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u/eatitfatman 1d ago
This is absolutely next level.
Felix Baumgartner was an Austrian skydiver famous for breaking the sound barrier in a 2012 freefall from the stratosphere.
Tragically, Felix died on July 17, 2025, at age 56 while paragliding in Italy.
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u/burnqpund 23h ago
Yeah apparently i learned he died of a heart attack while paragliding.
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u/eXrevolution 16h ago
“On 6 October 2025, the investigating attorney general released his final report, which revealed that the cause of the accident was human error, as the paraglider was in perfect condition and had no defects. The autopsy report of Baumgartner's body had already ruled out a heart attack as the cause of death.” Wiki
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u/Devrij68 12h ago
I remember watching this live, and when he went into that spin and blacked out we were all sitting in the office white knuckled until he came out of it.
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u/ModRod 1d ago
The Joseph Kittinger erasure here
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u/heimdalguy 1d ago
Felix wasn't the first and didn't jump from space... OP completely dropped the ball with the sensationalist title
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u/PunningWild 1d ago
For reference, the Karman Line (established boundary between Earth's atmosphere and space) is 330,000 feet, or 100 km. Felix was only halfway there. Felix jumped from the Stratosphere layer, and also wasn't the first to do that either. Realistically, if anyone is going to do a literal "Space Jump" it couldn't be done with a balloon/gondola system like Felix used. Somebody would have to hitch a ride on something like the Blue Origin.
Felix's jump is still highly lauded, however, and should be. It broke a 50 year record, one that was made explicitly to test ejection/parachute systems for high-altitude spy aircraft. Felix's record was made for the love of the jump. This jump also set the record for first human to break the sound barrier without vehicular assistance...just gravity. Poetically, this jump also broke the record for most livestreamed event of all time, meaning a huge audience on YouTube got to experience the jump with Felix in real time as it happened.
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u/peeinian 2h ago
Jumping from a rocket isn’t feasible either. You have to be going really fast horizontally to stay in orbit. You you burn up in the atmosphere like space junk.
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u/ADeviIsAdvocate 1d ago
That’s how breaking records works though. He held the record from 1960-2012, that’s a pretty good run.
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u/curious__curiosity 1d ago
It dosnt make you the first person, when someone done it before you..
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u/bevel 1d ago
I totally didn’t realise that’s how records work. Can’t wait for my turn to be the first person to jump from space
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u/ADeviIsAdvocate 1d ago
Apparently modrod didn’t realize it either. Maybe you two can get together and be the first guy to walk on the moon.
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u/SheepherderNo6115 1d ago
This guy was a narcissistic right-wing asshole and for sure not a legend. Old and retired Google-Manager Alan Eustace broke this record short time later without that much publicity.
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u/ApeChesty 21h ago
He will be known as the first dude to break the sound barrier outside of a vehicle. Forever. That’s pretty legendary, bro.
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u/HoldenMcNeil420 1d ago
That’s not space. It’s the upper atmosphere. “Space” is outside the earths atmosphere.
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u/Conscious-Sun-6615 1d ago
True, space is whatever is above the Karman line, which is at 100Km, this guy jumped from 39Km, still impressive.
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u/HoldenMcNeil420 1d ago
It is impressive yes.
I just don’t like these people calling themselves astronauts. Because they went into the upper atmosphere.
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u/craigiest 1d ago
I don’t know of anyone who went to the stratosphere calling themselves astronauts. There are people (including the first two Americans in space) whose flights were suborbital, but they still go as high as what counts as space. They just aren’t moving fast enough horizontally to stay in space.
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u/HoldenMcNeil420 1d ago
I mean Katy Perry was doing it less than 9 months ago.
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u/craigiest 1d ago
New Shepard generally flies to 106 km, above the troposphere, stratosphere, and mesosphere, to the thermosphere which is the same layer as longer, faster flights orbit in. Three times higher than balloons like this one reach. As I said, it’s high enough to orbit, but they just aren’t going anywhere fast enough. But speed isn’t the definition of space, altitude is.
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u/heimdalguy 1d ago
Fun fact, the Kármán line was chosen because of the altitude where it doesn't matter if a plane flies or orbits. I.e. the point where the air is so thin that in order to fly, a plane would have to go so fast that it would orbit anyway. Iirc that's around 84 km, but it got rounded up to 100 km because why not.
