Poor lil fellar never had a chance... perhaps he should attempt the world record for knot tying first?
"French skydiver Michel Fournier's bid for a record-breaking parachute jump from Earth's stratosphere was aborted Tuesday when the balloon that was to carry him into the far reaches of the sky slipped away from his flight crew."
[www.cnn.com]

lokimantis

Epic Fail.

N@tedog

When Col. Joe Kittenger made his freefall from approximately 124,000 back in 1960 he did break the sound barrier. Just so everyone knows, the sound barrier at such high altitudes is not 741.2 MPH as it is at sea level, it is a lower airspeed, not to be be confused with his "true airspeed". Also, his main chute was automatically deployed at 24,000', this after over a 4 1/2 minutes freefall!! Col. Kittenger wrote a book with National Geographic called "The Long, Lonely Leap". Good luck in finding a copy. It took me 12 years to find 2 copies to have the Col. sign for me. I would bet that the Col. is helping along side with the hopeful success with this jump. One of the reasons that the Col. was doing these gigh altutude jumps was to help develope the pressure suits used for high altitude flight, etc....one of his gloves failed during his highest jump. Suit of today have changed quite a bit.

Brokenspar

@Simpsons-Movie-ruled:

No Sharks in Saskatchewan ... but I think there's some in San Jose! ... although they're golfing now. [ had to put hockey in here some how! ;-) ]

trevc

@Simpsons-Movie-ruled:
acutally sir, if he were landing in canada..the headline would read
"Man survives jump, eaten by Moose"

tehdorkz

Wtg Fournier! I would if I could.

Michai

@Synthfilker: Of course you can hold your breath against that sort of pressure. That's silly. Muscles don't work in one direction only. Internal or external pressure makes no difference at all.

Even the people at NASA admit that it won't really affect you. They say it will probably damage your lungs in some unspecified way, but that no real catastrophic damage would happen.

@wagnerrp: You're VASTLY mistaken in that pressure calculation. VASTLY. Water exerts far more pressure than atmosphere ever does. The entire change in pressure of leaving the whole atmosphere is a difference of about 101 Kilopascals. From 1 atmosphere to 0 atmospheres. Which is the change in pressure you get when you descend maybe 10 or 11 METERS in water. At 100 feet you get somewhere around 400 kPa pressure, which is very roughly FOUR atmospheres of pressure.

Pope John Peeps II

I can't tell if he jumped yet. The official web site still looks like it was updated Saturday:

"The forecast for tomorrow Sunday is not excellent however Monday seems to be a possibility for the SuperJump."

[www.legrandsaut.org]

GiltProto

damn, when I think about the adrenaline rush I get when I sky dive... I can only imagine what falling at 1000mph is like. Best of luck to him!

lestat730

if he could freefall directly into his grave that would be sick. Good luck BTW. I hope that cool 20 mil makes the 15 worth it.

BTW-I know this Nigerian banker if any of that is left over

discounteggroll

@DisposableInterloper: Lighten up, Francis. It's called a sense of humor. Get one.

Sora57

@Jamaces: "what are the odds of a parachute failing"

Same as always.

@DearEditor:"Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut."

Merde! That's what I've been doing wrong! I always do DRUNK what I say I'll do SOBER. Son of a bitch!

GadgetPlay

Actually in Canada we use metric time, so 7 minutes in Canada is roughly 15 in the US.
That is why most flights get buggered up as they cross the border. Also we make a killing selling our metric watches to stupid Americans.

glimbo

am i reading this wrong? cause the post says he will be falling for 15 min, but everything else i have seen (the picture/diagram here in the post included) says 7 min.

HawaiianActor

I know terminal velocity for a human in a spread eagle position in 1g (Around 12000 ft.) is 120 MPH. When is it that friction, as with spacecraft, Burns up in the atmosphere? I am turly curious and using my dad's account. I don't need flames.

mrblank306

@Kareem King:
11. Last thing man sees before hitting earth: His ASS!

5h17h34d

When is Mr. Fournier set to attempt this feat? Will it be recorded on video and/or broadcast live somewhere? Just curious...

Sounds exciting!

It sort of makes me wonder though if these old rich guys couldn't be doing more productive things with their time and money...

I wish him well...

peacemover

@AdmNaismith: *cues "Shine on you crazy diamond" by Pink Floyd

sorry... seemed fitting to your comment

baldingnerd

Good luck, you crazy bastard.

