Michel Fournier in his jumpsuit.
Begging for a photoshop.
Posted on 02/27/2006 10:23:56 AM PST by presidio9
No human being has fallen farther than Joe Kittinger, but people keep trying.
On Aug. 16, 1960, the U.S. Air Force test pilot floated in his 20-story-tall helium balloon to the edge of space, more than 19 miles up, higher than any man had ever gone. Clad in a space suit, he stood at the edge of his open-air gondola and said to himself: "Lord, take care of me now." Then he jumped.
He quickly accelerated to 714 miles an hour -- becoming the first person to break the sound barrier without a vehicle -- before a small parachute opened to stabilize his fall. Four minutes later, a bigger parachute opened, and soon after that he was safely back on Earth. His historic jump showed that, if necessary, future pilots or astronauts could survive ejecting at the top of the atmosphere.
Now a Frenchman named Michel Fournier aims to top the feat. In 1988, two years after the U.S. Space Shuttle Challenger exploded on ascent 11 miles up, managers of Europe's space program selected the paratrooper as one of three people to leap from 25 miles up. Scientists wanted to see whether an ejection higher than Col. Kittinger's jump is survivable. After doing initial tests with lifelike dummies, Europe abandoned its ambitions for manned spaceflight and scrubbed the jump.
Michel Fournier in his jumpsuit.
Mr. Fournier wasn't so easily grounded, and in 1992 he retired to pursue the plunge solo. He has since amassed $12 million in gear -- and impoverished himself. He sold his house, antique furniture and gun collection to buy the mothballed European jump equipment and a massive balloon capable of rising higher than planes can fly. He cajoled sponsors to pitch in high-tech gear, including a pressure suit and life-support system that took nearly three years
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Michel Fournier in his jumpsuit.
Begging for a photoshop.
The movie, Danny Deck Chair, was lots funnier.
Monty Python had a skit about a man who tried to jump over the English Channel. He failed.
...and leave her behind when he jumps.
In France?
According to Evel Knievel, only cowards use parachutes. Remember when Evel planned to jump from a jet at 40,000 feet without a parachute and land in a giant haystack?
How'd that go? "Yes, Mister Fournier, we'd like you to jump at an altitude of 25 miles. We want to see if you live."
As a kid I had heard of these pre-space program balloon jumps, but once on late night TV I saw an old movie from this era that used this program as a dramatic background. As in the film Apollo 13, there were a bunch of scenes of the hero's wife waiting to hear if her husband had survived.
According to Douglas Adams, the secret to flying: jump from a high place, aim at the ground ... and miss.
He doesn't seem like your typical Frenchman.
Goal-oriented, ambitious, visionary, and b*lls of steel. Apparently he's a Frenchman of the Napoleonic tradition. All the more power to him.
A frencman in a yellow suit. snicker snicker hehehehe
Well think about it, they were most likely never fired.
...and only dropped once...
Jeez!! Am I a wuss or not!!
I get tense just cleaning the the gutters on the second floor!!
Sure ... as long as you haven't got a significant initial velocity.
Woody: "Buzz, You're Flying!"
Buzz Lightyear: "This isn't flying: It's 'Falling..with Style'. "
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