"No-one really knows what that will be like," he said.
Better take these along.
Posted on 01/23/2010 2:43:45 AM PST by darkside321
The Austrian extreme sportsman Felix Baumgartner says his next goal is to try to break the long-standing record for the highest ever parachute jump.
It is 50 years since the American Joe Kittinger made history by leaping from a balloon at 102,800ft (31km).
Many have sought to repeat the feat down the decades but all have failed.
Baumgartner, who is famous for stunts such as jumping off the Petronas Towers, aims to skydive from a balloon sent to at least 120,000 ft (37km).
It is likely that in his long freefall of more than five minutes, he will exceed the speed of sound - the first person to do so without the aid of a machine.
"No-one really knows what that will be like," he said.
"The fact is you have a lot of different airflows coming around your body; and some parts of your body are in supersonic flow and some parts are in transonic flow. What kind of reaction that creates, I can't tell you," he told BBC News. Baumgartner and his supporters claim the project will gather scientific data also about the stratosphere and how the body copes with the extreme conditions so high above the Earth's surface.
The most recent attempt to try to better Kittinger's mark was made in 2008 by the Frenchman Michel Fournier. The former paratrooper and adventurer had spent years preparing for "Le Grand Saut", or Big Jump, only to see his balloon break free and float off into the sky just as he was about to climb inside the ascent capsule.
Baumgartner has frequently incurred the ire of the authorities because of his base-jumping - the highly dangerous practice of parachuting from buildings. He also made headlines in 2003 when he crossed the English Channel on a carbon wing strapped...
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
extreme sportsman = death seeking moron.
Sometimes definitely true ;-)
Heh. Can we have Obama, Reid and Pelosi make the attempt first?
Interesting - I thought Kittinger had broken the sound barrier (http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&ct=res&cd=1&ved=0CAkQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.aerospaceweb.org%2Fquestion%2Faerodynamics%2Fq0243.shtml&ei=d91aS5mzPIuGlAff9YDxBA&usg=AFQjCNHQ5ezqRWPrVzxCUWg2nbqxWz5yAQ&sig2=9ViFbMx_ZzNM9j50hJu_Fw) but apparently he needed to go up 1500 meters further in order to do so. Great videos of Kittinger’s amazing 1960 jump are on youTube.
Hey, somebody has to do it.
Mankind has a drive to be the best, the highest, the fastest. It’s what makes us “Us”.
Sit on the sofa and have a nice day watching the TV.
True. But in my oppinion you have to be a little bit “crazy” to do this but anyway i will watch it too ;-)
Hey in the worst case Austria loses one tax payer and north america “wins” a new crater ;-)
greetings
Better take these along.
>> Many have sought to repeat the feat down the decades but all have failed.
Uh... failed HOW? Chickened out before the jump? Technical problems precluded it? Died on the way down? Did the bug-on-windshield thing at the bottom?
Enquiring minds want to know.
Well i have read (in a local European newspaper) that most of them have failed in the past because a lack of funds.
But as far as i know he is now sponsored from Red Bull and Microsoft so i guess money will not be the problem this time ;-)
>> sponsored from ... Microsoft
If he blows it, there’s one heck of an “I’m a Mac... I’m a Squashed PC Bug” Apple commercial waiting in the wings.
Future Darwin award winner.
*lol* But at least this shows he really is a very “courageous” man. I mean would you really bet your live on something wich has been developed by Microsoft?
;-)
What happens if he produces the sound of breaking wind while breaking the sound barrier?
>> would you really bet your live on something wich has been developed by Microsoft
I figure that someday I’ll be on the operating table looking up at that Da Vinci surgery machine... and right before the gas kicks in I’ll look up and notice that windows logo on the arm holding the scalpel...
sweet dreams baby!
Interesting. It seems to me that the danger is not in going supersonic during the fall through the thin upper atmosphere, it would be in transitioning back to sub-sonic speed as the shockwaves propagate along the length of your body.
Understanding and overcoming the forces of sonic shockwaves was a major hurdle in aircraft construction. Even the space shuttle has to throttle back on launch while it transitions through the sound barrier because the dynamic forces on it can be quite destructive.
I wonder if he will make two sonic booms as he slows back down...
This sounds almost like Heinlein’s “Starship Troopers”, only they used aeroshells for the descent.
More like men having fun and pushing the limits.
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