AdmNaismith

He's not landing in water either. This dude is landing near my house in Saskatchewan, Canada. Unless he lands in my pool.

itwasthedog

@Kaiser-Machead: Very nice! Do you suppose on the way down he'll be thinking "Oh no, not again!"?

FredicvsMaximvs

This guy is crazy.
Here is a link to the full press release and a few images:
[www.professionalwatches.com]
PDF and JPEGS

jpitsch

@Pope John Peeps II: It has nothing to do with the difference in pressure, but rather the ratio. At that altitude, the air pressure is somewhere under 1kPa (compared to 101kPa at sea level). That is a change in pressure as if being at over a mile underwater. If you take a lungful of air at even 100ft down, you will damage your lungs if you try to hold your breath up the surface.

wagnerrp

HOPEFULLY IT DOESNT MALFUNCTION AND HE ISNT ROASTED.

Lamburger Helper

@Pope John Peeps II:
wow wow wow. Not true, at all. Firstly one atmosphere of pressure is added every 33 feet of seawater, so unless you have a really deep pool, or you fill it with something really dense you are not holding your breath against 2 atmospheres of pressure. Secondly, as you descend the volume of your lungs decreases in response to the increased pressure outside, so you essentially have the same pressure outside to in, in order to actually hold your breath against one atm of pressure you'd have to go down to 33 feet, breath in fully, then hold your breath and come to the surface. There's a reason you are told *never* to hold your breath on ascent while SCUBA diving, lungs aren't strong, at all, and you'll end up with air in your blood stream, which is bad.

ValdemarAloeus

@Pope John Peeps II: Even if the odds of being rescued are two to the power of two hundred and seventy-six thousand, seven hundred and nine to one against (which by a staggering coincidence is also the number to an Islington flat), that doesn't negate the fact that we haven't the muscular strength to hold in a breath of air in our lungs in the total vacuum of space.

Kaiser-Machead

but I do hope all goes well

BigViper

the french always were good at falling down

BigViper

@Pope John Peeps II:

You DO understand the difference between "vacuum" and "pressure" in your example, don't you? It's far easier to hold your breath against pressure (in the pool) than it is against vacuum.

Odds are, you can't even hold in half an atmosphere of positive pressure differential in your mouth... like when you try to blow up a "stiff" balloon. Your cheeks puff out, and your lips can't maintain a seal.

Holding your breath against a vacuum? I predict an epic fail.

Synthfilker

nobody talked about the other failure point?

IMHO: at the precise moment when he'll open the said "capsule" from 130 000ft up??
won't he be violently "sucked out" of the capsule?

My bet is that he will bang his head on the capsule or it's door / get so much G's out of that suction that he will have a 15 minutes unconscious / traumatized free fall of death!

But: I wish him "merde" :)
(never wish good luck "bonne chance" to some french people right before an "act" like this, it's bad luck to do so. )
instead, wish em' "merde" .. literally "shit" ..)

oh and in case you wonder, because I did...
this expression comes comes from middle-age france, where Horses where bought by "Nobles" (rich people) in the street when theaters where hosting plays. more horses = more shit = more people at the play... = more money ... or more luck .. )

... and to the commenter (2 lazy 2 find back) that feared he would land in the ocean... please use Google maps for : Saskatchewan, Canada... would you ?

madlogik

@wagnerrp: Well, that's not really true either. You can hold your breath against vacuum. One atmosphere of difference in terms of pressure is REALLY not that much. If you dive to the bottom of your local pool, that's about two atmospheres of pressure, and you can hold your breath against that.

Pope John Peeps II

On Saskatchewan. Two Americans were traveling through Canada on the train when they arrived at a Station. One guy got off to see where they were. He walked up to a man and asked, "Hi, can you tell me where we are?" Dude replies, "Saskatoon, Saskatchewan."

When he got back on the train his friend asked him where they were. His friend replied, "I have no idea, they don't speak English here."

Gary_7vn

Those wacky French....always tryin' to break stuff.

Kaiser-Machead

will he bounce?

akmarksman

@Open_universe: Joseph Kittinger did break the sound barrier. The reason he could do it was because the thin atomsphere. With such a thin atomsphere there is much less resistance and practically no boom. Once he god down to the thick atmosphere his speed would have slowed.

This guy who is trying to do it and reengineer the whole thing is stupid. This was done in 1960. Not much has changed since then, other then tracking, etc. But I guess they might want to one-up him. But $20M is just dumb.