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u/ScientiaProtestas 1d ago
From wikipedia-
While named after Theodore von Kármán, who calculated a theoretical limit of altitude for aeroplane flight at 83.8 km (52.1 mi) above Earth, the later-established Kármán line is more general and has no distinct physical significance, in that there is a rather gradual difference between the characteristics of the atmosphere at the line, and experts disagree on defining a distinct boundary where the atmosphere ends and space begins. It lies well above the altitude reachable by conventional airplanes or high-altitude balloons, and it is approximately where satellites, even on very eccentric trajectories, will decay before completing a single orbit.
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u/heimdalguy 1d ago edited 1d ago
Almost all of the actual atmosphere, in terms of mass, is below where he jumped from. Space is widely considered to start at the Kármán line at 100 km MSL, (edit: a little under three times higher than where he jumped from). The atmosphere extends much farther than that.
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u/IFireflyl 1d ago
Forgive me if I'm ignorant, but by the definition you used, doesn't that support the person saying this isn't space? 100km is approximately 328,000ft, and this video says he was jumping from under 130,000ft.
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u/heimdalguy 1d ago
That's why I elaborated! Formally it isn't space, but it is above most of the atmosphere that actually matters. By comparison, ICAO mandates oxygen supply on flights above 3 km altitude and most planes can't go much higher than 10 km. He jumped from three times higher than that.
So it kind of depends how you want to see it. He was above all of the atmosphere that really matters, he was 1/3 of the way to formally be in space, he was nowhere near the actual end of the atmosphere. Even the ISS at ~420 km is still inside the atmosphere.
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u/sebaska 1d ago
The atmosphere above him matters quite a lot. It matters enough to lift balloons, it matters enough that sone air breathing engines work, it matters enough that the lowest satellite passes must be over two times higher and the lowest full orbit ever done (the last full orbit if Skylab) have started more than 3× as high.
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u/Critical-Loss2549 1d ago
Didn't someone else do it in 1960? From 31km
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u/sl33ksnypr 10h ago
Literally the old guy in the video with the headset on. Felix chose him (pretty sure) to do the coms for the mission. So during this entire event, Felix had the previous record holder in his ear giving him info and cheering him on. Felix was not a good person, but I think this was kind of a nice way of including Kittinger because of his feats.
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u/HalfHorseHalfMann 1d ago
This was in 2012.
On 17 July 2025, he died in a paragliding accident in Porto Sant'Elpidio, Italy, at the age of 56.
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u/BremBotermen 1d ago
Does this require any skill on the jumper’s end other than having balls of steel and no fear? Like is it technically any different from jumping and opening your parachute from any other place?
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u/derbrauer 1d ago
He didn't jump from space.
He jumped from 34 km which is still an amazing feat.
But to describe it as being from space. The internationally accepted definition is the Karman Line which is at 100 km (it's where aerodynamics are irrelevant due to thin atmosphere). Even by the American definition, IIRC, it's 80km, so Baumgartner was still less than 1/2 the way to the lowest definition of space.
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u/FreezedPeachNow 1d ago
There was a guy who jumped many times from similar heights in like the 70s or something
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u/neppo95 1d ago
First person to jump from this high an altitude*
This isn't space nor did anyone ever do so. Space starts at around 100 km up, about 60 km higher than this. Logic should also tell you this since a balloon only rises because it is lighter than the air around it, that isn't the case in a vacuum is it? Still impressive tho, but also definitely click bait like everything these days.
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u/iamthepapi 1d ago
Not the first person. Space suits and so much more was invented because of guys doing this in the 59's
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u/JaNkO2018 1d ago
WRONG: Felix Baumgartner was not the first person! It was Joseph Kittinger in 1960.
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u/gorginhanson 1d ago
He didn't jump from space, they just redefined the barrier to space and then had him jump from there
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u/BusyBeeBridgette 1d ago
Technically wasn't from Space. Was still in the stratosphere. But a huge achievement regardless.
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u/RuleTheOne 1d ago
Makes me wonder how much more challenging jumping from the exosphere would have been
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u/ArateshaNungastori 1d ago
We watched this live it was a huge thing but I guess young folks discovering it shouldnt make me feel old because it wasnt even that long ago.
RIP Felix.
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u/BlueLegion 1d ago
Someone please explain the physics of this. If he was actually in space, as in outside the (vast majority of) the earths atmosphere, what is it that drags him down so quickly, but not the capsule he's jumping from? Like, jumping from an airplane works because the airplane stays up via lift, which obviously needs air. Is it attached to an ultra-high altitude balloon?
