USA: Physicist Stephen Hawking to to experience weightlessness

After spending decades in his wheelchair, the theoretical physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking will be liberated -- if only for a few moments. Stephen Hawking, the renowned Cambridge University physicist, on Thursday (April 26) will be liberated from his paralysis for 30 seconds by plunging into weightlessness aboard a Kennedy Space Center plane. The flight is expected to take off at 14:30 eastern time (18:30 GMT). The author of A Brief History of Time who has long sought the elusive unifying theory which would explain the full nature of the universe, will be assisted into a modified Boeing 727-200 which will take off from the Kennedy Space Center and ascend steeply to an altitude of 30 thousand feet before plunging into a controlled free fall. As the plane reaches the apex of the parabolic arc, Hawking and all others aboard will be rendered weightless. Hawking will float freely, away from his wheelchair, in the cabin of the airplane -- liberated for approximately 30 seconds from the effects of a disease which has left him unable to move most of his body. A medical team and a team of handlers will be on board to assist Hawking throughout the flight. "I am looking forward to experiencing weightlessness. It has been many decades since I have been out of my wheelchair," Hawking said in an interview with Reuters Television. The flight is operated by Zero G Corporation, one of the first entrants into space tourism industry. The Florida company charges 3,500 U.S. dollars for a flight aboard one of its planes. Just to make sure nothing was left to chance, the company made a preparation flight on Thursday (April 19) in which a test-double, 14-year-old school student Ted Straight, who is roughly the same height and weight as Hawking, flew aboard the parabolic flight. Hawking suggested the space tourism industry is more than a frivolity for the wealthy. He said the human faces an ever increasing risk of being wiped out by global warming, or nuclear war, or genetically engineered virus, and if it is to survive, humanity has to be prepared for Plan B. "I believe that life on earth is at the ever increasing risk of being wiped out by a disaster such as sudden global warming, nuclear war, a genetically engineered virus or other dangers. I think the human race doesn't have a future if it doesn't go into space. For this reason I believe that the space programs and nascent commercial space companies are critical to helping spread the human species beyond its birthplace." he said.

ITN Source | April 26, 2007

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