HJTravels

"Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut."

-Ernest Hemmingway

DearEditor

what are the odds of a parachute failing

Jamaces

Oh, I just don't see this ending well.

Liz99

@Gary_7vn: "'That's cheap!" Madonna quipped. "Everyone's kissed George Clooney.'"

To which Clooney replied,"Oh, yeah? Well everyone's f***ed her!"

@Vindicare86: "only problem is, the shuttle is a giant glider..."

That doesn't run on gasoline...

@kevinyung89: "Thrilling sense of freedom beats anything!"

The only freedom he has is to chicken out at the last moment. Once he steps out of the capsule...

@Hardcore1: "Sacrebleu! [sic] Le Splat!"

Sacre Merde! Le Crater!

GadgetPlay

@bl1nk2much:

He won't be going at anything like these speeds when he reaches 9000 feet - in fact, he'd probably be travelling at terminal velocity for that altitude, which is about the same as most skydivers.

LeoR

@kevinyung89: There are cheaper ways to die

fastmike

I would love to do that - to be just enough out of our world to see how big and beautiful it really is, then free-falling my way back through the air and hopefully landing in a sea. Thrilling sense of freedom beats anything!

kevinyung89

@madcow3417: only problem is, the shuttle is a giant glider...

Vindicare86

он же пизданётся

shizik76

@Hardcore1:
but a hellava way to go.

kaikai34

Sacrebleu! Le Splat!

Hardcore1

Nutter.

lazarus3000

They can claim "20 years of preparation" but you just know this is a result of some drunken bet...that somebody took way to seriously...

jamesuschrist

This is crazy......teach the frenchman to make an omelette..shouldnt take TOO long...then throw the robot outa the balloon

fastmike

@bl1nk2much:
It shouldn't have to be any stronger of a parachute than if he was dropped at 40,000 ft. He'll reach his terminal velocity, which will decrease as he descends due to more air resistance, which should be fairly consistent, then at a similar altitude to a HALO jumper, open the parachute. In other words, the air resistance will slow him down enough that he shouldn't need too much of an extreme chute to make it down safely.

Blah8

@Mandatory_Field: HAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Awesome comment. @Obsidian: People, read previous posts...

Pander

Wish i had enough money to do that...

Lman

@SpeedyGonzalas: This guy is so damn old, he has very little sex anyways i bet!

Ryanraven

@SpeedyGonzalas: Thanks for the video. Very pretty, but somehow I don't think that's the official nasa footage ;-)

I heard the original nasa guy talk - very inspirational (go maker's faire!!). He said that they had to combat a potentially very lethal spin that's not encountered in normal parachuting: the person, facing down in the normal pose, would spin about their center, causing all their blood to flow to the brain and feet. I think they used a carefully constructed drag chute to stabilize this portion of the drop - if that chute would have failed, he would have been dead long before he could get a chance to deploy the main chute.

morcheeba

Is this Travis Pastrana's Grandpa?

mikeness

That's quite the milestone for a french guy

iCanhasLs2plz

This man has balls of steel. Balls of steel that will always break the sound barrier.

mcjake

@Gary_7vn: Hmmm yes, but at least that was for a charity auction. It's not like she was selling kisses to support her own personal skydiving adventure.

stronzo

can you imagine pulling on that chute handle after 30 sec into that Jump....you have all the time to think about how you are going to die....

mortel666

@snowninja: Actually SJ, its far far far worse than that...
Madonna auctions off lip gloss at AIDS benefit
Stone tried to get the crowd to bid for a kiss with Madonna, reminding everyone that George Clooney sold two kisses last year for a total of $700,000.
"That's cheap!" Madonna quipped. "Everyone's kissed George Clooney."
Madonna said she wouldn't give away a kiss for less than $1 million. Instead, she offered to serenade two fans backstage during her next concert tour in the city of their choice.
As bidding took off, Madonna prodded the crowd along, saying "Don't humiliate me!" and "People have offered me millions to play at their bar mitzvahs."
[news.yahoo.com]

Gary_7vn

@Obsidian: "A lot can go wrong when you're trying to reach 130,000 feet up in the air. At above 40,000 feet, there's no longer enough oxygen to breathe. At 12 miles up, the air pressure can cause blood to boil."

