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03/28/2024 12:50:46 pm

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Google Exec Alan Eustace Skydives From 136K Feet of Stratosphere

You think executives of tech companies don't know how to do extreme outdoor activities? Then, you definitely have the wrong notion.

Alan Eustace, 57, a senior vice president at Google, apparently parachuted from a balloon near the top of the stratosphere, and then did a free-fall from a height of nearly 26 miles.

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He lifted off through a balloon filled with 35,000 cubic feet of helium from an airport in Roswell, New Mexico. The balloon escalated at speed up to 1,600 feet per minute with an altitude of more than 25 miles for more than two hours.

Eustace detached from the balloon using a small explosive device and landed safely on Earth's ground after 15 minutes at speeds of up to 822 miles per hour.

“It was amazing. It was beautiful. You could see the darkness of space and you could see the layers of atmosphere, which I had never seen before,” Eustace told the Times.

According to Brian Reid, a computer network specialist who has worked with the Google exec, Eustace is a risk-taker and passionate with details.

The Google computer scientist's record-breaking skydive was part of the project by Paragon Space Development Corp. and its Stratospheric Explorer team. The team has been working privately for years in developing a self-contained commercial spacesuit that would permit people to explore some 20 miles above the Earth's surface.

"This has opened up endless possibilities for humans to explore previously seldom visited parts of our stratosphere," Paragon president and CEO Grant Anderson said in a statement.

The spacesuit with an elaborate life-support system could be used for emergency rescues or other scientific endeavors, according to the officials of Paragon.

In 2012, Austrian skydiver Felix Baumgartner, along with the help of the Red Bull Stratos team, did a parachute jump from a balloon at an altitude of 128,100 feet.

Eustace reportedly broke that record with his 135,890-foot dive.

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