JetMan posts

Well, Yves Rossy, the idiot (or genius, depending on how you look at it) who planned to strap himself to a rocket-powered carbon-fiber wing and fly across the English Channel, successfully made his record-breaking flight across the notoriously chilly body of water yesterday without plummeting to his death.

The Swiss daredevil completed his 22-mile, 12-minute, jet-pack-powered flight without incident. He even had enough fuel upon reaching the white cliffs of Dover for a little showmanship, performing spectacular feats of aerial acrobatics over the gathered crowd.

The Jet Man's historic flight will be aired tonight at 8 pm EST on National Geographic. [From: Wired News]

Swiss lunatic flying enthusiast, Yves Rossy, is planning an attempt to become the first person to cross the English Channel with a jet pack strapped to his body. Here's how it will go down: Rossy plans to drop himself from an airplane over 8,000 feet above Calais, France, fire up the kerosene firing engines on his home-made (seriously?) jet pack, and fly across the famous body of water at up to 187 miles-per-hour. His flight will end in Dover, England, following the path of Louis Bleriot, the first man to fly across the Channel in an airplane.

For protection, Yves will wear a crash helmet (though we're not entirely sure how that is going to protect him if he plummets from 8,000 feet) and a heat-proof suit to protect him from the exhaust of the engines. The flight will be aired, tomorrow (Friday, September 26), live on National Geographic and at Nationalgeographic.com.

Rossy, whose day job is flying passenger jets for Swiss Air, first flew one of his dangerous personal rocket wings back in 2006 and has been practicing with this latest version over the Alps in preparation for his trans-European flight. If his flight is successful, he hopes to build a lighter weight, higher thrust version that will allow for vertical take-off and plans to market it to other aviation enthusiasts. We're already taking bets for how many people die in the first year it's available. [From: Telegraph]