So, yeah, the atmosphere is thin up there.

jpx72x

Shouldn't they test this fall on a dummy first? oh wait...

Gary_7vn

How can he break the sound barrier? Wouldn't terminal velocity prevent him from reaching those velocities? Or is the atmosphere thin enough to reduce the amount of drag?

Obsidian

I've been hearing about this for years now, and every time I hear it, he's been years in the process of research and preparation, each time ready to make an actual low-orbit jump soon. There have even been mentions of people that might pose as rivals at various points. A quick Google search brings up names like Cheryl Stearns, Rodd Millner, and Steve Truglia.

I'm just waiting for when he finally takes the plunge. It might be a record-breaker if it ever actually happens, but it certainly won't be the first jump made from an extreme altitude.

@Sora57, snowninja:
Did you ever consider that maybe the scientific data gleaned from this might just be worth millions? If the world is screwed up because a man managed to collect enough funds to pull a stunt like this, then let's shut down NASA, the JPL, and the ESA. After all, why spend millions, if not billions, on sending probes up to study the solar system?

DisposableInterloper

@Simpsons-Movie-ruled: You do realize that he's (planning on) landing in Saskatchewan, right?

The most he'll probably land on is a flat piece of prairie seeing as, well, that's all we have to offer!

Codplay

I'm excited about this, since it's happening about an hour and a half from where I live ("Saskatchewan" is a pretty big region - he's supposed to be landing outside of North Battleford)... from the coverage he's gotten in the local paper, he's already a high-parachute record holder, but this jump will blow previous attempts out of the water. NASA is apparently interested in the results of the jump, so it's possible some of the $20M came from government coffers.

Fall-Apart

This is how expensive gas is getting. It is now cheaper to just build a new space shuttle each time, have the astronauts parachute back to earth when they're done, and not waste the fuel landing the shuttle.

madcow3417

Picture 2 reminds me of Woody Allen in Sleeper's Orgasmatron.

[davidszondy.com]

Sora57

@snowninja: The fact that people are willing to give him lots of money to jump from a plane means either he is a great salesman or many people hate his guts and hope he dies.

Sora57

@jrghoull: "that little story, whether true or not"

Not, just so you know. It doesn't work at all like that.

jpj007

The world is headed into a crazy shift, there are so many things that need to be changed, and so little funds to do it. This dudes some how raises 20mil to jump out of a god dam baloon. WTF. Life is strange.

snowninja

@Open_universe: That's the transonic region. Depending on the aerodynamics of the vehicle, that's usually around .9 to 1.2 Mach. That's the real limiting factor for airliners as they have to stay below that (as opposed to below Mach 1). You end up with localized areas that go sonic. The air becomes very turbulent, and shock patterns becomes erratic.

On a rigid structure, this can be designed around. Most modern aircraft fans and compressors operate transonically.

wagnerrp

"20 years of research and physical and emotional preparation"

Yeah, that's pretty much making the decision that you're no longer young.

I hope he doesn't get lost like Steve Fossett. Michel, don't forget ze transponder and cell phone! Come to think of it I assume the dude will be carrying a video camera with an RF tranmitter to beam down audio and video during his trip.

Ayeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!

GiltProto

@Pope John Peeps II: Yeah, the whole 'boiling blood' thing is a complete myth. Your capillaries on the surface of your skin will rupture, resulting in widespread brusing. The same thing happens in your eyes, resulting in blindness. Beyond that, you may end up with long term breathing issues and deafness. The real problem is that vacuum forceably evacuates the oxygen from your bloodstream, so you're brain damaged in under two minutes.

To be honest, the only risk I see here is broken limbs (necks) from transonic buffeting.

wagnerrp

@SpeedyGonzalas: Awesome video, weird that I was listening to Ballboy - A Day In Space, and he was singing "as the world turns" over and over again as the guy in the video was turning around and around.

Delaportas

And what happens to the pressure capsule? Eventually the balloon should fail and that thing will come tumbling down.

PushTheButton

Guys, what I was referring to is that, when an object breaks the sound barrier, it has to overcome the pressure wave that builds up around it. In truth, no plane flies AT the speed of sound, since that is the point of greatest instability. One has to break THROUGH the speed of sound, and flight then becomes stable again.

I think I read somewhere that when the US Air Force was examining wreckage of planes that had hit and stayed at the speed of sound, they found structural damage and lots of little holes, as if the pressure waves had ripped the plane apart. Yes, "in a land-based car" men have broken the sound barrier, but it might be a different story in a pressure suit.

