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Man Plans to Shoot Himself into the Sky With a Rocket

by Evan Shamoon on August 1, 2009 at 12:44 PM


If you think stuff like 'Jackass' and the 'X Games' is extreme, you clearly haven't met Mr. Bob Maddox.

Maddox, who makes his living as a cabinetmaker and artist in Medford, Oregon, has done plenty of skydiving in his day -- several thousand jumps, in fact. Now he intends to strap himself to a four-engine pulse jet rocket about 25,000 feet into the air, jump off at the peak, and parachute to the ground.

Addressing the possible safety issues with the stunt, Maddox says that he's not fearless, but thinks through possible snags and does lots of testing before such an attempt. "It would be a very slow ascent, just 200 miles an hour, straight up," Maddox told Wired.com. "That way, if there were a malfunction in guidance the vehicle would just slow down and I would get out, instead of it tearing itself apart."

Fortunately, he does have some experience with rockets, having used them in his skydiving to maintain more airtime. But he's never tried anything quite like this -- nor, for that matter, has anyone else. He's looking for sponsorship to cover the costs, which local paper, the Medford Mail, estimates to be around $40,000.

"I'm not looking for money," Maddox said. "I just want to build and run the things I design. If I had the money I would just do it on my own." [From: Wired]

Tags: extreme, main, rockets, science, skydiving, top

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