Pictured: Views from the top courtesy of the daredevil himself!
Depending on viewpoints, Dubliners were either amazed or outraged lately to witness the video of a young male ascending and summiting one of the Poolbeg chimney towers in what can be reviewed as either folly or bravery of the highest order.
Not much is known about the phantom chimney climber of old Ringsend town. From what we can gather so far, he goes by the name of Oliver, lives in Denmark, and gets his kicks out of scaling the highest structures in Europe.
It was on a trip to Ireland in November of last year when the 17-year old slipped away unnoticed for his latest adventure. Although Oliver hasn’t clarified, we’re presuming the visit was either a school trip or a family holiday. The resulting YouTube video, which went viral, must surely have come as a surprise therefore to a concerned teacher or a worried parent.
In case you are one of the rare Dubliners who hasn’t witnessed Oliver’s Irish antics yet, here’s what happened in his own words.
“I wanted to visit this amazing place and climb the famous chimneys in Dublin. I went out to the old and abandoned place one day, climbed over fences, jumped over walls and explored this awesome place. The scenery was amazing and I will never forget it. It took me a while to get up the 200-metre chimney and I was concerned about getting busted because I did it on an afternoon. I could easily be seen whilst I was climbing. The chimneys are not in use, but there is another part of the area which is. So there were security guards out there. I performed the climb without the use of safety equipment of any kind.”
Pictured: Daredevil Selfie!
Oliver filmed the entire event with the use of a selfie stick and showed no signs of nerves or a shaky hand despite the obvious danger. Perhaps his experience scaling towers in Budapest, Denmark, and Europe’s tallest chimney in Slovenia, stood him in good stead.
Needless to say, the owners of the land, the ESB, were less than impressed with the unwanted publicity and have since taken measures to restrict access to the area. When contacted for comments, a statement from ESB only declares: “We [have] reviewed and increased security at the Poolbeg site.”
However, they did inform the Gardai at Irishtown station, who no doubt took the matter very seriously although we’re guessing, decided against visiting the chimney, or at least the very top of it, for clues.
NewsFour contacted Oliver for comment through his YouTube account, but it seems that while he may be fearless in certain areas, he’s not willing to blow his cover just yet. He could, of course, be on the receiving end of some parental punishment and, dare we say it, be grounded.
By Paul O’Rourke
