About Us

Buddy Michaelson, Owner of Rocketman Parachutes, has spent a lifetime embedded in advanced recovery-system engineering. Born into a family synonymous with experimental rocketry—his father being stuntman and expert rocket builder Ky Michaelson—Buddy quite literally grew into the field. Given the legal middle name “Rocketman”, he has carried that legacy into a career centered on precision-engineered parachute systems for high-performance aerospace applications.

Buddy manages the company’s core technical operations, including system logistics, configuration control, inventory of specialized materials, and final inspection of every unit prior to deployment. His expertise extends across canopy design, load-path analysis, rigging architecture, and high-energy descent stabilization for a wide range of flight vehicles.

Before the age of 18, Buddy contributed to the construction and successful launch of the first civilian rocket to reach space in 2014—achieving 3,580 mph and an apogee of 73.1 miles. His work supported the design of the parachute recovery system capable of withstanding the aerodynamic and thermal stresses of a near-space reentry profile.

Buddy also engineered the complete recovery system used in Eddie Braun’s Snake River Canyon jump, a mission that required a parachute capable of stabilizing and slowing a vehicle traveling over 439 mph. His custom-designed canopy provided the energy absorption, drag characteristics, and deployment reliability needed to safely recover the craft—a feat Evel Knievel’s team was unable to achieve decades earlier.

Since then, Buddy has developed and qualified parachute systems for hundreds of companies worldwide, supporting rockets, high-altitude balloons, UAVs, and experimental test vehicles. His work often involves custom solutions for extreme environments, including supersonic deployments, low-density atmospheric conditions, and high-mass recovery scenarios. He oversees all field testing, from ground-drop tests to full-scale flight validation, ensuring each system meets stringent performance and safety parameters.

In addition to his engineering work, Buddy regularly mentor's student teams and rocketry associations, teaching recovery-system design fundamentals such as deployment sequencing, redundancy planning, material selection, and dynamic load mitigation.

Rocketman Parachutes continuously innovates new recovery technologies, and Buddy serves as the lead designer for every new canopy and deployment system. From prototype development to environmental testing, he ensures each product is engineered for maximum reliability, efficiency, and mission success.

KY “ROCKETMAN” MICHAELSON BIO Written by Colette Sandstedt

Ky “Rocketman” Michaelson battled the government, gravity and a profound learning disability to become the first civilian to launch a rocket into space. Michaelson has dedicated his life to pioneering space exploration, often from his own garage and backyard. He is the subject of ROCKETMAN: A DOCUMENTARY, a feature documentary on his life that is currently in production. As a young boy in Minnesota, Ky dreamed of being an astronaut, and his early contraptions showed a talent for building. His ancestors were inventors and daredevils, and he followed in their footsteps with a makeshift diving bell, a bicycle with wings – even a hot dog cooker dubbed “Ky’s Little Cremator.”


But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t learn to read, write or do math. Nobody really knew what dyslexia was back in the 40s, including Ky. His teachers simply thought he was stupid, so Ky dropped out of school in the 9th grade with a chip on his shoulder and “something to prove.”

Inspired by his love of racing, Ky used what he calls his “mechanical photographic mind” to build and race rocket-powered snowmobiles, motorcycles and hot rods – and rocket-powered boats, wheelchairs, sleds, bicycles, roller skates and jet packs. He stunned the crowds at the Bonneville Salt Flats with his rocket race cars, and by 1964, track announcers across the country were calling him “Rocketman.”

Ky and his cars eventually set 72 state, national and international records. In the 1970s he partnered with Kitty O’Neill, a deaf stuntwoman determined to become the fastest woman in the world. That brought Ky to the attention of Dar Robinson, Hollywood’s most famous stuntman.

Together, Ky and Dar worked on over 200 films and TV shows, including Burt Reynolds’ “Stick”, “Hooper” and “Smokey and the Bandit”, as well as “That’s Incredible” and “The World’s Most Spectacular Stuntman.” Their work revolutionized the industry, until Dar’s untimely death in 1986.

Ky headed back home to Minnesota and returned to his first love; rocketry. He started building high-powered altitude vehicles in his garage workshop. Soon, he was breaking every amateur record in the country. Then, he decided to take on the dream of a lifetime: to become the first civilian to launch a rocket into space.

In 1997, Ky formed the Civilian Space eXploration Team with a band of backyard rocketeers, and together they battled sandstorms, government stonewalling, explosions and crashes – and their own resolve. They were up against teams with unlimited resources, but they were undaunted. Finally, on May 17, 2004, Ky and the team launched their GoFast rocket a documented 72 miles up, becoming the first civilians in the world to reach space.

Today Ky consults on films and TV shows, and on projects like stuntman Eddie Braun’s successful jump across the Snake River in 2016, when he completed daredevil superstar Evel Knievel’s attempt. Ky lives in his beloved home state of Minnesota, where he speaks at schools, gives tours of his private museum, and builds something almost every day.

Below is a list of items available in Ky & Buddy The Rocketman’s Store:

  • High, Mid, and Low Power Rocket Parachutes
  • High and Low Powered Rocket Parachutes
  • High Altitude Balloon Payload Recovery Parachutes
  • Drogue Chutes
  • Deployment Bags
  • High Speed Ballistic Chutes
  • Parachutes & Packs For Model Airplanes, UAV, RPV
  • Pilot Chute for Drag Racing Bonneville NHRA
  • Kevlar Flame Proof Chutes
  • High Speed Ballistic Chutes
  • 1/4 Scale Dragster Chutes
  • Hang Glider Chutes
  • Kevlar & Nylon Webbing
  • Kevlar Nomex Flame Shields

Ky Michaelson is a true American Rocketman. Ky has built more rocket-powered vehicles and set more records using rocket power than anyone else in the world. Ky is also the founder of the C.S.X.T. team. On May 17th, 2004, the C.S.X.T. team were the first civilians in the world to officially get licensed. They were also the first to build and launch a rocket into space. The rocket reached a record speed 3,420mph in and an altitude of 72 miles up.