What kind of lunatic straps jet engines to his back and leaps out of an airplane? The kind of lunatic who may well deliver the personal flying machine of our dreams, that’s what kind.
Eric Hagerman reports on a revolutionary Channel crossing
Posted 01.14.2009 at 7:33 pm
29 Comments
More Leg Room: Rossy flies above the southern Swiss Alps, hitting the throttle to gain altitude Denis Balibouse/Reuters
Breaking Away from the Flock
How can an ordinary person understand such obsession? Is it really just a feeling? I'm not about to strap on Rossy's wing to find out, but I want to taste the sensation that apparently is driving him. What, exactly, is he trying to share with the rest of us? I figured jumping out of a plane was a good place to start. So one day last September, I visited the aerodrome Yverdon, not far from Lake Neuchâtel. The runway is lined with poplars, and the members of the Para Club Valais were tending to their chutes, sprawling on colorful tarps nested on the lawn like birds in an Escher drawing.
Rossy pulled off some of his first jumps with the wing here. "We've followed his adventure from the beginning," says Christian Landry, a soft-spoken tandem instructor, squinting into the afternoon sun. "With that type of guy, things become possible. I don't know exactly in the future if he can bring something important for everybody with the technology, but only with people who live more than 100 percent can society go forward. In French we say, metro, boulot, dodo: subway, work, sleep. If all people are like this, we are like sheep and nothing comes better. And we need some people like Yves."
Landry wears a Tintin T-shirt over a soft belly and has something of an aerodynamic face, with a pointy nose, shaved head and swept-back chin. He has the placid smile of someone who has made more than 5,000 jumps, and I'm disappointed to learn that he won't be the one taking me up today. I realize it's almost 5 p.m., and I start to wonder if it's even going to happen -- or if I want it to.
Then I'm shown a short video in French, climb into a jumpsuit, and make one last call home. I'm catching the last flight of the day on the last day of the season. A tall instructor snugs me into a harness and hands me off to another instructor who has just floated down. "My English is not very good, but it's OK," Dan assures me. He clips me to his chest, we waddle to the plane, and before I know it I'm squeezed onto his lap in the same kind of box-hulled Pilatus Porter that Rossy leaps from, huddled beside seven other skydivers, all young and experienced. As the plane spirals up, instead of slapping high-fives, they hunch forward conspiratorially and touch two fingers with one another. And then one of them jumps up, spins around, and flings open the door.
Cold wind and the roar of the propeller rush in, and the conspirators file out in ones and twos and threes, whooping as they take to the open air. Dan scooches us to the edge, where I gain a very realistic view of the patchwork of farmland below, dangling my legs out below the step. I'm uncomfortable. I feel like I'm slouching off the edge of a couch, except there's nothing below me for a mile or so. Then, suddenly, we're out. My breath is nowhere, and Dan cups his hand around my chin to wrench my head back into the proper position -- arched spine, bent knees, arms out in front. It's exactly the opposite of the fetal position, my instinctive posture. But then I breathe and look, and see the retreating sun glittering on the lake, the geometry of the cornfields and the velvety folds of the Jura Mountains. I have no sensation that Dan is behind me, and if I didn't know better, I might think I was flying.
Dan pops our chute, we float down toward the poplars, and he brings us in for a whisper-soft landing on a cool patch of grass. An adrenaline-addled jumper named Stéphane Marmier, one of Rossy's regular crew whom I'd met in Dover, bounds over with a big smile on his face, apparently mirroring my own. "Now do you understand?"
Yes. As soon as I land, I want to do it again.
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To dream the dream is exhilerating...to LIVE the dream must be wonderful!
Inside you exist the freedom and power to create the life of your dreams. Rossy is an exelent example of that.
www.USADiversityLottery.com
This thing blows that stupid Martin rotary jetpack away. Not only is this a viable piece of tech that the military and other enthusiasts can use, but it's way more efficient. I still don't know why people made such a big deal over that glorified hovercraft. Why would you want to hover when you can soar? This is the real deal people, and Yves Rossy is going to take us there.
there is a huge market for this type of transportation/recreation i.e. if legal issues wont be a problem. btw yves should be given a grant for r&d because a efficient re-design of yves rossy's design would be even more compelling.
To infinity and beyond
from Artesia, California
I wouldn't mind having one of those
Please countinue reporting on this.
Please countinue reporting on this.
Very cool, this dude made history! lol first flying man!!
That is really sweet! Now you just need a way to take of from the ground, and a little more fuel. But seriously, how do people manage to construct things like that? If NASA did it, they'd have 100 engineers working on it! How do one guy and a couple of friends build that kind of thing. Impressive is an understatement.
