He’s hoping to become the first skydiver to break the sound barrier, but weather conditions have now delayed his record-breaking attempt.

Extreme athlete and skydiver Felix Baumgartner is hoping to attempt a death-defying free fall Tuesday, from more than 30,000 metres above the New Mexico Desert.

So what actually happens when a person free falls from 37-kilometres? Weather permitting, Baumgartner will find out during his jump from the edge of space sometime Tuesday.

Jonathan Clark is heading up the Austrian skydiver’s medical team.

“If you’re going to be above 50,000 feet you wear a pressure suit, or a capsule, above 63,000 feet that’s the layer where water in a liquid state at body temperature spontaneously boils,” Clark said.

The 43-year-old skydiver will travel into the sky in a balloon, which was originally set to launch from Roswell at 7 a.m. With weather conditions not co-operating, it is unknown whether Clark will get to make the attempt Tuesday.

When Baumgartner does reach the stratosphere, he’ll hurtle himself toward earth, at which point he is expected to reach speeds of more than 1,100 km/h before deploying his parachute.

One of the major risks is that any tear or minor rip in his pressurized suit could expose him to a lack of oxygen and temperatures as low as 70 degrees below zero.

“Three or four minutes of exposure is still survivable, it’s not going to be pretty, he’ll have severe lung damage, but we have three teams positioned around the landing site so that we can get to him very quickly,” Clark said.

The energy-drink maker Red Bull is sponsoring the feat and is promoting a live Internet stream of the event here.

There will be a 20-second delay in the broadcast in case anything goes wrong.

His dive from the stratosphere is expected to provide scientists with valuable information for next-generation spacesuits.

Rogers Sportsnet will have exclusive Canadian coverage of the event, that has been 5-years in the making.