Nick Piantanida
| Nicholas J. Piantanida | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
Nicholas John Piantanida August 15, 1932 Union City, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Died | August 29, 1966 (aged 34) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Nationality | U.S. |
| Known for | Setting balloon altitude record |
| Spouse(s) | Janice McDowell (1963–1966; his death) |
| Children | 3 |
Nicholas John "Nick" Piantanida (August 15, 1932 – August 29, 1966) was an American amateur parachute jumper who reached 123,500 feet (37,642 meters, 23.39 miles) with his Strato Jump II balloon on February 2, 1966, flying a manned balloon higher than anyone before, a record that stood until Felix Baumgartner's flight on October 14, 2012.
Piantanida was born August 15, 1932, and he grew up in Union City, New Jersey. He had a younger brother, Vern. When Piantanida was 10 years old, he experimented with homemade parachutes, harnessing a stray neighborhood cat to one in a test drop off the five-story apartment building where they lived. When a neighbor informed Piantanida's parents of this, Piantanida tested the next parachute himself, jumping off a lower roof and breaking his arm. As he grew older, he took up skydiving with a "dogged determination", according to his brother.
As a young man, Piantanida played basketball in East Coast leagues. After high school, he joined the U.S. Army Reserve and shortly thereafter, the U.S. Army for two years, where he earned the rank of Corporal. After his military service, Piantanida and his climbing partner, Walt Tomashoff, became the first people to climb a route on the north side of Auyantepui, the plateau in Venezuela from which Angel Falls drops from a cleft near the summit. For this accomplishment he was interviewed on the Today Show. After his return to the United States, Piantanida worked in an embroidery factory, played basketball at various colleges, and worked as an ironworker on the Verrazano Narrows Bridge.
In 1963, Piantanida was living in Brick Township, New Jersey, and had a business selling pets when he discovered skydiving. One day after watching jumps at the then new Lakewood Sport Parachuting Center near Lakewood, he began taking lessons and jumping regularly. After making hundreds of jumps and earning a class D expert license, he learned of the 83,000-foot (25,000 m) jump from a balloon by Yevgeni Andreyev that gave the official world record for the highest parachute jump to the Soviet Union, and determined to bring the world record back to the United States. (The unofficial record, which Piantanida was also trying to break, was held by Joseph Kittinger of the U.S.)
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