Yes, very cool. Thanks for providing the close-up photo of the underside of the folded wing. When one also considers the 300 plus m.p.h. two wheel Acabian car it could be assumed that the Swiss are currently going through a highly creative period.
This is a very cool machine!! I would love to have one, after they fix the problems. If you look at history, most of everything that has changed the world was made by people, not government own buisnesses. So, :) why NASA would have 100 people working on it and it still take them 30 years to get it ALMOST right is because it's a government project! :)
Alexwoods it is so cool
There is no doubt this will be in Popular Demand®. When is it expected to be available to the public and what is the expected price? This is DEFINITELY on the list of "must have".
Yves Rossy has made history. This will be helpful for the military.
Well, its finally here. The first official, functional jet pack. Now what? It's great that we have finally advanced far enough, technologically, to a point which 40 years ago was mere sci-fi, but let's be realistic here.
The only practical current market for this device and ones like it is military(hold the stones and torches). Let's face it, there are a couple of fundamental problems with this product, not the least of which are cost (each of the engines on this baby costs around 4 or 5G's) and practical skills. First the manufacturing infrastructure for mass production must be established in order to a) minimize the per unit cost and establish a baseline for quality control/safety, and b) generate enough jobs/product to create a sustainable market. Second some form of training facility MUST be established to provide uniform standards to reduce forseeable and preventable accidents/injuries/deaths. Realistically, the only organizations financially capable of such a massive undertaking are governments and their militaries. Unless you happen to have years of flight experience, skydiving practice, and, oh yeah, a significant bankroll/stock portfolio or are a recent, and lone, powerball winner.
Still and all my hat is off to Hr. Rossy. It is indeed a rare individual who has the grit, determination and heart to have a vision this grand and follow it through to its inevitable, and envyable, conclusion.
Who'd'a thunk it? The first man to fly from France to England without a plane. Huh. Is this a great time to be alive or what?
cowboy82
We need things like this to be made before we can have the same principle used in better products. It starts here, it ends when people run out of imagination. I don't want to seem like i'm attacking you. I just wanted to put that in the picture.
from cairo, N.Y.
Sweetness, the thought of being able to fly around is just intoxicating.
Now all these men have to do now is figure out how to launch themselves from the ground and land safely.....Oh Boy!!
from Front Royal, Virginia
When I first caught a glimpse of this article, I thought the same old stuff: he can get airborne for like 30 seconds and fly half a mile, right? And, so, when is he going to burn his legs off? Same old same old. But then I started reading...
If he gets this thing to take off from the ground, gets it stable, and, darn it, protects those legs, well, then, I WANT ONE! Fun? Gotta be!
Anyway, 20 miles or so? Hmm... enough to commute to the next town, traffic be damned! Also, seems good enough to get a soldier, or soldiers out of, or, as soldiers sometimes go, into, harms way- without waiting for transport.
Please, give this guy what he needs and keep us informed of his progress- do you have anything on him on the PPX?
I read this Wingman story and i think this will make history. But after you read it, you might feel inspired by this story to do something like that. I mean personal flight? AWESOME!
Everyone will want one then we might need navigatinal sestems so we dont crash and pairashoots for safty so i am going to wait until they get to a 5.0 of one of these jet packs to buy one if they do go mainstreem soon.
savetheanimals
No offense taken. And, you're absolutely right, when folks like Yves Rossy no longer exist the party's over.
And, by-the-by, I WANT ONE TOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!
I would love to do that so much. That must be a one in a lifetime experience. I would love to also know how to make it.
I would love to fly around in this one here.
Some of the same prototypes available at http://menexis.com are pretty nice as well.
This is a brand new day as you can tell. The problem is landing this on the ground safly after taking off
What happens when you run out of fuel?
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Sweetness, the thought of being able to fly around is just intoxicating.
Now all these men have to do now is figure out how to launch themselves from the ground and land safely.....Oh Boy!!
http://www.hedefnakliyat.com
I read this Wingman story and i think this will make history. But after you read it, you might feel inspired by this story to do something like that. I mean personal flight? AWESOME!
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http://www.playstationturk.net
Should have a good experience, but I think this would be dangerous, maybe I think too much. If you can use it to countries to travel, that's so cool!!! If you plan to have an Asian trip,please browse this site
www.dragonflytours-japan.com/
You might need a air tank mask and suit for hi altitude. But i don,t think it will be that easy to launch from the ground it would be easier to launch from a building with a rail like system.