GoogleExec’sStratosphericPlunge Breaks World Record

This morning in Roswell, New Mexico, a spacesuit-clad 57-year-old Google executive, Alan Eustace, strapped into a harness beneath a giant helium balloon and lifted off to new heights in the upper stratosphere. After reaching an altitude of 135,908 feet—more than 25 miles high, with a black sky overhead and a visibly-round planet beneath—Eustace severed his connection to the balloon with a small explosive charge, and fell to Earth.

As first reported by John Markoff in the New York Times, during his descent Eustace broke the world record for highest-altitude jump, soaring more than a mile higher than the previous record-holder, Austria’s Felix Baumgartner, who ascended to 128,100 feet in October 2012. In his descent Eustace broke the sound barrier, reaching a top speed of more than 800 miles per hour. He safely touched down via parachute about 15 minutes after leaving his balloon.

Whereas Baumgartner’s plunge was a heavily promoted public extravaganza sponsored by energy-drink company Red Bull, Eustace’s attempt was pure Silicon Valley: shrouded in secrecy until today, and apparently largely self-funded. That minimalist, low-key approach may have contributed to Eustace’s decision to ascend dangling free beneath his balloon, rather than riding in a more complex and costly pressurized capsule as Baumgartner did.

Eustace had worked with a cadre of experts in aeronautics and life-support systems to perfect his crucial pressure suit, design the parachute, and conceive the mission profile. “What if you could design a system that would allow humans to explore the stratosphere as easily and safely as they do the ocean,” he said in a statement. “With the help of the world-class StratEx team, I hope we’ve encouraged others to explore this part of the world about which we still know so little.”

The “StratEx” Eustace mentioned is short for “Stratospheric Explorer,” according to the prime contractor he partnered with for his stunt, Paragon Space Development Corporation. The company’s website states that the StratEx system has, among other uses, “wide-ranging applications for the study of the science of the stratosphere,” and encourages potential customers to get in touch. Eustace, it seems, is hoped to be only the first of many future daredevils ascending to lofty heights.

Do not be fooled. For a part of the world “about which we still know so little,” the stratosphere is a crowded, busy place, filled with tens of thousands of commercial airline flights each day and monitored by fleets of weather balloons, sounding rockets, and orbital satellites. And although the overlooked upper stratosphere and the mesosphere above it have been dubbed the “ignorosphere,” truth is, the case for sending human “explorers” there is as thin as its air.

Eustace’s audacious project is a spectacular feat of engineering and a heroic achievement worthy of celebration. It’s also an astounding testament to the growing power of extremely wealthy individuals to perform feats that were previously the purview of advanced nation-states. But it is not science – it is, in the words of Alan Stern, a prominent space scientist on the Paragon board, “engineering space tourism.”

Summary

The last 24_th October 2014,  Alan Eustace jumped from an enormous helium balloon placed at 135,908 from Earth. This jump has already been made by the Austria’s Felix Baumgarnter, but this time Eustace has broken the barrier of sound. He’s worked with the StratEx team, which has provided him with the material and the necessary applications.

Glossary

-Strap: a narrow strip of material, esp. leather, used for holding things together.

-Harness:the parts other than the yoke that are attached to a horse's body or head to control it.

-Plunge: to push or thrust (something) intosomethingelsewithforce.

-Shroud: a sheet in which a deadbody is wrapped for burial.

-Cadre: a smallgroup of people, as soldiers, able to trainandlead a largergroup.

-Daredevil: a recklessanddaringperson.

-Lofty: extendinghigh in theair; towering.

Critical review

In my point of view, I think there should be more experiments like this. I was surprised when Baumgartner made his jump and none of my classmates knew about it, I couldn’t believe it! And this time, my mom let me know about this beaten record, but I hadn’t seen it in the news.

I firmly think that things like this are clue to develop our science, and mostly about something we don’t know like the space. As it is said in the article, the stratosphere is an enormous place filled with diary flights and planes, balloons, satellites or rockets; but until now we haven’t been able to take images of the wide space, an unknown place up there.

What if you could design a system that would allow humans to explore the stratosphere as easily and safely as they do the ocean? This question is suggested in the article, and I think it is well formulated, because it compares the huge ocean with the space, and it is logic, because they both are unknown places but the ocean is, at least, explored.

The StratEx (Stratospheric Explorer) team has worked with Eustace. This company encourages people to get in touch with the stratosphere and space.

Our enormous space, sometimes named as the “ignosphere”, is the case of sending explorers. As I have said in the summary, our space is still a huge place so undiscovered for us, and humanity’s curiosity has developed experiments like this one.

Written by Claudia Maldonado