It was raining men in downtown Chicago Saturday morning. Base jumpers took off from Trump Tower around 9:30 a.m. and landed near the Fannie May store on Wacker Drive. The stunt was part of the filming for “Transformers 3,” which began its three-day shoot on Michigan Avenue on Friday.
Cameras shot the action from the top of nearby buildings, and I assume the helicopter in the vicinity had a camera in it as well.
Mayor Daley arrived shortly before 2 p.m.to take a tour of the set and was on hand for the series of explosions that took place around a half hour later.
The loud explosions went off, one after the other, for about five seconds and shot flames, debris and smoke into the air.
The film’s stars, Shia LaBeouf and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, were on the set early Saturday morning. They filmed a scene by the Michigan Avenue Bridge in which they ran on the stairs that lead to the riverwalk.
Josh Duhamel and his military buddies have been filming scenes in the riverwalk as well.
Unlike the filming that took place Friday morning, the bridge has been raised up for today’s shoot. There are five cars somehow attached to the bridge, with one vehicle half-way off of it at the top.
The Transformers cars — the same ones that were speeding down LaSalle Street last weekend — are currently under tarps on Michigan.
Before the explosions, the only special effect I’d seen today were burning cars in the circle drive area on Michigan. An ambulance drove in the area to help put out some of the fires around 1:30 p.m.
-Chicago Tribune
