The Man Who Walked Between Two Towers
In 1974, French aerialist Philippe Petit threw a tightrope between the two towers of the World Trade Center and spent an hour walking, dancing, and performing high-wire tricks a quarter mile in the sky. This picture book captures the poetry and magic of the event with a poetry of its own: lyrical words and lovely paintings that present the detail, daring, and--in two dramatic foldout spreads-- the vertiginous drama of Petit's feat.
The Story
The Math
The "coup"(as they called it) is an incredible feat. The bravery/madness it took to walk the wire is mesmorizing. The planning and execution is maticulous. But one part of the story that seems almost "unbelievable" is how two men got all that cable up to the top of a 110 story building.Sure Petit and his friend used an elevator for most of the trip up but they still needed to carry the 5/8 steel cable up 180 stairs to the roof. How heavy was the cable again? Without going back into the story, let's see if we can figure it out.
How heavy was the cable?
The Clues...
Dimensions From Above
Note: The block that the Towers stood on was 616ft north to south.
Dimensions From Above
Note: The block that the Towers stood on was 616ft north to south.
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The Steel Cable Used
The 6x19 classification of wire ropes includes standard 6 strand, round strand ropes with 16 through 26 wires per strand. This is a good rope to withstand abrasion or crushing on the drum. Ropes with independent wire rope strands and a core (IWRC) in general, are more crush resistant than fiber core ropes.
The Answer
Go back to the story(see 2:10 of the film). Does your answer match up? Discuss why there may be variations between your answer, your classmates' answers and the story's?
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