Sixty five years ago, Captain Charles Yeager became the first man to travel faster than the speed of sound in his X-1 aircraft. Daredevil Felix Baumgartner just became the first man to accomplish the same feat without a plane — or indeed any assistance at all. In an almost unimaginable stunt, the 43-year old Austrian has jumped from a specially constructed balloon at over 128,000 feet (39km) above the earth, breaking the world record for high-altitude skydives and speeds in free fall. As you would expect, Baumgartner is no stranger to extreme sports. He is an accomplished BASE jumper and, using a carbon wing, was the first to free fall across the English Channel. On this dive he broke not only the previous altitude record of 102,000 feet for a skydive, but likely the speed of sound and the record for fastest free fall during his descent.
