![]() Baumgartner’s 128,000-foot altitude (he overshot his mark) is only about 24 miles the ISS orbits at an altitude of about 200 miles. It’s not entirely clear what applications this data would have, like the research on “passenger/crew exit from space.” The morning of the jump, people asked me whether the point was to prove that astronauts could jump from the International Space Station in an emergency. More concrete goals listed on the project’s website include: developing new spacesuits with enhanced mobility and visual clarity to assist in “passenger/crew exit from space” developing protocols for exposure to high-altitude and high-acceleration environments exploring the effects of supersonic acceleration and deceleration on the human body and testing the latest innovations in parachute systems. Ostensibly, the jump was designed to expand the boundaries of human flight. It was finally named The Red Bull Stratos project, and its goal was defined as transcending “human limits that have existed for 50 years.”īaumgartner during the record-setting event. The idea for a free fall from the stratosphere, a planned altitude of 120,000 feet, was conceived in 2005. His adventurous spirit and Red Bull’s out-of-the-box thinking meshed well, sparking a now decades-long collaboration. He perfected the art and in 1988 began performing skydiving exhibitions for Red Bull. Austrian-born Baumgartner started skydiving at 16. Not taking advantage of an opportunity to teach eight million people a few awesome things about science is a terrible waste, from an historian’s standpoint and a public relations standpoint.Ī little background first. I realize I sound like an irritated historian, but I also have a background (albeit a brief one) in publicity. Joe Kittinger’s 1960 jump was amazing, the heritage behind these types of tests is fascinating, but without any context the audience just saw a daredevil break a record for record-breaking’s sake. It had an eight million person audience captivated, but did nothing to teach that audience about the context behind Baumgartner’s jump. Red Bull, who sponsored the jump, wasted an incredible opportunity. But I’d argue that the event wasn’t entirely a success from a publicity standpoint. It was exciting and death-defying, but at the end of the day it was a just an elaborate publicity stunt that will likely see Red Bull sales skyrocket this month. Īccording to YouTube, eight million people watched Felix Baumgartner’s high altitude jump on Sunday morning. ![]() She blogs about the history of spaceflight at Vintage Space, where this post originally appeared, and tweets at. This issue was resolved quickly.Amy Shira Teitel is a freelance space writer whose work appears regularly on Discovery News Space and Motherboard among many others. The danger of the event was emphasised by the fact that the "live" broadcast had a built-in delay, allowing the public to be spared a gruesome spectacle in the event of tragedy.Īfter the long tension-building ascent, Felix could be heard running through the checklist with Col Kittinger and telling of the unexpected fogging of his visor. The helium-filled balloon took Felix on his two-hour journey into the stratosphere. This was enough helium for lift off, but did not fill the balloon envelope to capacity because they needed to leave space to allow the helium to expand while the balloon rose.Īs the air pressure decreased with the balloon's rising altitude, the helium inside it expanded, eventually filling the entire envelope to its full capacity of approximately 850,000 m³ (30 million ft³) at jump altitude. The balloon had around 5,097 m³ (180,000 cu ft) of helium inserted by the crew prior to its launch. A giant balloon, as tall as the Statue of Liberty when fully inflated and with a capacity of approximately 850,000 m³ (30 million cu ft), carried Felix inside a capsule to an altitude of 38,969.4 m (127,852 ft).
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