Skydiver Felix Baumgartner Plummets Faster than the Speed of Sound

If you’ve been anywhere near the Internet this past week, you’ve likely been made aware of a record-breaking skydiving attempt that was soon to take place. Well, that happened yesterday, after having been delayed due to bad weather on Tuesday. With this jump, Austrian skydiver Felix Baumgartner, backed by his Red Bull Stratos team, had hoped to break at least three world records. While it may be a couple of days before those are verified, the unofficial results look good.

Felix’s jump point was originally meant to be 120,000 feet, but as the helium-filled balloon remained full during the jump preparation, the final height became 128,097 feet. That alone would give him a world record, but next up is the one that involves him taking the plunge.

Further, during the jump he managed to reach 834 MPH, becoming the first person to exceed the speed of sound from outside a vehicle. However, at this point the exact MPH rating is being debated. It’s been said by some sources that the real value was 730 MPH, and the other note of Mach 1.24 would suggest something much higher than 834 MPH. Hopefully we’ll find out the real value sooner than later, although given Felix’s relayed experience, it does seem likely that he did in fact break through the sound barrier.

At 128,000 feet, Felix would have been twice as high as the “Armstrong limit” – that is, the point at which the atmosphere begins to work against you and evaporates bodily fluids – such as saliva, tears and other liquids (but not blood).

I tuned into the jump about an hour in, where Felix was about 50,000 feet up. At that point, the live YouTube stream had about 3 million live viewers. By the time Felix took his plunge, that number sat at 7.3 million. As impressive as that is, I’d love to know the kind of bandwidth YouTube was pushing at that very moment!

If you watched the jump, what did you think? Didn’t see it? Check out the official highlight video.