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June 4th, 2011, 32 year old Nick Wilinda stood atop the Coronado Plaza Hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

As a crowd gathered in the courtyard below, he checked the tension on his steel cable, strung to the hotel's other tower, 300 feet away.

Glancing down, he saw something that made his heart skip a beat. There on the concrete wall were

scratches left by his grandfather's tight rope 33 years earlier.

Tight rope walking is a family tradition for the Willendas.

Nick is a seventh generation, funambulist, descended from a long line of performers known as the Flying

Willendas.

His grandfather, Carl Willenda, may have been the most daring of all time.

At 865, Carl Wollanda, completed a walk across Tallulah Gorge in Georgia,

a quarter mile span some 750 feet above the river below.

To while the 30,000 spectators even further,

he stopped midway and performed a headstand on the highwire.

Carl Wylinda's last walk was at the Coronado Plaza in 1978.

Braving winds of up to 30 miles per hour, the 73 year old daredevil first paused, then sat down on the wire, then fell to

his death.

Family members later attributed the tragedy to poorly attached guy ropes. The wire had not been properly stabilized. the stress. Tight rope walking is all about tension.

First, the wire itself must be stretched tight, but not too tight.

Depending on the length of the span,

the riggers may place up to 4,500 pounds of stress on the wire.

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