Brit, 24, is arrested after he is made to abandon bid to climb 123-storey South Korean building in just his shorts and with no ropes – four years after he was jailed for scaling The Shard

• Local media identified the thrillseeker as 24-year-old George King-Thompson
• Reached the 73rd floor of the world’s fifth tallest building before being stopped
• In 2019, King-Thompson was arrested and jailed for scaling The Shard

A British free climber has been arrested after being forced to abandon his bid to climb a 123-storey building in South Korea wearing just his shorts.

The 24-year-old man, identified by local media as thrillseeker George King-Thompson, was caught on camera scaling the Lotte World Tower in Seoul, without any ropes today.

King-Thompson, who was jailed four years ago for scaling The Shard in London, reached the 73rd floor of the the world’s fifth tallest building.

The Oxford native was then forced to get into a maintenance cradle by authorities and into the building where police took him into custody, a fire department official said.

The police were not available for comment.

The 24-year-old man, identified by local media as thrillseeker George King-Thompson, was caught on camera scaling the Lotte World Tower in Seoul, without any ropes today

The Oxford native was then forced to get into a maintenance cradle by authorities and into the building where police took him into custody, a fire department official said

King-Thompson who had previously jailed for six-months for scaling The Shard in 2019, had climbed the building from the ground floor to near the very top in just 45 minutes.

London Bridge Station was briefly closed because of the incident and received a police caution after he was spotted on the side of the skyscraper at around 5am on July 8.

Imposing an immediate custodial sentence, Mr Justice Murray said King-Thompson’s breach of the order was ‘deliberate and knowing’ and that ‘he would have walked past at least 10 copies’ of the order during his climb. 

The judge added that ‘iconic buildings are sometimes the targets of terrorists’, and that ‘information regarding ways into and around the building’ could increase the risk to people living and working inside. 

This is not the first time that someone has tried to scale the Lotte World Tower, in 2018, the man known as the ‘French Spiderman’ Alain Robert also tried to conquer the Seoul building.

The 60-year-old was more than half-way up the building before he was arrested by police. 

Source: Read Full Article