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This 400-foot-high hammock in the Moab Desert is a mid-air playground for climbers in Utah

This 400-foot-high hammock in the Moab Desert is a mid-air playground for climbers in Utah

A hammock suspended 400 feet above ground in Utah’s Moab Desert has become an aerial playground for the professional base jumpers and highliners who flock to the canyons every year.

https://vimeo.com/114147105

Satirically named the “Mothership Space Net Penthouse,” the approximately 2,000 square foot hammock was wrought by climber Andy Lewis with the help of 50 base jumpers using basic rope weaving techniques.

Airspace being so vast, the climbers used to embark on their respective adventures while rarely rubbing elbows. Lewis’ pentagon-shaped net was hence conceived as a high flyer’s executive club, to borrow his sarcasm, and is now a mid-air hub for socializing, rest, and play.

Base jumpers leap daily from the man-sized hole in the center of the hammock, while highliners attempt to tightrope-walk across the five legs of the net, some of which span 262 feet. Overhead, paragliders fly by while dropping wing-suit pilots from high above.

In 2012, Lewis created a three-sided “Space Thong” (below) with a similar design but comparatively smaller, to bring together climbers who had come from all over the world to partake in the annual GGBY Highline Gathering (an unofficial gathering of slackliners from all over North America) and the Turkey Boogie, a Thanksgiving get-together for base jumpers.

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