Jumping From Space from Mark Gray on Vimeo.
From Spacecraft Films, whom I wrote about a few years ago over at Tech Central Station.
Update: Welcome to those readers parachuting in from NRO’s Corner!
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THIS IS SO COOL!
Why not ask Joe Kittinger himself? He still lives in Florida,
Frank,
But then I couldn’t post a nifty little video of extras from The Right Stuff jumping from 50 miles up.
(Though I’m always thrilled to hear that another man from the space program’s Golden Age is still very much alive.)
Kittinger had a pair the size of cantaloupes. God knows how they fit him into the suit.
The only person who comes close to the same size cajones is Mike Melvill.
Watching him in Spaceship One when the instrument/guidance panel(TANU?) went out and him deciding to continue. . . the ping pong ball on a string, peripheral vision, and his trust of Burt, were all he needed.
Poor bastard. Why’d they keep sending up Joe Kittinger? He’s like NASA equivalent of the one kid in the neighborhood who’ll eat bugs.
Did you notice the bags under his eyes after the first jump?
I would pay to do that. Seriously. My life is incomplete until such time as I parachute from space. Only one thing…I’d want Shooting Star playing the whole way down.
Personally I’d rather jump from 100,000 feet than from 40 feet!
Point of clarification. Should there not be a distinction made between parachuting from altitude and parachuting from altitude having attained escape velocity? The latter would require some sort of heat shielding for re-entry, no?
Gosh darn, Bill, you ask a lot of a guy. Bags under the eyes…you want bags under the eyes? Look up the ‘surface’ work of his goodbuddy, Col. Stapp. And fasten your seat belt.
Kittinger led a full life. If I recall correctly, he went on to fly missions in Vietnam, was shot down and spent time in a POW camp.
Let me correct that….a charmed life.
Thanks a bunch for this, Ed.
@ Excelsior: I’d be interested to find out if there was ANOTHER person on the gondola–the film (it sure wasn’t video!) of the chute opening seemed aimed by someone. If not, they sure got lucky with dead-aimed cameras (which I assume the jumper tripped before he took the longest step).
@Col. Stapp: The Mythbusters recently had a sort-of shout-out to that amazing man, with their rocket-powered sled “mash up” at New Mex Tech. I had not realized there are still THREE high-speed rail tracks in the NM desert, one university-owned (assuming WikiPedia is accurate).
But the bigger lesson: Boy, weren’t the late 50′s through the 60′s a grand time for aerospace? Few told them “no” and so much good science/human factors/experience was gained. How threadbare the current age seems, with mission planners assuming they will safely retire long before any metal is ever bent.
–Alex Pournelle
Anyone want to try this?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOOSE
“Parachuting” from actual orbit has been studied. You need a small amount of thrust to nudge you into the atmosphere, and then you need a very high drag/mass ratio in order to slow down from orbital speed slowly enough to avoid burning up. The designs tend to be giant inflatable things (a cross between a balloon and a parachute) made from heat-resistant cloth (such as silicone-coated fiberglass). The drawback is that you really have no control over where in your (former) orbital plane you actually come down. (Space buffs will recall pictures of the Mercury astronauts on survival training in many ungodly places.) The earth is 70% water; better bring a life raft.
ICBM warheads are designed exactly the opposite (high mass, low drag) to make their impact points as predictable as possible.
#11: If you’ve attained escape velocity, then by definition you aren’t coming back down. You aren’t even going into orbit.
The gondola is in the USAF Museum in Dayton, OH, tight quarters for one, no photographer. (How would HE have descended?)
The original Time magazine article on Kittinger’s jump from 1960 can be found in Time’s online archive. Does anyone notice a different tone in the piece? It is almost as if the press didn’t yet resent masculinity and the United States.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,939169,00.html
You should read Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds. It has a scene where soldiers drop from space in special combat suits. Reynolds is an astrophysicist by professions and he usually gets the science right.
I was in the 5th grade at Mendota Elementary School in St. Paul, Minnesota when this took place. I actually remember this event, because it was reported in the “Weekly Reader.” Anyone who went to school in the 50s and 60s will remember the Weekly Reader. It was a little 4-page “newspaper” that had short stories about current events and was distributed to schools. I don’t know why I remembered this, except that I was always interested in science. During space launches, they used to roll a black & white TV with “rabbit ears” for reception into our classroom because the school felt that it was history in the making and wanted the students to feel connected to it.
David L. Kutzler
Kutzler is right about a sense of “history in the making.” The reporting was raw at that time while, now, the subject (NASA) seems to have so much control on how space flight is presented. I recall in the West San Fernando Valley in the 1960s our grade school would have to stop for a minute or so when rocket engines were tested nearby but it made you wonder, “did it pass the test? Where will it go?” Harry Potter proves kids can still get excited about a story. NASA seems to have forgotten how to tell one.
At the time Kittinger made these jumps he was an Captain in the Air Force making $460 a month with another $145 a month in flight pay. He sure didn’t do it for the money!
