Believe it or not, the iconic Gateway Arch in St. Louis does actually need to be cleaned off every now and then. And the people who do the cleaning on behalf of the U.S. National Park Service have to slowly scale their way up to the top with the help of rope, harnesses and carabiners. Yes, it’s as nerve-wracking as it sounds and the National Park Service has released a video showing us what it’s like to be one of the brave souls who climbs up over 600 feet to perform the thankless task of scrubbing bird droppings off a national monument.
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In the video below, you’ll see some amazing footage of a worker looking down from the very top of the arch, which stands at 630 feet above the ground. Yes, it’s a very long way down, although all the workers in the video are securely strapped in with harnesses. Amusingly, the workers also have separate ropes that they attach to their sponges because it would really, really suck to have to climb down hundreds of feet just to pick up a sponge you dropped.
Check out the whole thing below.
