Stephen Hawking
zero-gravity flight
Thursday April 26, 2007

Stephen Hawking, the 65-year-old Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge University who has done ground-breaking work on cosmic black holes and the origins of the universe, today became the first person with a disability to experience weightlessness in a zero-gravity inducing flight laid on, as a commercial enterprise, by the Florida based Zero Gravity Corp.

The jet flights offered by Zero Gravity Corp feature the execution of parabolic plunges that allowed its passengers to experience weightlessness for bursts of 25 seconds. Each "parabolic" manoeuvre typically begins with a sharp climb to around 32,000 feet, followed by a rapid 8,000-foot descent.
A similar plane to "G-Force One" the modified Boeing 727 in service with Zero Gravity Corp. is used by the American space agency Nasa to train astronauts. Nasa astronauts often refer to their own zero-gravity aircraft as the Vomit Comet, because of the regularity with which they lose their lunch to its stomachchurning manoeuvres.

As many people will know the phrase, "with a disability," is something of an understatement in the case of Stephen Hawking who is famous not only for his achievements in Theoretical Physics but also for being such a high achiever despite suffering severe physical disability that has confined him to a wheelchair for many years.

Due to the paralyzing disease ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, Hawking - celebrated theoretical physicist and author of the acclaimed A Brief History of Time - is unable to move most of his body.
He also lost his ability for natural speech after a tracheotomy that followed a related bout of pneumonia in 1985. He can only make tiny facial expressions using the muscles around his eyes, eyebrows, cheek and mouth to communicate. Otherwise, he relies on a computer, attached to his wheelchair, to talk for him in a synthesised voice.

On the flight, which took off and landed from the space shuttle runway at the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Stephen Hawking was accompanied by two doctors, and three nurses, (also heart rate, blood pressure, oxygen and carbon dioxide measuring monitors!), to make sure he was physically safe and comfortable during the experience.
His assistant brought a card with the letters of the alphabet in case he wanted to communicate beyond facial expressions.

In the event Stephen Hawking, who had taken a pre-flight motion sickness pill as a precaution, lapped the experience up. What could have been a single parabolic dive was extended, at his own insistence, to a total of eight dives.
After the first zero-gravity plunge Stephen Hawking indicated to his carers after that he would like to perform a 180-degree "flip" with his body.

The weightless Hawking floats on air with just an apple for company

While Professor Hawking was enjoying zero gravity, aides also allowed an apple to float free in the aircraft as a tribute to Sir Isaac Newton, the British physicist who discovered the laws of gravity. He had been inspired to work out his Universal Law of Gravitation after watching an apple fall from a tree.

"He was doing gold-medal gymnastics in zero-g. It was incredible," said Peter Diamandis, chairman of Zero Gravity Corp. When asked if he was enjoying himself "his eyebrows went up and there was a big grin, meaning 'yes'...he was grinning the entire time". Zero Gravity Corp. had offered the ride, which normally costs $3500, to Stephen Hawking as a courtesy.

Prior to the flight Hawking had told journalists that "I have wanted to fly in space all of my life," and that "for someone like me whose muscles don't work very well, it will be bliss to be weightless."
Hawking told a pre-flight news conference. "I have been wheelchair-bound for almost four decades and the chance to float free in zero g will be wonderful."

After the flight Hawking enthused:- "It was amazing. The zero-g bit was wonderful...I could have gone on and on. Space, here I come."

Hawking said he had an ulterior motive for going on the flight besides raising money, (more than $144,000!), for charities and the thrill of weightlessness. He said he wants to increase public interest in space, since he believes humans' survival depends on going into space.

Hawking expressed hopes that the cost of space flight will drop and that humanity will be able to gain access to the resources of space. He suggested that a spread of humanity beyond the Earth was desireable and necessary:-

"I think life on Earth is at an increased risk of being wiped out by disaster, such as sudden global warming, nuclear war or a genetically engineered virus or other dangers...
...I think the human race has no future if it doesn't go into space."

Biography of Stephen Hawking