Window Cleaning champ streaks to a halt in Vancouver

KGW.Com Northwest NewsChannel 8

12:33 PM PDT on Monday, March 26, 2007

By DREW CARNEY, kgw.com Staff

America’s Fastest Window Cleaner streaked through Vancouver, Washington on Friday, March 23rd, in an effort to find the fastest window cleaner in the Vancouver-Portland Metro area.

A race to determine the fastest window cleaner in the Portland-Vancouver Metro area was held Friday morning, March 23rd in Vancouver, WA.

Jim Willingham, of Lubbock, Texas, is also the reigning U.S. Squeegee Speed Champion, a Water-Fed Pole cleaning expert, and the original founder and past president of the International Window Cleaning Association (IWCA).

His Friday morning pit stop in Vancouver was part of a West Coast tour where Willingham has been demonstrating various window-cleaning systems to professional window cleaners.

Watch Drew Carney go 1-on-1 with America's Fastest Window Cleaner.

Friday’s demonstration took place at the Boys and Girls Club of Southwest Washington, in the Hazel Dell section of Vancouver. It was followed by a race to determine a local window-cleaning champion. That honor went to Tim Hunter, owner of "Gleaming the View" window cleaning services in Hillsboro, OR.

In February, Willingham captured third place in the World’s Fastest Window Cleaner Championships, finishing behind only France's Franck Lauret and Japan’s Takeo Sato. Willingham was previously listed in the Guinness Book of World’s Records for his window cleaning accomplishments.

He’s also known in the industry for teaching safe methods of window cleaning.

Willingham himself survived an accident 20 years ago, when his five-story-high scaffolding broke. His efforts in the name of window cleaning safety earned him a lifetime achievement award from the International Window Cleaning Association last month.

The International Window Cleaning Association (IWCA) is a non-profit association committed to raising the standards of professionalism within the window cleaning industry.

For more information, you can contact the IWCA directly at 1-800-875-4922 or visit them online at http://www.iwca.org/.