The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum welcomed Felix Baumgartner and the Red Bull Stratos team on Apr. 1 to talk about their mission, their team and Baumgartner’s record-breaking 24-mile plunge.
Beginning April 2, 2014, the National Air and Space Museum will be home to a temporary exhibit about Felix Baumgartner’s jump, “Red Bull Stratos: Mission to the Edge of Space.” The exhibit consists of the Baumgartner’s suit and pressurized gondola as well as pertinent information about the Stratos project.
Baumgartner, 44, is an Austrian daredevil, best known for his October 14, 2012 jump from 127,852 feet above the earth. The jump, sponsored by the Red Bull and known as Stratos, shattered the previous record of 100,800 feet set by Col. Joe Kittinger in 1960.
The night’s discussion, held in the Lockheed Martin IMAX theater and moderated by Tom Crouch, the museum’s senior curator of aeronautics, featured the key players of the Stratos jump: Baumgartner, Art Thompson, the mission’s technical project director, and Joe Kittinger, mission consultant and previous world record holder for highest jump.
Both before and after the panel discussion, attendees gathered around the museum’s west end, where an open bar of Red Bull, water and champagne stood ready to stimulate, hydrate and inebriate in equal measure. Light, anonymous and noise-filling techno music drifted out of an unmanned DJ booth. Tie-clad men stood guarding the hors d’oeuvres as if they were a head of state.
Meanwhile, the panelists signed autographs, posed for pictures and talked with the guests. Behind them, the newly-installed Stratos exhibit stood gleaming, ready to be enjoyed by all who will come to see it.
During the discussion, the personalities of the panelists shined through. Baumgartner’s magnetic presence dominated the room as he spoke. During his speech, Baumgartner paid homage to his childhood hero Neil Armstrong.
“When I was a kid, I’d look up at the moon and think that it’s possible to go there,” Baumgartner said. “Because of him, I knew I wanted to go into aeronautics. I knew I wanted to to do something big.”
Thompson, the technical director, focused on the mission’s procedures, the data that they collected and what their research might mean for the future of aeronautics.
“[I hope] the systems we designed, the feats of engineering and the human body we proved, and the project [would] be used by private companies during the future of commercial spaceflight,” Thompson said.
Kittinger, 85, was grandfatherly and old-fashioned in his speech and demeanor, and his excitement and sense of humor was palpable. He described the differences between his 1960 Excelsior jump and Felix’s 2012 effort.
“In terms of technology, Stratos and Excelsior are night and day. Felix had a specially designed pressure suit, computers and a pressurized gondola, while my jump was all analog and done with older, existing technology,” Kittinger said.
Kittinger agreed to several conditions before his flight.
The Red Bull Stratos Exhibit is open at the National Air and Space Museum until May 24, 2014.<
