Appreciation: Felix Baumgartner

The world has moved on from Felix Baumgartner’s 2012 freefall from the edge of space. Alan Eustace, an executive at Google, surpassed Baumgartner by 8,000 feet barely two years later, with far less fanfare than the Red Bull-funded Stratos jump, notable as a case study for modern marketing prowess. Today, Baumgartner is racing cars and enjoying life as a celebrity athlete. And yet despite the stunt-like hype surrounding Stratos, there is an enduring legacy to his 127,852-foot skydive, one that’s little known or simply overlooked: His triumph over crippling claustrophobia.

The Austrian had made more than 2,500 jumps before planning to be lofted by a giant balloon to the edge of the stratosphere. Falling from out of the sky was no big deal. But getting into a pressurized space suit, that was another issue. The suit had four layers to keep the liquids in his body from turning into gas and protect him from the temperature extremes—a liner, a bladder, mesh to keep the bladder