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Swiss is first human to jump into powerful jet stream

Swiss is first human to jump into powerful jet stream

Tokyo (SCCIJ) – The Swiss are somehow obsessed with records high in the skies. There was the team of Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg which made the first circumnavigation of the earth by a piloted fixed-wing aircraft using only solar power. Then there is Raphael Domjan, who wants to become the first human reaching the stratosphere in a solar plane. Marc Hauser, a Swiss entrepreneur, fits into this picture. He became the first human who jumped into the high-altitude winds of the jet stream to highlight its potential as an untapped energy source. Now, an eye-opening documentary is being aired which gives an astonishing insight to this pioneering and daring project.

An untapped energy source

Swiss entrepreneur Marc Hauser and world acclaimed filmmaker Claudio von Planta have followed high altitude winds in the last two years, in particular the jet stream with its special winds at a speed of 100 kilometers per hour (kph) and the height of 6,000 meters. The documentary “Chasing the jet stream” presents visionary airborne wind energy projects, which are using different approaches to harvest high-altitude winds but still are looking for investors to prepare for a market entry.

Swiss is first human to jump into powerful jet stream

Marc Hauser in the sky

Marc Hauser, a passionate skydiver and world record holder in horizontal forward speed at 304 kph, has become the first human who has jumped from a height of 7,400 m at the temperature of -40°C into a 140 kph, 87 mph jet stream on 30th of June 2018. Marc had to prepare thoroughly for this risky jump. At this altitude oxygen is rare and the freezing cold wind reaches the strength of a hurricane. Nothing was left to chance, as the gripping documentary shows.

Airborne wind energy projects

“High winds are very powerful but nobody yet taps into this energy to generate electricity at an industrial level. If we would use the high-altitude winds, we could power the whole world in a sustainable way,” Hauser says. With his jump into the jet stream he wanted to bring attention to the manifold startups which are developing pioneering systems to produce energy from the jet stream. “I wish that this initiates more investments to make this promising vision reality”, he said.

Marc, who offers also motivational speeches to companies, visited for the purpose of the documentary three startups in Switzerland which are developing kites or drones to tap into the power of high-altitude wind. “We can power the whole world with energy from high-altitude winds,” Hauser stated. The 62 minutes long film about his endeavor is aired on 1st, 8th and 15th of December 2018 on BBC World News. For local times, the schedule of the channel needs to be checked. The documentary will be traveling different film festivals all over the world and can already be obtained here.



Text: SCCIJ based on material of speed-tracking.com; Photo: speed-tracking.com

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