Milestones of the Century shows the heroic contribution made by Col. John Paul Stapp in the study of human factors. At :43, Stapp is shown boarding the Gee Whiz rocket sled test at Edwards Air Force Base / Muroc, as part of groundbreaking human deceleration experiments. At 1:01, Stapp is shown with his face distorting due to acceleration and deceleration. At 1:22, the June, 1954 test at Holloman, New Mexico aboard the Sonic Wind produced a 421 mph acceleration. At 1:40, Stapp’s face distorts as he travels at high speed and slams into the water brake. At 1:56, the December, 1954 test with 9 JATO rocket bottles is shown at Holloman, New Mexico, simulating an ejection from a jet aircraft at supersonic speeds. This test on December 10th, 1954 hit speeds up to 632 miles per hour. This set a ground speed record and put Stapp into the books as “Fastest Man on Earth”.

John Paul Stapp, M.D., Ph.D., Colonel, USAF (Ret.) (11 July 1910 – 13 November 1999) was a career U.S. Air Force officer, USAF flight surgeon and pioneer in studying the effects of acceleration and deceleration forces on humans.

We encourage viewers to add comments and, especially, to provide additional information about our videos by adding a comment! See something interesting? Tell people what it is and what they can see by writing something for example: “01:00:12:00 — President Roosevelt is seen meeting with Winston Churchill at the Quebec Conference.”

This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com