(June 18th, 2012) In the United States alone over 13.1 million viewers (100 Million Internationally) witnessed the beauty and grandeur of Niagara Falls throughout the world thanks to the ABC News special “Megastunts – High Wire Over Niagara Falls” featuring Nik Wallenda’s death defying high wire walk across the Horseshoe Falls. Additional world wide coverage from over 250 Media members from every major network throughout the world including Australia and China solidified Nik Wallenda’s place in Media history.
With this coverage came jobs for our highly skilled production professionals throughout Western New York as well as business for our hotels, restaurants, and equipment suppliers. The positive exposure for Niagara Falls was priceless and the production itself had and estimated economic impact of over 1.2 Million Dollars according to estimates based AFCI’s standard production matrix.
Along with ABC Networks 48 visiting crew members was the addition of IATSE 52 which saw over 5 Days of production work, with over 19 crew members enlisted, and NABET saw another 20 crew members hired to support the ABC Production which featured over 14 cameras and was switched from mobile production trucks on site featuring talent Hanna Storm, Josh Elliot, and Sam Champion.