Rocket man's flight of fancy

[Sticks]

From the Guardian online (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/oct/30/aeronautics-gadgets-rocketman)

"I've always loved flying," says Stuart Ross, a commercial airline pilot for whom flying a 767 to the Mediterranean and back a couple of times a week just isn't enough of a thrill. "A lot of my colleagues get involved in restoring old fighter planes and things like that," he says, "but I thought, sod it, let's go for something a bit different."

So Ross retreated to the bottom of his garden in Horsham, West Sussex, and spent four years and the best part of £100,000 building a rocketbelt - a Buck Rogers-style flying backpack that can shoot the wearer 1,000 feet into the air at 60mph. With testing of this most sought-after of gadgets nearing completion, Ross is preparing to take his rocketbelt on the road.



I liked this bit

Ross also sought advice from the Civil Aviation Authority, who referred him to a psychiatrist from their medical department.

:shifty:

[NEOWatcher]

I think I'm going to file that one under "so what?"

Unless somebody can convince me otherwise, this is purely optimistic marketing hype on an over 40 year old product. Possibly an improvement on that design, but they don't seem to point out what any of the improvements are.

He admits, however, that insurance difficulties might scupper that idea. "I guess we'll cross that bridge when we need to go public," he says.

Insurance and liability are BIG when it comes to consumer products.