Professional Rigger here (SPRAT & IRATA Certified) & logged thousands of hours as a safety supervisor around the world mostly on wind turbines, but also on bridges & buildings (Guggenheim, MetLife Stadium, etc.).

Photos of my team and friends: http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/09/07/arts/artsspec... http://news.auroraphotos.com/wp-content/uploads/petzl.jpg

I have a bone to pick with the safety setup for this photoshoot. SmugMug staff should be concerned...

There are 2 types of fall protection rigging setups for this corner of the building scenario - Fall Arrest & Fall Restraint. Both have to do with the ability of the person to go "over the edge" in the case of a fall.

Fall Arrest is when the person has fallen over the edge of the building and they are arrested with the rigging equipment from falling and hitting the pavement 1,000 feet below.

Fall Restraint is a rigging system that restrains the person from falling over the edge in the first place.

From the video and photos it looks like Von Wong is a bit of a wahoo adrenalin nut[0] and though he and the team had good safety intentions, there are some serious safety issues I would like to point out. And next time please contact me so we can do this safely.

I am going to use this photo[1] and this photo[2] to point out safety flaws.

In these photos I see an Anchor on the I-beam (photo[1] left image red friction protection), a rock climbing harness for Body Ware, I see the connector with webbing, but I don't see a deceleration device. A fall arrest system consists of 4 items ABCD: Anchor, Body Ware, Connector & Deceleration Device. From this setup i'll assume the rigging plan was to build a fall restraint system to prevent their subjects from falling over the edge because there is no deceleration device.

There are just a few problems with this logic that lead to serious safety concerns. As we can see in photo[2] there is:

a) a hand holding the webbing "preventing" a fall, this is not a fall restraint system, it adds slack to the system that increases forces in the case of a fall (this is more apparent in the .gif: http://www.vonwong.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/1-VbF...
You can see the black rope coiled up and moving, not cool. EDIT: It looks like the subject is attached via lanyard to the "safety" guy. In the case of a fall he is in the system preventing himself from performing a rescue.

b) the subject could fall off either side of the "point" of the building as the anchor is not around the I-beam in the frame, but out of frame to the right (making the length of the lanyard longer and increasing the force of the fall especially if she fell to the right)

c) that granite edge acts as a knife and webbing doesn't stand a chance being dragged across it if they fall over the edge,

d) because this is a fall arrest scenario there are serious forces on the system if the subject falls over the edge, especially if they are standing up! (the higher they are above the anchor the more potential energy they have).

These are really interesting photos, just when you do them be smart and rig it correctly.

[0]https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/O32BWH3s0qkaA...

[1]https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/CG8GkzYscTabC...

[2]https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/8NXYjfzC6a5RV...