Onward and Upward (and Downward)

[Broomstick]

Posted because with all the awful things that happen in the world it makes me happy that someone is still pushing limits in a good way. Plans to break 50 year old skydiving record

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.

Felix Baumgartner's base-jumping has not always pleased the authorities

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 to his back.

His assault on Kittinger's record is likely to take place later this year over an as yet unnamed location in North America. He will ascend to the stratosphere in a pressurized capsule attached to a 450ft-high (140m) helium balloon, and then jump out at an altitude he hopes will exceed 120,000ft. .

He will be wearing a specially modified full-pressure suit and helmet.

The organisers of the project called Red Bull Stratos say, if all goes well, he should break the speed of sound about 35 seconds into his descent.

Joe Kittinger's 16 August 1960 jump was an extraordinary achievement. It was made nine months before Alan Shepard was even launched on the first American sub-orbital space trip.

Kittinger experienced intense swelling in his right hand as his glove malfunctioned and his body reacted to the low pressure at high altitude.

"I was headed back down to a friendly Earth," he recalls. "It's extremely hostile up there and the further you fall, the friendlier it is," the retired USAF colonel told the BBC.

He is now supporting the Austrian in his endeavour.

As well as coping with freezing temperatures and ultra-thin air, a key objective for Baumgartner must be to try to maintain a good attitude during the descent and prevent his body from going into a spin and blacking out.

Baumgartner acknowledges the risks of breaking the sound barrier

If he does go into a spin, it is unlikely, he says, he will be able to correct it.

In any case, his chute will be automatically deployed if he is unconscious.

Baumgartner has an eye on the benefits he believes can accrue to space exploration, making it possible to bring astronauts back to Earth alive if their vehicle malfunctions.

"We want to prove a human person - if they have to bail out of a capsule from 120,000ft - can come back safely to Earth," he explained.

Michel Fournier has promised to make another attempt in 2010 also, if he can secure the funding.

A BBC/National Geographic Channel documentary is being made about Baumgartner's project. The 90-minute film will be transmitted on BBC Two in the UK shortly after the jump.

[LaCroix]

Go Felix!
Go Red Bull Team!

[Broomstick]

Red Bull - it gives you parachute!

[LaCroix]

Of course, they gave him his wings already, back in2003

[Oskuro]

Woooo! One step closer to this!



Regarding the part about needing a pressure suit, thinking back to the survival in a vacuum thread, would it be feasible to actually jump off a ship without protection, and dive fast enough to survivable pressure levels? I know it'd be suicidal to try that in real life, but, theoretically speaking, under wich circumstances would it be feasible?

[Razaekel]

would it be feasible to actually jump off a ship without protection, and dive fast enough to survivable pressure levels? I know it'd be suicidal to try that in real life, but, theoretically speaking, under wich circumstances would it be feasible?

Don't quote me on it, but I think it would take too long to get to a survivable pressure level, since you only have about 10 seconds before you pass out in vacuum, and you'd need several minutes just to get to a survivable level. Not to mention the problem with slowing down at the end...

[Surlethe]

This is better suited to OT.

[Phantasee]

It's a shame Fournier has so much trouble getting funding for his attempts, while a stuntman like Baumgartner has Red Bull paying his way. It broke our hearts a little when news of Fournier's attempt reached us here (his last attempt was in neighbouring Saskatchewan).

[tim31]

I remember seeing the footage of Kittinger's big jump on a beeb documentary(Planet Earth?) years ago. Even though this is going to be a record, I'm doubtful that the footage of the event will have the raw pioneering spirit of the original, what with all the Redbull labels and all.

Pity NASA can't sponsor manned spaceflight with dirty Coke money.

[aerius]

Red Bull again, go figure. On a somewhat related note I was watching New World Disorder 10 with my friends recently and we concluded that it was actually a 50 minute Red Bull commercial.

[Sea Skimmer]

I’m glad someone is pushing the envelope again. I was very disappointed when Fournier failed, especially since he lost so much of his own money, millions of dollars, trying. Bail out from orbit concepts have been around since the 1950s, no ones tested one with so much as a dummy. Its cheaper to just accept that manned spaceflights are as dangerous as combat missions… except with no chance of only being wounded. 120,000ft is a nice step in towards changing that. If NASA had any brains for public relations they’d realize funding shit like this would be good cheap publicity.

[Mayabird]

Red Bull again, go figure.

I figure if anything good comes out of that horrible swill, it's better than nothing at all.
[line2]

[Teebs]

Isn't the problem with bailing out more that it would be from a spacecraft moving at orbital speeds and so you'd hit the atmosphere much much faster than you do jumping from an essentially stationary balloon?

[Sea Skimmer]

Isn't the problem with bailing out more that it would be from a spacecraft moving at orbital speeds and so you'd hit the atmosphere much much faster than you do jumping from an essentially stationary balloon?

Yeah, but on the other hand you’d weigh so little that even the tiny bit of atmosphere present at a low earth orbit would slow you down much more rapidly then it would a several ton space capsule. None the less the concepts put forward usually involve something like a wing suit, in ordered to provide more drag area and slow the person down prior to chute deployment. They’d also use multiple parachutes to further reduce speed prior to deploying a main chute that takes down down to the ground (or more likely ocean, the suit would float for when that happens). Making the parachute systems work safely is harder then anything else, which is why absurdly high altitude jumps are useful research.

[Phantasee]

Red Bull again, go figure.

I figure if anything good comes out of that horrible swill, it's better than nothing at all.
[line2]

They sponsor a lot of sports. Four football clubs, two Formula One teams, a NASCAR team, a hockey team, several rally teams, the Air Race World Series, several entries in the Dakar rally, extreme sports from skateboarding, BMXing, and parasailing to motocross, surfing, and cliff-diving.

Actually, it's never really registered on me how many motor sports team run the Red Bull name: DTM, MotoGP, Superbikes, WRC, World Touring Car Championship, Indy, GP2, F1 (x2), NASCAR...

They even own a basketball team in the Philippines.

So it's typical of them to sponsor a BASE jumper as he tries to fall out of the entire sky.

[Mayabird]

Yeah, I don't exactly count corporate sponsorship in sports which acts as advertising for them as good things. That's just business. This is for a little actual bit of adventure and science.

[Phantasee]

Yeah, I don't exactly count corporate sponsorship in sports which acts as advertising for them as good things. That's just business. This is for a little actual bit of adventure and science.

They own a lot of those teams, actually. With the associated junior level programs, which is kinda a good thing because it helps promote sports among younger people, it's a net benefit for society. Between giving younger guys a chance to breakthrough into Formula 1 (they pick up drivers from feeder series, particularly after bringing them up to those levels in the first place, and then they have a junior team in Toro Rosso Ferrari and a very competitive team in Red Bull Renault) to the associated programs a football club or hockey team have that contributes to the community and promotes local prospects to higher levels of the sport. Of course, they use it to promote their drink, but the drinks and the sports are almost divisions within Red Bull as a corporation, from what I understand.

Actually, I think I have a topic for my report now: Red Bull! It'll be interesting to examine them, I think.

As for the motives of Baumgartner, I doubt he's doing it for SCIENCE! primarily, and more for the thrill and maybe some of those sponsorship dollar. At least somebody has the foresight to strap some equipment onto him before he jumps so it's not just another adrenaline junkie doing something XTREME.