Tom Cruise has earned a Guinness World Record for most burning parachute jumps by an individual, performing the stunt 16 times while filming the latest installment of the Mission: Impossible franchise, Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning. The 62-year-old actor, known for his daredevil stunts, pulled off the feat in a climactic showdown with nemesis Gabriel (Esai Morales) in the skies.

In the eighth installment of the action-packed franchise, Cruise's super-spy Ethan Hunt fights for possession of a rogue artificial intelligence known as the Entity, flying 1940s biplanes above canyons and fields in South Africa's Drakensberg mountain range. The sequence ends with Ethan falling from one of the planes as it's on fire and breaking into pieces in mid-air; he deploys a parachute only to have it burst into flames and disintegrate, forcing him to deploy the backup parachute as he plummets to the ground.

Cruise, a licensed skydiver, "leapt out of a helicopter 16 times while strapped to a parachute pre-soaked in fuel and lit ablaze, before cutting away the charred remnants of the first chute and safely deploying a backup," per the Guinness World Records website. "No other actor or stuntman has come close to that amount of death-defying drops."

Tom Cruise also holds the Guinness World Records title as the actor with the most consecutive $100-million-grossing movies ever, with 11 films between 2012's Jack Reacher and 2025's Final Reckoning.

For more on the franchise, including exclusive interviews and behind-the-scenes photos, check out PEOPLE's special edition, out now.

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Image credits:

Credit: Joe Maher/Getty; Paramount Pictures and Skydance

Credit: Paramount Pictures and Skydance