Supersonic skydiver Felix Baumgartner was actually faster than first realized during his record-setting jump last October from near space.
Red Bull Stratos, the sponsor of the Austrian parachutist's historic skydive, reported Monday that new data indicated that Baumgartner reached Mach 1.25 and or 843.6 mph and not Mach 1.24 or 834.0 mph as previously thought.
Either way, he became the first human to break the sound barrier with only his body at 1.25 times the speed of sound.
The leap was from an altitude of 127,852 feet, which is 248 feet lower than original estimates, but still stratospheric or from near space.
"He jumped from a little bit lower, but he actually went a little bit faster, which was pretty exciting," said Art Thompson, technical project director for the Red Bull project.
He wore a pressurized suit and jumped from a capsule hoisted by a giant helium balloon over Roswell, N.M. in the historic skydive Oct. 14.
The updated records were provided by Utley, official observer for the National Aeronautic Association's contest and records board.
Based on all the data collected from sensors on Baumgartner's suit, Utley determined that Baumgartner was 34 seconds into his jump when he reached Mach 1.
The speed for breaking the sound barrier depends on the temperature at a given altitude and for Baumgartner, that mark was determined to have occurred just shy of 110,000 feet.
He reached peak supersonic speed by the time he was at 91,300 feet, 50 seconds into the jump, and was back to subsonic by 75,300 feet, or around 64 seconds into his free fall.
His entire free fall lasted four minutes, 20 seconds.
He used a parachute to cover the final 5,000 feet, landing on his feet in the desert outside Roswell.
Baumgartner, 43, shattered the previous record set by Joe Kittinger, an Air Force officer, in 1960. Kittinger did not quite reach supersonic speed during his jump from 19.5 miles up or 102,800 feet.
The private project was aimed, from the start at helping future space crews, whether NASA or commercial, survive high-altitude accidents in such falls.
The Austrian adventurer's free-fall demonstrated that with the right equipment and proper training, a human being can safely accelerate through the sound barrier, according to Red Bull Stratos.
That is a vital breakthrough for the aerospace industry as it looks for answers to the questions of crew and passenger escape in emergency situations, especially with commercial space travel on the horizon.
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