I guess we'll find out soon enough.

Open_universe

If he succeeds, he could be the greatest French hero since..... gimme a minute....

Sora57

"Le Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh..."

Mandatory_Field

At least the French army is good for something. :D

Lstormy10

@Harlan: Considering the speed at which this guy will be falling, if his chute fails in any way the resulting pancake effect may earn this guy the name "iron-on man."

Sora57

And 12 miles up, should his protective systems fail, his blood could begin to boil because of the air pressure, said Henri Marotte, a professor of physiology at the University of Paris and a member of Fournier's team.

Uh. What the fuck is this guy talking about? Blood doesn't boil at less than one atmosphere's difference. Not even at one atmosphere's difference, in vacuum. At most, capillaries close to the skin's surface would break a little, but blood boiling is total bullshit.

I call shenanigans on French science.

Pope John Peeps II

Good for him. You go Frenchman!

Stacky Botrus

@godwhacker: Nice Ironman reference! :-)

Harlan

@Windhawk: Terminal velocity changes with altitude. More specifically, terminal velocity changes with air density. Drag is directly proportional to air density, so less density, less drag, and higher terminal velocity.

From the opposite side, the speed of sound is proportional to the root of temperature. It is considerably lower at altitude than it is at room temperature.

wagnerrp

he will be traveling very fast at first, but the "sound barrier" is a variable speed, depending on the altitude/thickness of the atmosphere. and no, he will never at any moment be traveling faster than sound. silly Elaine!

[hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu]

speed of sound at SEA LEVEL is around 340 m/s, actual speed of sound depends on barometric pressure and air temperature.

doofusgumby

@Windhawk: as mentioned above, the atmosphere is thinner up higher, so he can fall faster without the air resistance slowing him down.

evan_phi

i was thinking the same thing windhawk a human body can only fall at like 130 mph thats about its terminal velocity

hippiekiller16

@windhawk He will break the Sound Barrier in the upper UPPER atmosphere where there is very little air to slow him down. As he get closer to earth, air resistance will slow him down to "normal" speeds. Holy crap I want to do this.

GarthAthos

At 32 feet per second per second how do you break the sound barrier? If you are in freefall you hit terminal velocity well below the sound barrier.

Windhawk

i wonder if he worked out the icing problem

godwhacker

If he's travelling faster than sound and he screams, will he hear it?

Reminds me of an old joke: what's the last thing to go through a fly's mind when it hits your windshield? It's asshole.

Good luck dude. Don't be that fly.

Sora57

@Kareem King: "1. Man survives jump, eaten by bear"
I think it would be more accurate if it was..."Man survives jump, eaten by shark"
since, you know he'll probably land in the water.

Simpsons-Movie-ruled

Hopefully he lands on a Canadian.....the ultimate '2 for 1' special....

fastharry

@Open_universe: It's been done in a car, too (or at least a land-based jet):

"The current absolute (or unlimited) [land speed] record holder is ThrustSSC, a twin turbofan jet-powered car which has achieved 763 mph (slightly under 1228 km/h) over one mile, breaking the sound barrier." --Wikipedia

-AP-

I say kudos frenchman, just for the success of raising 20 mil for personal pleasure!

Crescent

@Kareem King: Mean spirtedness aside, I hope he makes it.

Kareem King

Based on the information above, here are 10 headlines to accompany his potential death.

10. World record set for longest suicide.
9. Man locks self in capsule, floats into outer space.
8. Man in fire retardant suit catches fire.
7. Unidentified aircraft shot down by military. People continue to live.
6. Sky diver hit by jumbo jet.
5. Parachute proves useless for man rocketing to ground.
4. Death drop, 15 minutes without parachute.
3. Man dies of shitting, heart attack.
2. Man jumps from space, lands on flagpole.
1. Man survives jump, eaten by bear.

Kareem King

@Open_universe: I think the rule is that, after you jump to the Earth from Space, you get to have sex with whoever you want.

itchytooth

I would TOTALLY do this.

shenanigans61

P.S. No human being has broken the sound barrier without being inside a plane. This guy may not live through that.

Open_universe

Google "Joe Kittinger", he's the Air Force officer who currently holds the freefall record. The Air Force discovered that he needed to have a small drogue chute deploy relatively quickly after jumping out of the high altitude balloon as a human won't just go straight down head-first, as the diagram above implies, but rather will spin around. Stability is very important.

