Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump?

Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

comanchepilot said:
not to responding verbally . . .
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I think the enormity of what he was about to do, coupled with the concern over the faceplate had his attention. Stress shuts your brain down as effectively as hypoxia. I am fairly sure they had PPO2 sensors wired on him, and just because they didn't display all the data on screen doesn't mean they didn't have it available.

I heard he is now going to attempt something that requires even more daring (IMHO)...... he wants to fly rescue helicopters. :D
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

I think he had to pee and that's all he could think about!:D
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

N747JB said:
I think he had to pee and that's all he could think about!:D
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After Shepard everyone wore diapers at launch. I cannot imagine no matter how many times you have jumped, not looking out that hatch and being overwhelmed with the need to pee . . .
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

comanchepilot said:
After Shepard everyone wore diapers at launch. I cannot imagine no matter how many times you have jumped, not looking out that hatch and being overwhelmed with the need to pee . . .
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I know with me, 2 hours after take off, I need to pee and that's not at FL 1250 either, that might cause a #2 type urge and maybe even an accident. :hairraise:
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

comanchepilot said:
After Shepard everyone wore diapers at launch. I cannot imagine no matter how many times you have jumped, not looking out that hatch and being overwhelmed with the need to pee . . .
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I've never had claustrophobia in my life, and have been in some pretty confined spaces, including recreational caving, and cave diving.
I had a mild case last week in an MRI machine though. It was totally weird, all I could see was white. Seemed just as blinding as the darkness of a cave, just stranger. I could not tell if the tube was an inch from my face or a foot. After a minute, and before the session started, I told the operator I needed to get out and pee. I don't think it was bladder pressure as much as it was the need to regroup and look at that machine from outside again. :hairraise:
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

When they got to Gemini they wore diapers for #2 but the had condoms with a tube to dispose of urine. I know the guy who designed and built the system and then improved it for Apollo.

They had 2 sizes for the urine collection sleeve - large and omg. Seriously. Made me laugh at 12 when he told me. PAR associates of HoHoKus NJ.
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

RJM62 said:
This article says his visor fogged up, which said malfunction almost caused the jump to be aborted.

-Rich
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:) that ol gag. Worked for the F16 driver at Oshkosh :D

Glad Felix made it!
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

flyingron said:
Is that the body bag with the hole for your face?
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It isn't quite that bad. More like a dry suit that you wear under everything else. It is a non-breathable material (obviously) with rubber cuffs at the wrists and neck to make a water-resistant seal. It's built with booties on it, so there is no leaking down there. You basically have to put it on, burp it, put your flight suit over it, burp it again, put flight boots on, burp it again, put your gsuit, parachute harness and survival vest on, burp it again. Then you get to deflate the upper portion because it has just given you air boobs, so that the JHMCS cords aren't all up in your face. Not too bad once you get it all on, but I always break a sweat doing it, and doing BFM with it on really sucks!
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

and then you have to have the AC full on in the winter even to cool off - the rubber bags are not there for our comfort but then not much is . . .
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

His responses and confusion had a marked point of worsening. Hypoxia was my first thought as he was opening he door.

Something wasn't right and Joe K knew it.
 
n20junkie said:
His responses and confusion had a marked point of worsening. Hypoxia was my first thought as he was opening he door.

Something wasn't right and Joe K knew it.
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I agree, whole thing seemed strange to me. He was either hypoxic or claustrophobic and rushing to get outta there.
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

I was listening to some of the audio again on the Red Bull site, they cleaned it up considerably (audio quality, I mean) and he sounds just fine in those bites. Either they had some legitimate transmission issues or they are covering up hypoxia/claustrophobia symptoms after the fact.

In an case - he made good on the jump, alls well that ends well.
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

Interesting interview with the technical director. http://www.engadget.com/2012/10/16/art-thompson-red-bull-stratos-interview/
Seems he was perhaps overly concerned about his visor, low powered radio 1.5 watts with antenna alongside his legs. And medically wired, I doubt it was hypoxia, but if it was someday the word will get out.
 
1.5W VHF or UHF radio at 20+ miles inside a big capsule shaped Faraday Cage probably didn't work so great.

The ground stuff was MotoTRBO. Wonder if the suit stuff was also. It could have been AM Aircraft band and patched into the TRBO system. There's a few keying and timing gotchas there.

He was also having trouble hearing them when the helicopter joined the landing chase. I'm starting to think that there was a patch in use between two radio systems and a ground station dedicated to TX/RX to him. And that there was a timing issue there.

Dang it. Now I'm curious. Stop that. ;)
 
ebysumem.jpg
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

I must have watched on a different channel because there was a tape running that showed cabin pressure versus ambient pressure. They would turn it off and on so you had to be alert.
At altitude the cabin was running roughly 0.5 Bar.
Remember, this was not a first for him, he had two prior high altitude jumps, and I doubt he was panicked.

The first time Joe had to jerk on him to get him to respond I also wondered about hypoxia, but then he would reply appropriately. I watched carefully and one instance where Joe had to prompt him three times it looked like he was just sitting there until I reran it, and you can see his sleeve twitching slightly and it is clear he was busy trying to manipulate something while wearing pressure gloves - not easy. In retrospect his delays look more like tunnel vision on what he was dong and he was just ignoring that annoying voice in his ear.

On balance, other than his insistence on pulling the door open before the pressures were equal, I feel he was not compromised, but totally focused on each task he was working on.

The fanatical determination to open the door and get out of there is something I seen before. I have flown jumpers and some of these guys have an absolute phobia about landing in an airplane (or gondola) They will take any risk, do any thing, to avoid riding the plane back down.
Irrational? Sure, but who says any jumper is rational?

One of our guys had a chute pop in the doorway and drag the jumper out damaging the horizontal stab. (jumper was unconscious briefly but landed OK) The remaining jumper was frantic to get out and the pilot was determined that he was staying inside because he had to run nearly full throttle to keep the ship under control and the higher airspeed put that jumper at high risk of also hitting the stab and taking the airplane down. Luckily, Ron was a big boy and there he was holding onto a flailing, screaming jumper with one hand while trying to fly a damaged C180 with the other.

But the guy with cajones, was that fat old man, Joe. He rode up on the outside wearing what passed for a pressure suit in those days.
I doubt that Felix would have done it with that equipment.
 
Re: Anyone think Felix Baumgartner might have been a little hypoxic there at the jump

I guess he just needed to stay in a Holiday Inn Express the night before . ..
 
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