Meet Hyperion, that is the name of our tallest living friend. It is the tallest living thing on earth. This tall redwood is named Hyperion after a Greek God of beauty. He is 379.1 feet tall! It was found almost 6 years ago in 2006 by naturalists Chris Atkins and Michael Taylor at a Redwood National Park.  The tree is estimated to contain 18,600 cubic feet of wood. That is enough wood to build 35 houses with 5 rooms each. It is around 700 years old.

Can you imagine how tall is 379 feet? Let us see, the height of Big Ben in London is 316 feet, that of the statue of Liberty is 305 feet, so Hyperion is even taller than these two constructions.

A lot of other record tall trees were found in 2006: “Helios” (named after the Greek God of the sun), the world’s tallest known tree as of June 2006 (374.3 feet), “Icarus” (371.1 feet), and “Daedalus” (363.3 feet).

There is a mark near the base of the edge that shows Hyperion had a narrow escape from getting cut. It was in the seventies before the Hyperion was saved as it was included in the Redwood National Park. It is also believed that it could have grown taller if the woodpecker did not damage the top of the tree.

Although Hyperion is the tallest living tree, the biggest living tree is a giant sequoia tree named General Sherman.