Memorial Page for Felix Baumgartner

Felix Baumgartner (born 20 April 1969 in Salzburg; died 17 July 2025 in Porto Sant'Elpidio, Italy) was an Austrian skydiver, BASE jumper, pilot and extreme athlete. He became known worldwide through Red Bull Stratos: on 14 October 2012, above New Mexico, he jumped from a capsule in the stratosphere, reached Mach 1.25 in freefall and became the first person to break the sound barrier using only his body in freefall. His name remains linked with that jump, but his career began long before Red Bull Stratos.

Early years and flight

Baumgartner grew up in Salzburg. He began parachuting as a teenager; later he gained experience in the Austrian military and specialized in jumps where planning, body control and technical understanding had to work together. He worked for a time as a mechanic, but stayed focused on the dream of flight. The skydiver became a BASE jumper, and the BASE jumper became a pilot who kept looking for new forms of controlled risk.

BASE jumps and the English Channel

In the 1990s and 2000s Baumgartner became known through spectacular jumps. He jumped from tall buildings and landmark structures, including the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur. In 2003 he achieved another record: using a specially designed carbon-fibre wing, he glided from an aircraft above Dover across the English Channel to France. Projects like these looked like stunts at first glance, but they demanded precise preparation, weather windows, material testing and a willingness to name the risks clearly.

Red Bull Stratos

The Red Bull Stratos project became the high point of his career. Baumgartner and the team prepared the jump for years. A pressurized capsule carried him beneath a helium balloon to about 39 kilometres. From there he stepped out in a pressure suit. The FAI confirmed three world records: highest exit altitude, greatest vertical distance in freefall without a drogue and fastest vertical speed without a drogue. Red Bull later released the mission data: 1,357.6 km/h, Mach 1.25, more than four minutes of freefall and just over nine minutes from jump to landing.

More than one record image

The stratosphere jump was watched live by millions and became one of sport's early global online moments. Yet its meaning was not only in its reach. The mission produced data on pressure suits, parachute systems, medical procedures and high-altitude rescue scenarios. Baumgartner's achievement therefore lay not only in the courage of stepping off. It also lay in the discipline with which a dangerous undertaking was broken into controllable steps. Red Bull Stratos left behind not only a record, but also technical and medical knowledge.

Final years and death

After Red Bull Stratos, Baumgartner remained present as a pilot and public adventure athlete. On 17 July 2025 he died in Italy in an accident involving a motorized paraglider. ORF reported that Red Bull had confirmed his death; later, Italian prosecutors said they found no technical defect in the aircraft and attributed the crash to human error. Felix Baumgartner was 56. His public image remains that of an athlete who sought extreme situations but did not want to leave them to chance: a man from Salzburg whose best-known jump began high above New Mexico and whose impact reached beyond record lists.