Dubai's sky-high aspirations find a new outlet as it hosts a jet suit race for 'Iron Man' pilots
Pilots lined up on a runway in Dubai and fired up their seven jet engines with an ear-splitting roar
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Pilots lined up on a runway in Dubai on Wednesday and fired up their seven jet engines with an ear-splitting roar. But they weren't preparing to fly an airplane — they were the aircraft.
This city-state in the United Arab Emirates, known for being home to the world's tallest building and other wonders, hosted what it called its first-ever jet suit race. Racers zipped along a route with the skyscrapers of Dubai Marina looming behind them, controlling the jet engines on their hands and their backs.
And if it sounds like Iron Man, the Marvel comic book character made internationally known by actor Robert Downey Jr., the pilots say it is exactly like that.
“The closest analogy would be that dream of flying… and then go wherever your mind is taking you,” said Richard Browning, the founder and chief test pilot for Gravity Industries, the firm that put on the race with Dubai. «And yes, the world of Marvel superheroes and DC Comics, they have created that dream book with CGI, and we’ve got the closest I think anybody’s ever got to to delivering that for real.”
Gravity previously drew worldwide attention when it equipped one of its jet suits on a U.K. Royal Marine, who landed on a ship at sea several years ago. In the time since, they've traveled widely with the suits and pursued other military applications for them before coming up with the idea of a competition with the Dubai Sports Council.
The races on Wednesday saw pilots wear 1,500-horsepower jet suits, using the same kind of fuel that powers Dubai-based long-haul carrier Emirates' Airbus A380s and Boeing 777 aircraft. Pilots lined up on a
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