'Fastest Man on Earth,' Col. John Paul Stapp, Dies at 89; Had Connections to Roswell Incident, Murphy's Law - Brief Article - Obituary

Colonel John Paul Stapp, USAF (Ret.), died on November 13, 1999, in Alamogordo, New Mexico, at age 89. On December 10, 1954, Stapp became the "Fastest Man on Earth" in a pioneering rocket sled experiment, in which he was accelerated to 632 miles per hour in just five seconds, and then brought to a complete halt in 1.4 seconds. The purpose of the experiment was to study the effects of bailing out from supersonic aircraft. Srapp's medical research led to innovations in seatbelts and other safety devices, although his recommendation to make seats in passenger aircraft face the rear (so the entire back can absorb the shock of a sudden stop) was not adopted.

As head of the Stapp Foundation, he led an annual conference for surgeons and engineers on car crashes, which still continues in his name. His landmark speed record earned him a place on the cover of Time magazine on September 12, 1955, and he was the subject of the 1956 Twentieth Century Fox movie On the Threshold of Space. His busy career earned him many accolades as well, including the National Medal of Technology, presented by President Bush in 1991.

His work with high-altitude balloon pioneer Col. Joseph W. Kittinger led Stapp to commission a series of lifelike human dummies for crash tests. Some of these crash-test dummies may have even been mistaken for Roswell "aliens." (See "Case Closed: Reflections on the 1997 Air Force Roswell Report," Gildenberg and Thomas, SKEPTICAL INQUIRER, March/April 1998 [Vol. 22, No. 2].)

A November 16, 1999, New York Times obituary by Douglas Martin included a story about an assistant to Col. Srapp, one Capt. Edward A. Murphy, Jr., who had incorrectly installed some sensors used on Stapp in a 1949 high-speed sled ride. The sensors could be installed in one of two ways, and Murphy managed to place every single sensor in the wrong position. And so it was that Col. Stapp, staggering off of the sled with blood oozing from his eyes, learned that the sensors all read "zero"--he had been tortured for nothing. Capt. Murphy remarked, "If there are two or more ways to do something and one of those results in a catastrophe, then someone will do it that way," the original statement of the well-known Murphy's Law, "If Something Can Go Wrong, It Will Go Wrong (at the worst possible time)."

Col. Srapp wrote the following words, which he intended to serve as his epitaph:

When life comes to a crossing of the ways

Where mere existence falters through its path

While sands of time drain to the aftermath,

What morning through review my former days

How hard I worked to make my life worthwhile

The causes lost before they could be won

The goals not reached, tasks started but not done

The day of waiting for good fortunes smile.

Forever free from life's unending woes,

Through endless tranquil ages I'll repose.

No more to grope for goals t could not gain

No more to feel the bitterness of pain,

Forever free from life's unending woes,

Through endless tranquil ages I'll repose.

From "For Your Moments of Inertia: From Levity to Gravity," Copyright 1992 by John Paul Stapp.

Dave Thomas is a New Mexico physicist and SKEPTICAL INQUIRER consulting editor.

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