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Forum:	Free Space
Topic:	Red Bull Stratos: Felix Baumgartner's skydive

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Your Reply: HTML is ON UBB Code is ON Smilies Legend	[QUOTE]Originally posted by YankeeClipper: [B]<BLOCKQUOTE>[i]RedBull Stratos was an incredible opportunity to teach a huge audience about the past and future exploration of high altitudes and space. I can’t help but think this Stratos jump could have been more powerful and interesting had we learned the context behind the mission. In the end, I have to wonder how much we’re gaining if the public is excited by space exploration but doesn’t understand why it matters or the technology behind it.[/i]</BLOCKQUOTE>Obviously she never read the articles in [i]New Scientist[/i] and [i]Air & Space Magazine[/i] or visited the Red Bull Stratos website in the lead-in to the jump that explained the context and history. With Joe Kittinger as mission CapCom visible to the world, there was every stimulus for an interested kid or adult to jump on the internet and google the heck out of the jump to learn more. I wonder whether this flight would have been perceived differently had Zenith Watches been the lead sponsor, just like Breitling for the 1999 global circumnavigation by balloon. People forget that Red Bull was not the only sponsor of Felix's jump, there were a number of aerospace and equipment manufacturers onboard as co-sponsors. People are also forgetting that Felix pioneered a flight across the English Channel in 2003 using a specially engineered carbon fiber delta wing. No one considers Louis Bleriot's 1909 flight to be just a stunt - it is properly positioned as a milestone in pioneering aviation. Finally, no one considers those climbers who regularly enter the 'deathzone' of the 14 peaks of the [i]eight thousanders[/i] (peaks above 8,000m or 26,247ft) to be guilty of pulling a stunt. The first person to climb all 14 eight-thousanders, Reinhold Messner, said this in 2004: <BLOCKQUOTE>[i]"You could die in each climb and that meant you were responsible for yourself. We were real mountaineers: careful, aware and even afraid. By climbing mountains we were not learning how big we were. We were finding out how breakable, how weak and how full of fear we are. You can only get this if you expose yourself to high danger."[/i]</BLOCKQUOTE>Felix Baumgartner said as much in 2012: <BLOCKQUOTE>[i]"Sometimes you have to go up really high to see how small you are."[/i]</BLOCKQUOTE>Felix's jump was over 4 times the height of Chomolungma/Everest (8,848m or 29,029ft) or K2 (8,611m or 28,251ft) and far into the 'deathzone'. This is no place for amateurs, tourist thrill-seekers, or crazy 'daredevils' stunt-flying. This was a deadly serious technical endeavour/discipline and a historic flight in aerospace exploration.[/B][/QUOTE]
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