Jump! Jump!
Two angles on the world’s most dangerous high-altitude stunt
from POPULAR SCIENCE, January 2003
In the middle of the plate-flat Canadian prairie, not far from where writer Raymond Carver hunted geese, a flurry of activity broke out last September around a small, rural airfield. Here was ground zero for French skydiver Michel Fournier’s audacious attempt to ride the pressurized gondola of a helium balloon to 130,000 feet-the cusp of space, the highest anyone has ever gone without a rocket-and topple out earthward. Diving into a near-perfect vacuum he would, in 31 seconds, hit 670 mph and slam into the sound barrier, the first human being to do so with his body. If all went well-a big if-he’d free-fall for just buy ambien cr 12.5mg online under 5 minutes before his chute delivered him to the ground.
The helium truck had moved into position in the adjacent canola field near Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. The doors to a hangar yawned open, revealing a phone-booth-size, airtight gondola ready to be moved onto the flatbed launch truck. An ambulance stood by in the event of catastrophic failure of any components-the balloon, the gondola, the parachute couplings, the oxygen supply, the partial-pressure suit, the supple oversuit designed to shield Fournier from freezing atmospheric temperatures. After two weeks of dashed hopes, it looked as if Le Grand Saut -The Big Jump-just might happen. All the ghoulish handicapping of Fournier’s chances of coming down alive had ceased.
Read the whole article here:
www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2003-01/jump-jump
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