Skydiver's record jump could help save lives
Felix Baumgartner during his freefall on Oct. 14, 2012. / Red Bull Stratos
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. Now that the dust has settled in the New Mexico desert where supersonic skydiver "Fearless Felix" Baumgartner landed safely on his feet, researchers are exhilarated over the possibility his exploit could someday help save the lives of pilots and space travelers in a disaster.
Daredevil successfully jumps from the edge of space
Baumgartner's death-defying jump Sunday from a balloon 24 miles above Earth yielded a wealth of information about the punishing effects of extreme speed and altitude on the human body -- insights that could inform the development of improved spacesuits, new training procedures and emergency medical treatment.
A NASA engineer who specializes in astronaut escape systems said Baumgartner's mission "gives us a good foundation" for improving the odds of survival for professional astronauts, space tourists and high-altitude pilots and passengers.
"What I would hope is that, perhaps, this is just the first step of many, many advancements to come" in emergency bailouts, said Dustin Gohmert, who heads NASA's crew survival engineering office at the Johnson Space Center in Houston.
In an interview after Baumgartner became the first skydiver to break the speed of sound, Gohmert noted that researchers have spent decades working on self-contained space escape systems, with no significant advances since Joe Kittinger in 1960 jumped from 19.5 miles up and reached 614 mph, records that stood until Sunday.
One giant leap for a skydiver
Baumgartner's feat was sponsored by energy drink maker Red Bull, and NASA had no role. But Dr. Jonathan Clark, a former NASA flight surgeon who lost his wife, Laurel, in the space shuttle Columbia accident and dedicated himself to improving crew escape systems, was in charge of Baumgartner's medical team.
And he was thrilled at how much was learned.
By going well beyond Mach 1, or the speed of sound, Baumgartner provided even more data than anticipated. Wearing a pressurized suit and helmet, he accelerated to an astonishing 834 mph and was supersonic longer than expected. The speed of sound at that altitude is close to 700 mph.
"It was Mach 1.24, which is really huge. I mean, that's a much higher level than we'd ever anticipated, so we learned a lot by going faster and higher," said Clark, who teaches at the Baylor College School of Medicine.
Clark said his team is still analyzing all the medical data -- heart rate, blood pressure and the like -- collected from sensors on Baumgartner's body.
During his descent through the stratosphere, Baumgartner went into an out-of-control spin for about 40 seconds, experiencing around 2.5 G's, or 2.5 times the force of gravity, before stabilizing himself.
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Baumgartner's technique for righting himself may prove useful for companies like Virgin Galactic that are developing spacecraft that will take tourists up into space and right back down. These enterprises will need to have some sort of emergency escape plan.
NASA's next-generation spaceship, the Orion vehicle intended for deep-space exploration, will parachute home like the old-style Mercury, Gemini and Apollo capsules. The lessons learned from Baumgartner's effort probably won't apply directly to the Orion design, since it will be safer for astronauts to remain in the vessel all the way back to Earth, Gohmert said.
As for the now-ended shuttle program, Columbia was traveling too high and too fast during its 2003 descent for a Baumgartner-style exit to have helped the seven astronauts. The spaceship broke apart about 40 miles up while traveling more than Mach 17, unleashing forces that tore the crew members' bodies apart.
In the 1986 Challenger disaster, the crew capsule shot out of the fireball that erupted during liftoff, but there are too many unknowns to say whether any lessons from Baumgartner's feat might have applied to that tragedy, Gohmert said.
After each accident, NASA improved its efforts to protect crews in an emergency. But by the time the 30-year shuttle program shut down last year, the window for escape was still limited to below about 6 miles and less than 230 mph.
Felix Baumgartner prepares for record-setting 23-mile free fall
Baumgartner's pressurized suit -- a close cousin of the orange suits used by shuttle astronauts and the suits worn by high-altitude U-2 spy pilots -- was designed for use in a standing, free-falling position, while conventional spacesuits are made primarily for sitting. By all accounts, the new suit performed well.
