‘Iron Man’ lifts IIT-Bombay fest with a jet-powered suit – Times of India

MUMBAI: Are those bulky astronaut suits undergoing an upgrade? Maybe yes. And space companies might be considering changing them to propulsive jet suits that would allow flight.
Inventor Richard Browning, speaking at IIT-B’s Techfest 2020, being held virtually because of Covid, said there were discussions to upgrade the astronaut suit. “There is a space organisation that has approached us to collaborate to use our motor flight. In other words, our propulsive devices on the arms and one on the back that could be used to replace the very old space suit where you got arm rest and joy sticks and little thrusters. They want to upgrade that using what we have done potentially. That is a conversation that is ongoing,” said the founder and chief test pilot of Gravity Industries, which makes jet suits that allow humans to put them on and take to the skies.
In November 2017, Browning was able to fly the longest distance of 1.4km – which is further than a Gravity Jet Suit pilot has ever flown before. Then, last November he smashed his original Guinness record with the Jet Suit speed reaching almost 137 kmph. The suit, said Browning, is currently not an efficient way of moving around. “We will stay in the entertainment and niche mobility sectors for the foreseeable future, but we do not rule out the possibilities of the electric winged version becoming more mainstream, as the technology continues its rapid advance.”
Speaking to TOI, he said, “Most opportunities arise taking ideas from different sources, putting them together in a way that hasn’t been thought of before. If you go very narrow, you are really just learning everything that is known now and even without thinking about it, you’re in danger of being blinkered, and forced down a channel where everything is done already. If I would have spent my 16-year career in the aviation industry I would have probably subconsciously just assumed all of the reasons why this should not work (building a flying suit). I had not been immersed or drowned in academia to the point where there was a barrier for me to going and trying,” said Browning.
His mantra for students: “The education system teaches you a bunch of facts and then ideally regurgitate those facts again. The more powerful skill is to have some light knowledge of lots of things, and ask questions and get curious and hold different ideas together and experiment and dismiss and quickly move to on and try again. Don’t lose that childlike imagination and don’t let the education system and big employers beat that out of their mind.”