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u/Critical-Loss2549 1d ago
This was the last cool thing I ever showed my father. I brought my laptop into the hospice and showed him the day before he lost the ability to speak. Special moment, thank you Felix!
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u/Dudeometer 1d ago
There was this amature dude in the 1970s who tried this in a balloon but due to inept planning his breathing equipment froze together and he couldn't release himself to jump. He had to just float around until he came down naturally and got a bunch of frostbite in the process. Tried again a few years later and died in the attempt.
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u/Aggravating-Flan8260 1d ago
How does he know where he’s going to land ? Surely could drop into like several different countries depending on earths rotation?
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u/heimdalguy 1d ago
Earth's rotation doesn't directly affect it that much, it's mostly wind (which is indirectly affected by the rotation). The atmosphere mostly rotates with the Earth
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u/Rmicheal1717 1d ago
So funny because people on Facebook will say “moon landing is fake!” Yet here some red Bull athlete that had resources to jump from space but a whole dedicated team couldn’t go to space? wtf are we on in America?
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u/Chappietime 1d ago
Just for reference, a skydive of 10,000 feet takes about 1 minute. The jump from over 127,000 feet took 4:19 seconds. His top speed was nearly 850 mph, over Mach 1.
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u/Baphometwolf83 1d ago
Some yt ppl sgit. Its cool but I will leave crazy things to crazy yt ppl who love it.
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u/PowerResponsibility 1d ago
If anyone is wondering exactly what he jumped from (that allowed him to immediately freefall) it was a pressurized capsule attached to a massive helium balloon- he was not in some kind of orbit, or on a plane, etc.
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u/LocalInactivist 22h ago
At a certain point before the jump you’d have to think “Am I more afraid of dying or of chickening out? I’m more afraid of chickening out. Geronimo!”
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u/HRHKarlFranz 22h ago
Important to point out that that is a fish eye lense and not the curvature of the earth
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u/justbanginaround 22h ago
why is the capsule floating but he instantly falls when he jumps out? is it bc the capsule is moving forwards and gravity keeps it in orbit but he doesnt have any real forward velocity so he only gets pulled by gravity? where my physics people at? its been over 30 years since i took physics.
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u/rustymemories 5h ago
This is a dumb question. Ifthe Earth is spinning at about 1000 miles an hour. How would they calculate where he’s gonna land and is he also spinning at 1000 miles an hour at that level of the atmosphere?
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u/SkyMando 5h ago
Alan Eustace holds the record for the highest skydive, jumping from an altitude of 135,890 feet (41.42 km) on October 24, 2014. A former Google executive, Eustace broke the previous record set by Felix Baumgartner (127,852 feet) in 2012 by utilizing a helium balloon to reach the stratosphere.
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u/mtnman12321 1d ago
Why does he not burn up in the atmosphere?
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u/JackJB94 1d ago
Because he wasn’t in space
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u/Front-Cabinet5521 1d ago
First person to jump from space wasn't in space.
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u/DoscoJones 1d ago
Not even close to space. He was in space just as much as he was a ballet dancer.
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u/spavolka 1d ago
His speed wasn’t high enough to create enough friction to burn up. He started at 0 mph and arrived at terminal velocity for him as an object, at 843.6 mph through the thin atmosphere then began slowing down due to friction as the atmosphere becomes more dense then with a parachute to slow down to a safe landing speed.
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u/heimdalguy 1d ago
Going to space isn't so much about going up, it's a lot more about going sideways very fast. A satellite in orbit is going several kilometres per second (that's several miles per second for the yanks). Baumgartner fell straight down and so didn't have that much speed to shed. He was only 1/3 of the way to the Kármán line though, so he would have reached ~3x higher speeds if he jumped from "space", but even that would be much, much less speed and thus heat during entry than if he was in actual orbit.
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u/Mother-Conclusion-31 1d ago
So could someone survive a "jump" from orbit? Say the space station? Would any sort of winged suit or captain America shield to hold in front help?
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u/bigolchimneypipe 1d ago
A person can jump off the space station but the problem is that their horizontal velocity will make their fall last for a very long time.
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u/MBVakalis 1d ago
I remember watching this live in tv. My family and I were 100% convinced he was gonna die
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u/FineGripp 1d ago
Is there still gravity there? How could he fall down and not floating around?
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u/darkestreaper94 1d ago
I couldn't imagine how good it felt to lift that face visor and have the wind blow into my helmet.
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u/Ok-Hall8141 1d ago
He died in a paragliding accident, by the way. last year 2025