In yet another chapter written into the bold, beautiful, and occasionally bizarre history of human feats, ice climbers Will Gadd and Sarah Hueniken became the first to ascend the Niagara Falls. Yep, those Niagara Falls, the ones that blast water at an average of four million cubic feet per minute — that is A LOT of water.
Anyway, the Canadian pair made this ascent this past Tuesday. Gadd, 47, led while Hueniken, 24, belayed. According to National Geographic, they took a 30-foot-wide route made up of a “strip of rotten spray ice that formed along the left edge of Horseshoe Falls, which rises up 150 feet as it straddles the border between the United States and Canada.”
Gadd himself is no stranger to ice climbing. In fact, he wrote the book on it… literally. Ice and Mixed Climbing: Modern Technique is the definitive how-to book on ice climbing. Along with that credential of sorts, he has “won three gold medals in ice climbing at the X Games, won the Canadian national sport-climbing championship four times, won the U.S. and Canadian paragliding nationals, holds the world distance record for paragliding (263 miles), flew a paramotor across the United States, and kayaked dozens of first descents of rivers across North America.”
How did this ascent compare? “The power of the falls is staggering,” Gadd told the outdoor title. “It vibrates your intestines and makes you feel very, very small. I’ve never experienced anything like it.”
Read the entire story over at National Geographic.
