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Austrian daredevil Felix Baumgartner fell has been proved to be even faster during his historic skydive last October than was originally thought.

Subsequent analysis has revealed that Felix Baumgartner attained a speed of 1,357.6 km/h (843.6 mph) when he leapt from his stratospheric balloon.

It is about 15 km/h (10 mph) above what was initially reported.

Felix Baumgartner’s stated aim was to become the first person to break the sound barrier unaided by a vehicle. This he did. His final Mach number was 1.25.

But although his vertical velocity has been revised upwards, the 43-year-old’s jump altitude has been corrected downwards slightly.

The additional analysis shows Felix Baumgartner stepped out of his special capsule at 38,969.4m (127,852.4ft), a reduction from the previous estimate of 39,045 m (128,100 ft).

Felix Baumgartner’s “space jump” was made over the New Mexico desert, US, on October 14. Millions across the world followed his progress on internet video feeds as he climbed slowly into the sky in his 55-storey-high helium balloon, before making a rapid, 10-minute descent to Earth, with just under five of those minutes spent in freefall.

The biggest moment of drama came when he went into a spin as he hurtled towards the ground, turning at a maximum rate of 60 revolutions per minute.

He had to use all the skills picked up in more than 2,500 career skydives to recover a stable configuration and complete the dive safely.

Felix Baumgartner’s feats bettered the marks set 50 years previously by Joe Kittinger.

The now-retired US Air Force colonel leapt from a helium envelope in 1960. His altitude was 31,300 m (102,800 ft), but his top speed was just short of the sound barrier.

Joe Kittinger, now an octogenarian, was integral to Felix Baumgartner’s team, providing the Austrian with advice and encouragement throughout the project.

Austrian daredevil Felix Baumgartner fell has been proved to be even faster during his historic skydive last October than was originally thought

Austrian daredevil Felix Baumgartner fell has been proved to be even faster during his historic skydive last October than was originally thought

Although the jump had the appearance of a stunt, Felix Baumgartner and his group of experts continually stressed its high scientific relevance.

The researchers said it provided invaluable data for the development of high-performance, high-altitude parachute systems, and that the lessons learned would inform the development of new ideas for emergency evacuation from vehicles, such as spacecraft, passing through the stratosphere.

“Together, we proved that a human in freefall can break the speed of sound returning from near space, going through a transonic phase and landing safely on the ground,” said Dr. Jonathan Clark, a former space shuttle flight surgeon and the Red Bull Stratos medical director.

“That was a big part of the programme, and monitoring the mission was a meaningful event in aerospace medicine and physiology.”

The revised data will now be submitted to the Federation Aeronautique Internationale (FAI), the official world body that oversees these types of records:

Maximum Vertical Speed*: 1,357.6 km/h (843.6 mph/Mach 1.25)

Previous estimate: 1,342.8km/h (833.9 mph/Mach 1.24)

Highest Exit (Jump) Altitude: 38,969.4 m (127,852.4 ft)

Previous estimate: 39,045 m (128,100 ft)

Vertical Freefall Distance*: 36,402.6 m (119,431.1 ft)

Previous estimate: 36,529 m (119,846 ft)

*without drogue or stabilization device

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Hypersonic jet X-51A WaveRider has been tested by US military in a bid to reach Mach 6 (4,300 mph; 6,900 km/h) above the Pacific Ocean.

At that speed it could travel from London to New York in about an hour. Results from the test flight have not yet been released.

The Pentagon and NASA hope to use the project to develop faster missiles.

During a test in June 2011, WaveRider travelled at Mach 5, but failed to reach the target speed.

It is one of several projects currently under way to create a hypersonic aircraft.

The research could also be used to build a commercial plane, able to reach much higher speeds than today’s jets, after Concorde was decommissioned in 2003.

Hypersonic jet X 51 A WaveRider has been tested by US military in a bid to reach Mach 6 (4,300 mph; 6,900 km/h) above the Pacific Ocean

Hypersonic jet X-51A WaveRider has been tested by US military in a bid to reach Mach 6 (4,300 mph; 6,900 km/h) above the Pacific Ocean

The military intended to use a B-52 bomber to lift the wingless unmanned jet from US Edwards Air Force Base in California to 50,000 feet (15,250m).

The craft was then to be dropped and after a free fall of about four seconds, its engine is supposed to ignite.

X-51A WaveRider was then expected to climb to 70,000 ft (21,300 m) and eventually reach Mach 6.

The Mach number is the ratio of the speed of an object to the speed of sound. Mach 1 is the speed of sound – approximately 768 mph, depending on various factors including temperature and altitude.

So Mach 6 is six times the speed of sound. Concorde’s cruising speed was Mach 2 – it flew from London to New York in just over three hours.

The WaveRider test flight was expected to last for about five minutes before the craft falls into the Pacific.

The test is essentially a repeat of last summer’s attempt, when the hypersonic aircraft reached Mach 5, but the engine failed to attain full power.

Military officials said the results would be available later on Wednesday.

European aerospace and defense giant EADS believes that hypersonic passenger flights are likely to appear in the near future. In 2011, EADS presented its own concept of a commercial high-speed aircraft designed to fly at Mach 4.

“The business community who wanted to be in New York in three hours made Concorde highly viable, and now there’s interest on both sides of the Atlantic to jump a generation and go from supersonic flight to hypersonic flight,” said EADS’ vice-president of business development, Peter Robbie.

“Such an aircraft will be very expensive, of course, because of the enormous amounts of energy that is required to get to such speeds.

“But the idea of going from Tokyo to Paris in two-and-a-half hours is very attractive for the business and political community – and I think that by about 2050, there may be a viable commercial aircraft.”

In August 2011, US military scientists attempted to get another unmanned hypersonic experimental aircraft to reach Mach 20 – 20 times the speed of sound.

However, they lost contact with the Falcon Hypersonic Test Vehicle 2 (HTV-2) after it had separated from its rocket.

 

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