Climber Alex Honnold free solos on the Taipei 101 skyscraper

Climber Alex Honnold completed a solo free ascent of Taipei 101 in Taiwan, using no ropes to scale the massive 1,667-foot skyscraper, and he did it live, as the world watched with bated breath and racing hearts.

It took Honnold 1 hour and 31 minutes to climb the 101-story tower on Sunday. The event was broadcast live on Netflix.

“It’s windy,” Honnold said at the top before taking a selfie. “I’m so excited… And you know what, actually pretty tired.”

Honnold’s climb was originally scheduled for the day before, Jan. 23, but was postponed due to bad weather, Netflix said. “I guess climbing is always at the mercy of nature, that’s how it works,” Honnold said in a video posted on social media.

Before the climb, Honnold told Netflix fansite Tudum that he expected viewers would “probably be nervous watching this,” but that he hoped they would “get a little bit of my joy out of the experience, that they could appreciate the fun of it and the beauty of it, the scenery, the whole experience.”

Taipei 101 is one of the tallest skyscrapers in the world. The building was designed by CY Lee & Partners and opened in 2004. It houses observatories, restaurants, a shopping mall and offices, as well as the Taiwan Stock Exchange.

Frenchman Alain Robert climbed the tower as part of its inauguration. Robert used ropes and it took more than four hours, Honnold told Tudum. “I think if I do this, it will be the greatest free urban solo of all time,” he added.

Honnold too famous for climbing El Capitan without ropes or safety equipment in June 2017. El Capitan is a sheer granite wall approximately 3,000 feet (more than twice the height of the Empire State Building) in the northern valley of Yosemite National Park in California. His incredible feat was captured in the Oscar-winning documentary “Free Solo.”

That solo on the Freerider route took Honnold 3 hours and 56 minutes. The following year, Honnold and fellow climber Tommy Caldwell I climbed the Nose of El Capitan route. in 1 hour, 58 minutes and 7 seconds, breaking the previous speed record and surpassing the two-hour barrier.

In a “Note to Personal” on “News Mornings” in 2018, Honnold reflected on what it took to climb El Capitan untethered, saying to his 18-year-old self, “You’re afraid of a lot of things right now: strangers, girls, vegetables, falling to your death. It’s okay; fear is a perfectly natural part of life. You will always be afraid.”

“But over time you will realize that the only way to truly manage your fears is to expand your comfort zone,” he said. “It’s a long, slow process that requires constant effort, but eventually you’ll feel great and climb big walls like this.”

Honnold and his wife, Sanni McCandless Honnold, have two daughters together.

This is a developing story and will be updated.