==8°0
2) If Primates were meant to fly, we'd have wings...
Oh, wait...there IS our flying cousin—a Colubo—from Asia:
Posted on 12/09/2007 11:48:50 PM PST by neverdem
Jeb Corliss wants to fly — not the way the Wright brothers wanted to fly, but the way we do in our dreams. He wants to jump from a helicopter and land without using a parachute.
And his dream, strange as it sounds, is not unique. Around the globe, Mr. Corliss said, at least a half-dozen groups — in France, South Africa, New Zealand, Russia and the United States — have the same goal in mind. Although nobody is waving a flag, the quest has evoked the spirit of nations’ pursuits of Everest and the North and South Poles.
“All of this is technically possible,” said Jean Potvin, a physics professor at Saint Louis University and a skydiver who does parachute research for the Army. But he acknowledged a problem: “The thing I’m not sure of is your margins in terms of safety, or likelihood to crash.”
Loïc Jean-Albert of France, better known as Flying Dude in a popular YouTube video, put it more bluntly: “You might do it well one time and try another time and crash and die.”
The landing, as one might expect, poses the biggest challenge, and each group has a different approach. Most will speak in only the vaguest terms out of fear that someone will steal their plans.
Mr. Corliss will wear nothing more than a wing suit, an invention that, aeronautically speaking, is more flying squirrel than bird or plane.
He plans to land on a specially designed runway of his own design. It will borrow from the principles of Nordic ski jumping and will cost about $2 million, which explains why he is so much more vocal than the others about his quest.
Mr. Jean-Albert figures he could glide to a stop on a snowy mountainside...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
;^)
The movie was The Silver Chalice. Jack Palance played Simon the Magician, who proclaimed he could fly from the top of the tower.
Said a disappointed onlooker after it was over “He didn’t fly”.
I was just clarifying the difference between 'jumper' and 'jumpee'.
;^)
==8°0
2) If Primates were meant to fly, we'd have wings...
Oh, wait...there IS our flying cousin—a Colubo—from Asia:
I think its possible if he was to incorporate some sort of landing ski or skid plate and just come in for a belly landing. Either that or use some small JATOs or rockets used in ejection seats to slow his final descent. Another thought would be there can be a memory material that pops out like Batman upon final. I still think our military has a better design and has been using it for years. Just as a thought and not necessarily whats our military is using I am posting a pic I grabbed with Google.
Laugh if you may, but, some of our best military fighters have learned how to use these type of flying suits to drop behind the enemy by many miles.
Drop them out of a plane and they fly to their target area sometimes many miles.
NYT story? I heartily endorse the requirement that every NYT reporter must make such a jump...
IIRC, Burt hadn’t gotten the landing quite right in that one. };^)
Those serials were awesome( $.25 movies on Sat aft .) . We used to flick fake dials on our chests and leap off the curb to mimic that guy .
Aww, c’mon. They can probably get down to 60MPH or so at touchdown. All they have to do is run it off...
I sure hope Youtube carries the video of this. Ya think it will be in the face-plant category?
Ha!!
THere is nothing like sky diving! I love it. You ought to try it just once!
“Besides, with “wings” this small, he’d really have to be cooking and he wouldn’t want to even think about touching the ground at that speed.”
Would a tail hook solve that problem?
Are they gonna’ first hollow out their bones so that they can float like a bird?
Meat bombs!
I hope they aren't buying their gear from ACME...
Its not the fall that will get you but the sudden stop.
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