"I think all of us here in our lab specifically who have dealt with the shuttle suits have looked at this in wonder and amazement, and really appreciated what they did," Gohmert said. "And that efficiency that they brought it forth with is also a model for us to learn from as well."
The suit was made by the David Clark Co. of Worcester, Mass.
"Perhaps in the future, someone might say, 'We want people to be in suits, some type of commercial space thing. We want them to be able to float around better and not in a seated position,'" Dan McCarter, a program manager at the company, said Wednesday.
"Now we know a little more on how to reposition arms and legs on the suit. Of course, we're always doing research and development. ... New knee joints, new elbow joints, lighter hardware. It's nonstop. We are currently working on the next-generation of suit right now for NASA and the Air Force."
The suit Baumgartner used was previously certified to 100,000 feet. "Well, we pretty much say now it's certified to 128,000 feet," McCarter said.
An uncorrected spin could have caused Baumgartner to black out and suffer a deadly stroke. Baumgartner said afterward that he could feel pressure building in his head during the spin, but did not come close to passing out.
His recovery crew had specialized equipment on hand to treat him for a multitude of medical problems he might have suffered. Clark and his team spent years refining the emergency treatments and the mobile gear required. In the end, none of it was needed.
"I tell you, we had a lot of medical support because we were very concerned," Clark said. "We had to be ready for everything."
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Okay maybe not such a giant leap for mankind, but still an accomplishment of note.
BTW, the only difference between golf and skydiving is the order of events...
**WHACK** "Oh, $#!^!!"
"Oh, $#!^!!" *WHACK**
The Wright Brothers attained immortality by making a flight that was less than the wingspan of a 747...
Yet they are rightly acclaimed as the forerunners of international air travel, supersonic jets and space flight...
As more and more people enter the space-exploration business, the demand for reliable emergency gear will increase...
And no one ever claimed that Evil Knevil was risking his life to make canyon-jumping safer for future generations of adrenaline junkies...
Geez Gruen...what a pathetic, bitter and mean-spirited comment!
This is not to take away a thing from an amazing feat with an amazing pay off. It just seems unprofessional to call him an "extreme dare devil" when that was a carefully calculated and executed high risk experiment with long lasting benefit. Certainly "stunt" does not seem quite respectful of the actual accomplishment. I also understand that additionally he had to fight psychological problems of fears of confinement to add further merit to getting it done.
Baumgartner and his associates v. Gruven. A fitting reflection of the contrasts between the coming election's agendas, candidates, and their core supporters.
Realistically speaking most of the data could have been collected in a vacuum chamber and/or with a wind tunnel (supersonic wind tunnels do exist).
I really do hope, however, there was some real science to be had.
What would happen to a human body under those condition could only be meaningfully tested by doing it. The same basic question that faced Chuck Yeager on that date in 1947 in a rocket plane. That is, by the way, the reason in aerospace engineering that test flights (or jumps) are done. It was not obvious what punching through a supersonic shock wave would do.
It was not obvious if an unrecoverable three axis spin would result at height and speed. They killed X-15 pilots and almost took out Chuck Yeagar himself in later flights. From the the helmet video it appears he simply rolled first clockwise and then rapidly counter clockwise until he stabilized apparently with arm positioning. Just try to find the flight or jump manual for that procedure at 100,000 feet and 834 miles per hour.
It seems to me in one mid-air picture that his suit appears to be discolored perhaps from friction although I have seen no comments about the surface temperature of his (literal) flight suit. Certainly the skins of aircraft get very hot at those speeds.
Lets get real for just a half a second
This planet will be dust ,just like its beginnings before there is the remotest kickback to help anything anywhere ,anytime from
Some idiot satisfying an egotistical longing to be in a record book that nobody gives a sh.....t about
Other than it must have been a nice view and his mother must be proud
Thanks Mom