LarryD (17): “If you’ve attained escape velocity, then by definition you aren’t coming back down.”
Oh, you might, if your velocity vector points into the atmosphere.
Ever read Heinlein’s Starship Troopers? “On the bounce Rico!” Heinlein was dropping soldiers out of spacecraft long before Alistair Reynolds was. And there is probably someone prior to Heinlein, but he is a famous example.
Slight nit-pick with the post: from the trailer, what the Star Trek characters appear to be doing is sky-diving. Kittinger was parachuting. The aim of Project Excelsior was to test the Beaupre Multi-Stage Parachute system–a system which was specifically designed to get pilots of high-speed, high-altitude jets safely to the ground. The system consisted of a drogue ‘chute, a stabilizer ‘chute (to prevent the flat spin that had been plaguing Western parachutists since they started jumping out of airplanes in WWI), and a main ‘chute–no sky-diving required. If a pilot was unconscious, the ‘chute would still deploy and prevent the flat spin.
#8 edh
Kittinger did not work for NASA. He was an integral part of the USAF Manhigh and Excelsior project teams–he volunteered for all of his stratospheric balloon flights. There’s a significant difference between what he did and eating bugs. Eating bugs as a little kid requires recklessness, a grown man parachuting from 102,800 feet in a controlled experiment requires courage.
After Project Excelsior, the team members were brought in on the USAF Man In Space Soonest project. They fully expected that Kittinger would be the first US man in space. M.I.S.S. was subsequently cancelled in favor of Project Mercury but the data and gondola design from Excelsior were used extensively for Mercury. IOW, Mercury relied very heavily on the stratospheric manned ballooning program.
The last serious attempts to beat Kittinger’s record that I’m aware of were made in the late ’60s by a pet store owner from St. Paul, MN. He made three attempts. The first launched from a former airfield owned by the University of Minnesota in what is now Shoreview, MN. In that attempt he experienced some sort of malfunction and bailed out at a relatively low altitude, landing, by some accounts, in the St. Paul city dump. I don’t recall the details of the second attempt off the top of my head, though I think it launched from the Stratobowl in South Dakota. The third and final attempt also launched from the Stratobowl. IIRC, his balloon exceeded Kittinger’s record altitude but he again experienced a malfunction and was forced to use the cargo ‘chute on the gondola. As he was tossed around in the gondola during his descent, the faceplate on his helmet cracked. He was rushed to a hospital in Minneapolis where he stayed alive for some time (weeks, possibly months–I forget the precise amount of time) before eventually passing away. His was, supposedly, the worst case of anoxia ever recorded.
Poor Michel Fournier’s balloon went up without him in May of last year in his third attempt to break the record.
Please don’t show this to George H. Bush. I have a fondness for his wife and family and would feel terrible if he (GHB) takes a shot at this.
#25 matt
I forgot about Fournier. Hopefully he’ll make it on his next attempt.
And a Correction: Kittinger may have been brought into M.I.S.S. after Manhigh, not Excelsior.
That dude is a rockstar. He has a 40,000 lbs pair of nuts. I salute you, sir.
I’m surprised nobody has mentioned this Popular Science article (cover story, actually) from a couple of years ago.
http://www.popsci.com/military-aviation-space/article/2007-06/high-dive
“Ride a rocket into space and then abandon ship? You’d need to be nuts–or desperate. Either way, space diving could be the future of reentry”
“”"”"But then I couldn’t post a nifty little video of extras from The Right Stuff jumping from 50 miles up.”"”"”
50 miles or 50 km? Big difference. Still, 30 miles up is huge. And, was it even 30 miles? I thought the biggest jump was from about 25 (`40 km)?
Not trying to diminish the feat, which is incredible. Somebody is planning to top this in a special suit that reminds me of the “Ironman” suit.
As to questions on this thread about reentry from higher up, inflatable paragliders and similar one-man re-entry devices had been designed back in the 60′s. In the coming years, space daredevils will do one-person space launches and recovery.
#31. Brian:
Most likely they would go up in a vehicle designed by Armadillo Aerospace.
It appears they don’t make too many like Joe Kittinger any more.
In 1960, the gondola that he rode to 102,800 feet sported a cardboard licence plate made by his 5 year-old son out of a cereal box.
During the Viet Nam War, Kittinger volunteered for three combat tours in Vietnam, where he flew 483 missions before being shot down – after which he spent 11 months in captivity as a prisoner of war.
Over the years he has piloted 78 different types of aircraft and up until a few years ago was still barnstorming at aviation shows.
In 2007, the United States Air Force Auxiliary, honored Joe Kittinger by renaming the Texas CAP wing’s TX-352 Squadron after him at a ceremony attended by Col. Kittinger and his wife Sherry.
He is, apparently, still active in the aviation community as a consultant.
Well!…that’ll just have to do.
Thanks a million, Ed.
But for you I might never have learned of this excellent man!
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