The New Scientist has a fascinating article about extreme sports enthusiasts who are trying to develop a means to skydive without a parachute. Basically, by building wingsuits.

At least two teams around the world are bent on tackling this pinnacle of extreme sports, and they have very different approaches in mind. In the race to be the first, secrecy rules, but the leading contenders have revealed some tantalising details of what they hope will be - only metaphorically, of course - a ground-breaking achievement.

A modern wingsuit is a full-body outfit with wings of tough nylon sewn between the arms and the torso, and between the legs: think Las Vegas-era Elvis crossed with a flying squirrel. During free fall, the airflow inflates the wings to form aerofoils, creating lift and turning a one-dimensional drop into a three-dimensional glide. While skydivers usually fall at terminal velocity - about 195 kilometres per hour - a wingsuit flier falls at only 80 to 100 km/h while travelling horizontally at 115 to 160 km/h. Skilled fliers can perform surprisingly precise aerial manoeuvres, including briefly slowing their vertical descent to zero and even gliding upwards a short distance at the end of a swooping dive. Daring individuals have skimmed as low as 5 metres above sloping ground.

Wingsuit pilots always use a parachute to touch down safely but, perhaps inevitably, a few have started to wonder if they could do without one. It’s the most common thing skydivers say when they first try a wingsuit, says veteran pilot and wingsuit flier Tim Mace. “Because they’re used to falling so fast, a wingsuit seems like it’s stationary.”

Read the whole thing, which is pretty damn fascinating.