A Chicago police officer must have thought he was seeing things when he spotted a parachute-wearing man early this morning drifting down to a Loop street from a skyscraper construction site.
The alert Central District cop heard a popping noise in the air in the 100 block of West Wacker Drive around 2:40 a.m. Seconds later, he spotted a man slowly falling to the ground by a parachute, according to police spokesman Officer John Mirabelli.
Police said the downtown daredevil appeared to have leaped from the unconstructed shell of the Waterview Tower and Shangri-La Hotel, a high-end condominium/hotel resort at which construction sputtered to a halt in 2009, during the nation's economic woes. Only about 26 floors of the planned 90-floor project had been completed.
After making sure the 44-year-old man was uninjured, the officer took the man into custody. The parachutist, Shaun Walters, of Ottawa, was charged with misdemeanor reckless conduct.
Walters was unavailable for comment.
