Free falling from the edge of space

In just under an hour Felix Baumgartner will step out of a space capsule on the edge of space and free fall back to earth... breaking the sound barrier in the process!

Watch it live here: www.redbullstratos.com/live/

Phil.

think its delayed due to weather? Love to do it :laugh: if I could find an XXXL spacesuit to fit

Declan

One very brave man is almost at 90,000 feet , when he gets to 120,000 feet or thereabouts
he will jump out of his capsule OMG

Deirdre Kelleghan watching live now www.redbullstratos.com/live/

Ahh well. I've always been a Kittinger worshiper (1st man in space) ,but I have to tip my hat to Felix on this one. I'de love to give it a go :rock: .

I can buy "on the edge of space" etc - but I think it would be incorrect to say that Baumgartner or Kittinger reached - or jumped from - "space".
These are tremendous accomplishments none-the-less and - I'd shake either man's hand for these achievements.

However, a convention of where space starts lies at about 100km (the Kármán line).
At this altitude the atmosphere is too thin to be able to get lift on a wing without going so fast that the aircraft will break out of orbit.

Baumgartner jumped at about 39km.

Calculated using WolframAlpha.com: *
"atmospheric pressure at 39km altitude" yields 3.3 mbar.

mars.jpl.nasa.gov/MPF/science/atmospheric.html
indicate that Pathfinder found a minimum atmospheric pressure on Mars
at 6.7 mbar.

(Wolfram give me very small numbers for Mars when I tried it - and I've taken the higher NASA figure).

(Earth sea-level pressure is about 1,013 mbar.)

Isn't that thought provoking?
We're still in the ball-park of Mars atmospheric pressure (okay half-of).

Homer goes to Mars and starts hopping:-
"Now I'm in space - now I'm on Mars - now I'm in space..."

Mark C.

* I'm relying on wolframalpha here to be accurate.