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Swiss Man Flies With Jet Powered Wing
NotBornYesterday writes "After spending $190,000 and 'countless hours' building a set of jet-powered wings, a Swiss man has successfully demoed this ultimate mother-of-all-toys. After jumping from a plane like a skydiver, he then lit the four jet engines and proceeded to fly around a valley in the Alps at up to 186 miles per hour. His site is here, if you want to see shots of him in action. 'I still haven't used the full potential,' he said."
This news is AT LEAST several months old!
Here are some youtube clips of him:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-66AcTo9TU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEXxkWXncuo
I for one welcome our new jet-winged Swiss overlord.
Cheers!
Strat
FP?
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
This ought to be fun. Might even turn into a sport or extreme recreational activity. But just remember what happened to the last person who got too close the sun ...
This is the one time where people could legitimately use the term "jetpack" and then the submitter and TFA choose not to!
Looks very cool.
Why, yes I have been touched by His noodly appendage. And I plan to sue.
Who cares about transportation? It would be FUN!!
You're messin' with my Zen Thing, man.....
"The German-built model aircraft engines he currently uses already provide 200 pounds of thrust, enough to allow Rossy and his 120-pound flying suit to climb through the air."
So... he weighs less than 80 pounds?
I wonder if these things show up on radar. And how easy they'd be to shoot down. Because they'd make dandy kamikaze weapons.
Bah. These are the people who _should_ be reproducing -- the ones who have the balls to explore and take risks to further the ability of humans.
Well he would be getting frosty piss at that height.
But I want to know if he can run.. err.. fly.. Linux!
Do it yourself, because no one else will do it yourself. [beta blockade 10-17 Feb]
'I still haven't used the full potential,' he said.
Feh.
Definitely famous last words.
Yes, it's an old story, but it has been a very slow news day. Actually, it's been a very slow news month!
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Not really enough mass to do good damage. Bug splat kamikaze pilots don't really make the same statement as fighter jets, and even 747's plowing through the target.
Always going forward, 'cause we can't find reverse.
I initially misread it as "Jet Powered Wang".
The guy was dropped from a plane. The car equivalent to that would be to be dropped from a plane to land on a runway as the Bell X-1 did.
I gather that this number makes some sense in metric.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Man, you just don't get the slashdot zeitgeist. Old news is an essential part of the whole experience.
PS: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fLOgMQon7c
Well... very carefully of course.
With a parachute.
rj
how exactly does this guy land?
He cuts the engines and opens a parachute. The more concerning issue is the major bane of jet powered flight - bird hits. At the speed they are talking about, a bird hitting this guy in the head, even with a helmet, stands a good chance of knocking him out. Then you're going to have a dead bird as well as a dead wing-rider.
The problem being that the windchill permanently damaged his balls, so that scuppers that plan!
Okay, okay, so I'm just kidding - I know not the actual condition of his balls.
which is totally what she said
thegodmovie.com - watch it
I do. Have you flown on commercial aircraft recently? I'd rather get tugged behind jet-man on a rope.
ôó
Oh, there are parachutes that can be used at those speeds - they have some method of allowing air to travel through them, albeit impeded, which is why the Thrust-SSC car was able to use parachutes at speeds exceeding mach 1, and why there is some value in having ejector seats capable of supporting supersonic airspeeds. You will have noticed, of course, that commentators on the Challenger disaster stuck to discussing subsonic parachutes only and essentially classed all supersonic flight as beyond the limits of what you could escape from. All mention of escape methods specifically stated that the speed the shuttle was traveling at were far too fast to use any of the methods available. This is not because supersonic ejection technology did not exist at the time (they did), or that supersonic parachutes were new (they'd been around a few decades by then), but because even the most cynical of commentators accepted that that was just too damn hairy to be remotely viable.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I don't know how, but he only does it once.
Hobgoblin in 3... 2...
Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
> Not really enough mass to do good damage.
\\ > Supposedly the wings can hold like 200 lbs worth of gear in addition to the "pilot."
Tin foil hat or no, 200 pounds is a lot to work with.
http://www.google.com/search?q=smallest+nuclear+weapons&btnG=Search
Operator, give me the number for 911!
The bigger concern, I would think, would be avoiding the amorous attentions of Rodan. No amount of plastic surgery is going to help you cope with THAT.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Well, they say that any landing you can walk away from is a good one. If you can re-use the aircraft, it's a great one.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Naw. You've got the same problem with motorcycles - a buddy of mine had TWO birds hit him almost simultaneously, while he was doing 200+ mph. One nailed him in the head, cracking the face-shield, while the other one turned itself into jello inside the bike's headlight. Not only did it not knock him out, but he even managed to retain control of the bike.
Most birds don't have much weight, and modern helmets are built with some heavy-impact in mind (no pun intended). You'd have to hit a friggin condor to get knocked out.
Wiley Coyote, is that you?
A Human Right
Didn't I see Wyle E. Coyote with one of these?
If the Swiss man flew this into a mountain side with a tunnel painted on it, I wouldn't be surprised at all.
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
Cobra Commander had one almost exactly like that. The dude needs a shiny metallic facemask! Cobra always was much cooler than G.I. Joe (except possibly Snake Eyes).
There exists no way of exchanging information without making judgments. --Bene Gesserit Axiom
Mass?!? Who need mass when you can carry a 200lb BOMB with you?!?
Small jet engines have been an elusive goal for decades. They can be built, but the cost doesn't go down much below bizjet size. That's why general aviation is still piston-powered.
This guy is using four model aircraft jet engines. Probably ones like this. They're somewhat marginal devices, needing an overhaul every 25 hours. (For aviation jet engines, that number is usually at least 1000 hours.) Good thing he carries a parachute.
Um... yeah, and base jumping is widely acknowledged to be about the most dangerous thing you can do for fun, bar jumping off office buildings WITHOUT a parachute. Parachutes, rectilinear or otherwise, aren't "quite safe", they're "safer than not having one". There
Certainly, you're a dozen times more likely to die in a car accident than you are from a chute malfunction. That's because you travel in a car every single day whereas a couple of dozen jumps makes you a seasoned skydiver. If you parachuted your way to and from work every morning, I think you just might possibly find that parachuting is higher risk than driving.
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
Mass is measured in kg
Thrust is measured in N (newtons)
There wouldn't be such confusion if you USians used proper units.