SEATTLE — Chef Michelle Matsko paused as she walked to work Wednesday, gazed up from beneath her red umbrella and marveled: Nearly 24 hours later, a man was still perched near the top of an 80-foot-tall sequoia tree in the middle of a shopping district in downtown Seattle.
“I’m really impressed,” she said. “It’s been raining. He’s a trouper.”
The man, name and cause unknown, finally climbed safely down just before noon, after transfixing the city and the Internet for 25 hours.
As onlookers cheered and chanted “Man In Tree” — in deference to the Twitter hashtag by which he became known — he sat down near the base of the conifer and appeared to be chomping on a piece of fruit. Officers got him on a gurney and took him for a medical evaluation. Reasons for the drama remained unclear.
At times, the man appeared agitated, gestured wildly, yelled and threw apples and branches at officers.
