Falling Faster Than Sound

Artists' depiction of Felix Baumgartner

Man's Ambition is all about men striving for greatness. And in the ambition for greatness, there is letter better than the undying goal to push the human body and mind beyond what we think is possible. I remember from my days as a cutlery huckster during our Mini-Tony-Robbins conferences I picked up one great acronym: CAN I - or "Constant And Neverending Improvement." Our athletes are hitting harder, throwing better, running faster. But very little can compare to one man's proposed feat - a 23 mile freefall from outer space to Roswell, NM. A dive from the stratosphere that many are thinking might lead to the first human ever breaking the sound barrier (that would be 1126 ft/sec).

And that crazy bastard, Felix Baumgartner, will most likely be attempting this feat tomorrow, assuming all conditions in Roswell are good. He's gonna be taken to the stratosphere by a big helium balloon strapped to the little metal cubby he'll be inside and there, with a scenic view of earth from space, he's gonna plunge to earth, setting a new record for highest skydive. Here are just a few of the considerations to take into account should you wish to attempt it:

• Everest, the tallest mountain on the planet, is less that 4 miles tall. It's still in the lowest level of earth's atmosphere, the troposphere. The stratosphere starts at 6 miles up and extends to about 30. He's going from 23 miles or 6 times the height of Everest, in the top third or so of the Stratosphere.
• Oxygen that high is 0.1% the amount that one finds down at sea level so, yes, he will have to breathe through an O2 mask.
• He'll be slowing down as he drops - the pressure is so little where he's starting that he'll be traveling faster than terminal velocity so as he descends into the troposphere added wind resistance will actually break his fall somewhat
• Because of change in UV rays being blocked and whatnot, the stratosphere is actually warmer at the top than the bottom so he'll be going from about -3 degrees Celsius to somewhere between -45 and -75 degrees Celsius. Then it'll start warming up, of course.
• The biggest danger is that his suit bursts while he's in the stratosphere, exposing Felix to deathly low amounts of oxygen, sub-freezing temperatures, and the possibility of bubbles forming in his bodily fluid, known as boiling blood, which, as it sounds, is not good. And then there's the simple ones like he might just spin out of control or, possibly, pass out from the g-forces, the risk, any of a bunch of factors.
• The previous record was set in 1960 by some dude jumping out of a gondola attached to a balloon at about 19.5 miles. Which brings to mind the fact that Felix Baumgartner may hold the record but it'll be a dynamic similar to Michael Phelps winning 8 golds fitted out with the finest of swimming technology while Mark Spitz won 7 with a bushy Tom Selleck mustache. The number is all that counts in the history books but we need to remember the assholes who set previous longstanding records with little more than a hope and cold war era know-how.

 

So, as of now Felix Baumgartner will be going for this tomorrow, Tuesday 10/9. And it should be noted that this amazing feat is yet another example of how Red Bull is funding the expansion of what's possible and the continued exploration of the edge and beyond. After he makes this jump, according to Baumgartner, he plans on retiring to the calm, boring life of being a heli rescue pilot in the U.S. and Austria.

Good luck. And God bless.

UPDATE: On October 14th Felix Baumgartner accomplished the feat, as seen in the below YouTube video of his jump.

Not only did he set a few records with this jump, so did Red Bull's YouTube channel, with about 52M views of the live event. Doesn't get more badass than that.

- Ryan