boy who crossed an illegally placed high wire atop the World Trade Center on a calm August morning nearly a quarter-century ago.

When a 24-year-old Petit pulled off the unimaginable in 1974, few saw the performance live. The covert operation took place just after six in the morning, with only some friends and passersby staring up as the black-costumed artist crossed the steel rope between the towers at 1,350 feet (400 metres). The entire event was orchestrated without the consent of the World Trade Center, so no media could be summoned.
Petit would make the crossing six or eight times (the total varied between the accounts of his awestruck friends) before eventually succumbing to the "octopus of hands" that were the half-dozen policemen reaching out to seize him.

The charges were eventually dropped. Instead, Petit would be requested to explain to the security department of The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey how he did it.
"For several hours I let them have it: I describe the spying, the sneaking, the disguises, the deliveries -- everything ... I answer questions and conclude by offering suggestions on ways to improve security at the World Trade Center," Petit writes.

In a sense, few have probably ever known the World Trade Center as well as Petit and his gang of accomplices did. During the six years of planning he would learn everything about the buildings, hiding in undiscovered crannies, running up stairwells and spending a fair amount of time diving behind crates on the unfinished roof.
Petit came to regard the towers and his magical walk between them with a spiritual possessiveness. He was in the midst of writing the book when the World Trade Center fell from the sky. Despairingly, New York's Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine, where he has been an artist-in-residence for more than 20 years, was struck by fire at nearly the same time. Distraught, he ceased work for a while. Then, he explains, he realized that "as an artist, my mission is to create," and began to work again.

Surprisingly, the crowd at the book launch didn't inquire about the effects of 9/11 on Petit. Many of them were old friends, one of them lovingly introduced by Petit as a "master juggler." The rest were more concerned with Petit the firebrand, the daredevil in the clouds. The theme of the evening was brilliance; be it the brilliance to build such an ambitious structure or the brilliance to double the world's high wire record. In the book, Petit sounds a note of optimism.
"When the towers again twin-tickle the clouds, I will offer to walk again," he writes.

Up until Petit's walk, engineers and funambulists alike had thought the wind would take him down, or, in a worst-case scenario, cause the wire to explode. But Petit managed the walk relatively unhindered. Though not a religious man, he possesses a steely concentration and a belief in the structures that allow him to soar. "I don't believe in God, but I believe in the god of the wire, the winds, the tower," he says.

It is this fervent reverence for the beautiful and the brilliant that causes people to marvel at all of his performances. He has walked wires at the Cathedral of Notre-Dame, Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Eiffel Tower. These romantic locales, combined with Petit's unfaltering confidence, have made him arguably the world's most well-known high-wire artist.
But this popular awe may also be inspired by the fact that Petit never uses a safety net. "Seemingly, I'm crazy -- a suicidal maniac. But you have to enter my world. I work for days, months and years to prepare. My safety net is much stronger than anything else in the world -- it's my preparation," he says.

This bravura performance style and training regimen works. Petit has never fallen in a performance. Confidence aside, Petit alternated between thinking the WTC walk was impossible and a death wish. It is these, at times amusing, vacillations and trials that are recounted in his book. For those who might be curious as to how one would smuggle a 250 pound steel cable up 110 flights, the book has the answer in detail.

In fact, the entire plan was very much an exercise in detail. The swirling conclusion involved two teams of collaborators on either tower. It took the entire night to rig the wire and secure the space. When the walk was completed, the team was exhausted and dehydrated. Of his accomplice on the south tower, Jean-Louis, Petit writes that one of his team "dragged him to the nearest bar and ordered him eight large orange juices, which, to the amazement of the barman, Jean-Louis drank without stopping."

Despite a little more grey at the temples, Petit continues to walk the high wire. "There's no average. Sometimes I do five walks, sometimes none. It depends on the projects," he says. When asked what his next walk might be, Petit was reticent. "I have a walk planned for Manhattan, but that is all I can say."
© Copyright  2002 National Post