Felix Baumgartner has been forced to call off his death-defying skydive from a balloon 23 miles over the New Mexico desert because of winds at the launch site.

The 43-year-old Austrian daredevil had been preparing to break a longstanding altitude record.

"Mission aborted due to gusty winds," a statement on the website of sponsor Red Bull read, shortly after the balloon launch was aborted on Tuesday afternoon,

While organisers gave no indication of when a new launch attempt might be made, during a live webcast of the event mission commentator Bob Hager said the weather forecast for Wednesday was uncertain and conditions were expected to deteriorate for the rest of the week.