Posts tagged records
you can watch Felix’s fall live on Discovery Channel or on DiscoveryNews online.
if he succeeds he’ll break a long-standing record, but if he fails… well… it won’t be pretty.
© Volkmar K. Wentzel, Aug. 16, 1960, Joseph Kittingers free fall
Today, Austrian sky diver Felix Baumgartner aims to execute the highest free fall in history. For 52 years that record has been held by U.S. Air Force pilot Joseph Kittinger—shown above at the outset of his historic skydive.
It was August 16, 1960. Kittinger had just uttered “Lord, take care of me now” and stepped out of his open-air, helium-balloon gondola, some 20 miles (31 kilometers) up. Thirteen minutes and 45 seconds later, he had traveled from the edge of space to New Mexico using only a pressurized suit and parachutes.
Designed in part to study high-altitude bailouts, much of the Air Force project, from training to touchdown, was captured in classic National Geographic pictures, re-presented here in anticipation of Baumgartner’s expected sound barrier-shattering dive from 23 miles (37 kilometers) above the same spot.
“At zero count I step into space,” Kittinger wrote in 1960. “No wind whistles or billows my clothing. I have absolutely no sensation of the increasing speed with which I fall.” The U.S. Air Force pilot accelerated to 614 miles (988 kilometers) an hour—nearly the speed of sound—during his 4 minutes and 36 seconds of free fall. In a few hours, Baumgartner intends to break that speed record, and the sound barrier in the process. (read more here and here)
(via pbsthisdayinhistory)
that’s a big fella.
World’s Tallest Dog (and Cat)!
The dog, seen in the above video, is a Great Dane named Zeus. When Zeus stands on his hind legs, he towers 7 feet 4 inches above his owner, Denise Doorlag of Otsego, Michigan. He can eat en entire 30-lb bag o food in a day.
The cat was 19 inches tall, earning him the Guinness record and named Savannah Islands Trouble.
They used a toothbrush to repair one of mankind’s most ambitious science projects ever.
Astronauts are boss.
Spacewalking Astronaut ‘Touches’ the Sun
In legend, the bright sun was a dazzling temptation for Icarus and so, too, it is for NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, who appears to touch our closest star in a photo snapped during a spacewalk this week.
Astronauts Williams and Hoshide spent six hours and 28 minutes working to remove a stuck bolt using improvised tools made from spare parts, including a toothbrush.