I also feel that it is STUPID of this guy to have squandered $20 million for this feat. Bang some supermodels instead, fercrissake!

Open_universe

@Alfonzo: Whoa, I think you mean 200km/h!

I think, if anything is worth 20 million dollars, this is it. Luckily, after reading this story, I'll probably have a dream about it tonight and won't have to spend a dime. Dream life, ftw!

itchytooth

Sorry, this has been done before: Back in 1999, when the Jupiter 2 found a new planet, John Robinson actually got down to the surface by falling from space.... So, been there, done that.

VioletCaballo

a guy i know said that in one of the of the first types of outter space missions, a man, wearing a home made space outfit, got into a hot air ballon, and got high enough so that he could jump from the hot air ballon into a part of the atmosphere that was high enough so that he could float. then i think he somehow pushed himself forward (could he have swam) towards the earth, and opened up his parachute.

that little story, whether true or not, reminded me of that is all.

jrghoull

new carnival attraction...skydiving from space

Sheemo44

holy fuckin shit!

and btw, he'll only be travelling that fast when he's really high up. as he gets closer to earth the atmosphere will get thicker, air resistance (drag coefficient, whatever) will increase, and he'll slow down (hopefully without turning into a fireball first). If his chute opens around the same altitude as a normal skydiver, at that point his speed would just be regular terminal velocity (200km/s)

Alfonzo

This guy keeps trying, and every time, something goes wrong. Given his perpetual scrappiness, hopefully this time he'll make it. His scrappiness, however, is itself a risk given relatively modest funding for such a high tech challenge.

One cool aspect of a jump this high is that there is no wind whipping by you at first, flapping your suit and whizzing by your head, as there would be on a typical jump. Since the atmosphere is so thin that high up, you just fall. There's not enough air to resist, whip and flap... just a clean, fast, silent drop until the atmosphere thickens out at lower altitude. Assuming he makes it that far.

frigg

Look for it on "Worlds most amazing videos", just after the "motorcycle jump gone wrong" spot.

lionelbob

@CutePuppyz: How can there be no gain from surviving this? This would be the ultimate thrill. I would be afraid that even sex would be boring after that. Okay, so that ain't so much a gain as it is a loss. Nevermind.

SpeedyGonzalas

I say the guys a dumbass if it has no gains.

CutePuppyz

Look for the headline "Man explodes upon impact" real soon.

UniComp

still... God speed brave Freedom Fly.

ANoel

Oh well, here's a link:

+ Watch video

SpeedyGonzalas

I don't think it will work because the terminal velocity for a human is only 147 mph

HubertSeneca

I hope this embed works. It is a vid of Joe Kittinger, the previous record holder. Super cool.

SpeedyGonzalas

A year or so ago when this somewhatsuicidal stunt was posted here at Giz, someone suggested that if they bcould get one Frenchman to do this, maybe they could get all Frenchmen to do it!

/just sayin'

ANoel

@bl1nk2much:
I'm sure his ass will check the sewing thoroughly..

drum

"Will Break Sound Barrier, World Records" ... and possibly a few other things.

Windhawk

Why would anyone want to jump out of a perfectly good capsule?

strider_mt2k

Wasn't a very similar stunt pulled off way way back? I seem to recall seeing something about it on Discovery. That guy also used a balloon and had a "space suit" to stay alive.

BoinK

@gusnyc.com:

He would have been better off making the pants brown and yellow to hide the way they'll look at the end.

AlexTheSane

Where can I bet on his survival?

chrisaroz

his ass better check the sewing on that parachute....opening that thing, at those speeds, can be very dangerous...

bl1nk2much

he should have made the suit blue with red undies and a red cape.

gusnyc.com

So it just by chance this post is above a headline about an Omelet?

HotShotNN

Good luck...

kOtic

That's really freaking cool. I wish him the best of luck!

xzenkx

Betchya he depressurizes the capsule before he jumps.

Also, to the question about what happens to the capsule after he jumps, the reason his last attempt failed is because the charges that are supposed to separate the capsule from the balloon after he jumps fired while they were filling the balloon and it floated away before he ever got off the ground.

So the intent is to return the capsule to the ground by separating it from the balloon. I can just see it now - the guy lands safely, is greeted by the press and adoring public, and then is crushed by the capsule on its way back down.

kps9727