Skydiving from Space

Michel Fournier, a retired French army colonel is attempting to break all previous skydiving records. He will be trying to sky dive from 25 miles up into the sky. Which puts him right on the edge of space. His goal is to both set the record for the highest parachute drop ever, and to be the first person to break the sound barrier in free-fall. He will be attempting the jump over the Saskatchewan plains in Canada next month.

Pretty amazing. The description of his drop reminds me of the drop sequence from the Robert Heinlein book, Starship Troopers. In that book, an assault team of marines is inserted onto a planet by skydiving from near orbit. The book is pretty good, and I do recommend it. Just don't bother watching the awful movie that was based on it.

Man plans record skydive from edge of space