‘Real-life Iron man’ says military is set to buy £24,000,000 of his jet suits

An inventor whose jet suits have won him comparisons with Iron Man says he’s poised to sign £24,000,000 of deals with special forces. Richard Browning’s ‘human flight pack’ can carry it’s wearer more than 600 metres in the air at speeds of up to 85mph. It holds the current world speed record for flight packs and improves on previous technology with six micro gas turbines attached the arm allowing for greater movement control.

Mr Browning, a former Royal Marines reservist and oil trader, already offers £6,600 flight ‘experiences’ to members of the public – or their very own custom-made jet suits for a cool £456,000. He now says his suit is now particularly in demand for use by commandos to board ships. Two militaries allied to the UK are about to sign contracts with his company Gravity Industries, which he started in his shed eight years ago and his now worth $72 million.

‘We do something that looks like it should be in a Marvel film and it does look spectacular, but actually it’s now a serious international business which is driving export’, he told The Sunday Times. ‘Special forces mobility is now where we are generating success. ‘We are in the process of signing several deals with two western allies, in particular for marine mobility, enabling special forces to rapidly secure maritime targets.

‘Instead of trying to snag the railings of a moving ship with a pole and hook, before climbing a caving ladder, or descending from a hovering helicopter, which has its own challenges, we can secure a target in seconds with a swarm of independently mobile specialist personnel from all directions. ‘In this difficult world we live in at the moment, you can imagine that moving special forces around is fairly attractive.’.

Mr Browning says he also has plans to launch a separate charity to help mountain rescuers and other emergency services. A series of successful demonstrations on this front included scaling a mountain in Transylvania ‘in two minutes rathert than the 2.5 hours it takes on foot’. He also says his company successfully trained a paramedic to ‘fly really well’, showing the technology can become part of the 999 response process.

In documents that formed part of the patent claim, the company cited Marvel Studios’ Iron Man character and his use of a wearable flight system which utilises propulsion units worn on the hands. Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk. For more stories like this, check our news page. Stay on top of the headlines with daily email updates. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Your information will be used in line with our Privacy Policy.