This story reminds me of the Steven Wright quote; if at first you don’t succeed, then skydiving definitely isn’t for you.
Today’s Moment of Science… Franz Reichelt, tinker tailor’s gonna fly.
The first gizmo we’d recognize as a parachute that was witnessed successfully being used was invented by French monk, chemist, and physicist Louis-Sebastien Lenormand. There were earlier designs, but theorizing away is one thing. Actually attempting to spit in gravity’s dirty whore mouth is another.
Roughly meaning ‘against a fall,’ Lenormand Mary Poppins’ed his derriere out of a tree using two modified umbrellas before concocting his proto-parachute. It was 14 feet in diameter, had a rigid wooden frame, a cloth canopy, and it allowed him to weather a 26 meter jump from the tower of Montpelier Observatory unscathed. It was a promising sign that Lenormand’s invention could be used to help occupants escape from burning buildings.
Parachutes started being designed without a wooden frame. New, more compact designs could get people safely to the ground from a hot air balloon. We wouldn’t see ripcords or parachutes in backpacks until about the 1910s though. For over a century, there were still plenty of ways to turn Lenormand’s idea into a better lifesaving device.
Then there was Franz Reichelt’s way.
Born in what was the Austro-Hungarian empire in 1878, Reichelt moved to France in 1898 and set up a dressmaking shop. As you do. After hearing tales of accidents suffered by early aviators, Reichelt got to work.
Now that airplanes were a thing, the parachute needed to fit in the cockpit with the pilot for immediate deployment in an emergency, lest a miserable day turn worse. His idea was for a ‘parachute suit.’ He started developing it in 1910, and look. I wish I could say the writing wasn’t on the wall with this, but it was smeared on the wall in goddamn feces.
His prototype of foldable silk “wings” attached to test dummies gave them a soft landing from a fifth floor drop. But the design never worked after that. The parachute suit weighed 150lb, which wasn’t helping these dummies fight against a fall.
He reduced the weight of the design, but it didn’t seem to help Reichelt either. He reportedly made multiple jump attempts using the suit at heights between 8 and 10 meters. He lucked out and landed in a pile of hay one time. Another time he broke a leg.
Which was apparently good enough for him. Because he was sure all the device needed was a higher jump to work.
After over a year of applying, he finally got the chance to demonstrate that his device worked at the Eiffel Tower. Note, he was given permission to show this on dummies only. But he showed up wearing his device, showing off the ease of movement and wearability of what I can only describe as a steampunk batsuit.
He made his way to the top of the structure. His departing words were “À bientôt” (see you soon) before taking the plunge, absolutely sure he’d crafted his salvation.
This being a 1912 stunt on the Eiffel Tower, there were ample photographs. The pictures of the design are fascinating. Horrifyingly though, there’s also video.
The parachute suit failed to deploy. Grainy video shows the earth beneath the Eiffel Tower all but swallows him whole.
He suffered broken bones in his spine, limbs, skull, and was bleeding from every possible facehole. Though it’s been reported that an autopsy revealed a mid-air heart attack killed him before he hit the ground, I’m blaming the cold Parisian dirt.
Franz Reichelt, tailor, inventor of the parachute suit, was only 33 years old.
This has been your Moment of Science, disappointed that I have never gotten a parachute with my fire escape.
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