After Felix Baumgartner’s death: girlfriend speaks for the first time

One day after the tragic death of extreme athlete Felix Baumgartner, his partner Mihaela Schwartzenberg spoke publicly for the first time. The 56-year-old Austrian died on July 17 in a paragliding accident on the Italian Adriatic coast.

On Instagram, the 55-year-old Romanian TV presenter now publishes a portrait of the late extreme athlete as well as intimate couple shots in happy moments. She writes in English: “My words don’t come out now. But I’m grateful for your. Felix, you were loved. We were love.”

The Instagram post, which received almost 33,000 likes in the first three hours, is accompanied by countless condolences. “Felix was a hero of our century,” writes a user. Others wish the grieving woman “a lot of strength” for the difficult time.

According to media reports, the couple got to know each other in a TV interview in 2014. Schwartzenberg interviewed Baumgartner for a television program, whereupon he asked about her number. In the same year they became a couple and made their relationship public through joint appearances on the red carpet.

A few hours before his death, Baumgartner had shared a video by Mihaela in his Instagram story. In it she ran through the picture with open hair, a long dress and a parachute over her shoulder, and Baumgartner chose the song “Perfect” by Ed Sheeran. A few hours later, the accident occurred in Porto Sant’elpidio.

Baumgartner had become world famous in 2012 through his legendary stratosphere jump, in which he jumped from over 39,000 meters and broke through the sound barrier.