Paraglider plummets, death of Baumgartner, the king of extreme challenges
Felix Baumgartner, 56, from Austria, died today in the Marche region in an accident in Porto Sant'Elpidio (Fermo) while flying a powered paraglider
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He had continually challenged his own limits by pushing the physical boundaries of human flight, even to the point of being the first to break the wall of sound by free-body, to the point of jumping from the stratosphere. Felix Baumgartner, 56, from Austria, died today in the Marche region in an accident in Porto Sant'Elpidio (Fermo) while flying a powered paraglider.
He lost control of his vehicle, possibly due to an illness, and crashed into the edge of a swimming pool of an accommodation facility. For the man of records, a trivial accident was fatal.
It will be the coroner, with autopsy findings, and the national flight safety agency that will shed light on the causes. The recordman was staying in an accommodation facility in Fermo together with his wife, who rushed to the scene immediately after the tragedy.
In the afternoon, the 56-year-old had set off on his paraglider. It was a short trip before the crash at around 4 p.m., when it crashed into the edge of a swimming pool, hitting a girl who was an entertainer at the facility. Nothing serious, fortunately for her, who was nevertheless transported to hospital for assessment and treatment.
For the 56-year-old, however, there was nothing to be done; the attempts of the 118 emergency services to revive him were to no avail, to the dismay of those present. An initial hypothesis is that the sportsman was seized by a fatal illness that caused him to lose control of the aircraft, which then crashed into the Elpidian accommodation facility.
