New Skydiving Record Attempt

[FB]

Not sure if many of you have heard about this but there was an interview with Felix Baumgartner on R4 this morning who is planning the World's highest skydive. He will be jumping from a balloon at 120,000 feet up, beating the current record of just under 103,000 feet set in 1960.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17836283

Because of the height he will be wearing, effectively, a spacesuit when he jumps. Within 30 seconds he will be exceeding the speed of sound but his speed will reduce as he gets lower down and the atmosphere becomes more dense. He plans to open the parachute at 5,000 feet, so has quite a long way to drop before finding out if it works.

Very brave or very foolish?

 

[siffert_fan]

Don't know whether it is foolish or brave, but I can see no reason why anyone would bother making such an attempt except to satisfy their ego.

 

[Tacitus]

Captain Kittinger is a legend, read about it here. He had a pressure seal failure on his right glove but carried on regardless.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Excelsior
EDIT: didn't realise the video contained the information i already knew.

 

[Speshal]

The jump was meant to be made today but has been postponed until tomorrow

http://www.redbullstratos.com/

 

[Bill Boddy]

I read that tomorrow so it should happen today.

 

[Josh]

It's in a little over 50 minutes if anyone wants to watch it. You can watch it live HERE.

 

[Brogan]

Sigh.
Looks like it's delayed again.

Edit: Next launch time pushed back to 1400 GMT.

 

[Josh]

1430 now. Looks like I'm gonna miss it...

 

[Josh]

Earliest launch is now 1730GMT.

 

[Greenlantern101]

He's wearing a space suit !
How much of a problem can a little bit of rain be ?

GET ON WITH IT.

 

[Brogan]

I assumed it was wind which was the problem as he's ascending via balloon.

 

[Greenlantern101]

Hmm yes having wind in a space suit would be bad.

 

[Viscount]

Jumping from that high I wonder how far he could miss his landing spot by.

 

[Mephistopheles]

If I jumped from that height I'd miss the whole bloody planet let alone my landing spot...

 

[Speshal]

He's taking off from Roswell - Maybe he'll land in Mexico.

 

[F1Yorkshire]

He's taking off from Roswell - Maybe he'll land in Mexico.

I hope he's packed his passport

 

[Viscount]

Aborted. Gonna try again tomorrow.

 

[Brogan]

Due to gusting winds, as I surmised.

 

[siffert_fan]

It's gone very quiet on this front, hasn't it? Is the stunt cancelled?

 

[Josh]

It's not canceled, they're looking for an other weather window to make the jump and so far it's looking like October 14 is the best option for a new attempt.