Google Inc executive Alan Eustace broke the sound barrier and set several skydiving records over the southern New Mexico desert early on Friday after leaping from the edge of space.
Eustace’s supersonic jump was part of a project by Paragon Space Development Corp and its Stratospheric Explorer team, which has been working secretly for years to develop a self-contained commercial spacesuit that would allow people to explore about 32km above the Earth’s surface.
Friday’s success marked a major step forward in that effort, company officials said.
Photo: EPA
“This has opened up endless possibilities for humans to explore previously seldom-visited parts of our stratosphere,” Paragon president and chief executive Grant Anderson said in a statement.
The technology that has gone into the systems used in Friday’s launch are intended to advance commercial spaceflight, namely efforts by Arizona-based World View Enterprises to take tourists up in a high-altitude balloon and luxury capsule starting in late 2016.
After nearly three years of intense planning, development and training, Eustace began his ascent via a high-altitude, helium balloon just as the sun was rising. It took more than two hours to hit an altitude of 41,419m, where he separated himself from the balloon and started plummeting back to Earth.
Eustace hit a top velocity of 1,322kph during a freefall that lasted four-and-a-half minutes.
Jim Hayhurst, director of competition at the US Parachute Association, was the official observer.
Eustace did not notice when he broke the sound barrier, but the ground crew heard the resulting sonic boom, Hayhurst said.
“He just said it was a fabulous view. He was thrilled,” Hayhurst said of his conversation with Eustace after the landing.
The jump happened out of the media spotlight, unlike the 2012 attempt by daredevil Felix Baumgartner and the Red Bull Stratos team. Baumgartner, who went aloft in a capsule funded by millions of US dollars in sponsorships, had set the record by jumping from 39,045m.
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