On a Wing and Weightless?

(EDITOR'S NOTE: It took me a while to muster the nerve, but last October I finally pulled the proverbial ripcord and jumped out of a plane. Skydiving was everything that I imagined it to be and more: thrilling, frightening, and miraculous. To float among the birds, if only for a minute or so, is to carry oneself among the Gods.

Nonetheless, that first initial step out of the plane may be too much for most of our readers. Indeed, it demands overcoming eons of evolutions that taught human beings that we simply cannot fly. Thank goodness the Wright Brothers were immune to that sentiment. Fortunately, a company named Zero Gravity has an alternative. Borrowing from the same methodologies that NASA used to train their astronauts about the effects of weightlessness aboard the 'Vomit Comet', they have begun to market their services to those in the general public who yearn for the freedom of soaring. Excerpt from an article on MSNBC should offer our readers all the details they need to make their first 'visit to space'. But be forewarned, at $3000, it costs more then 10 times a simple leap from a plane. -EBO)


Zero-gravity Flights Go Mainstream
By ALAN BOYLE
MSNBC
Tuesday, September 14, 2004


Courtesy of MSNBC and Zero Gravity
Weightlessness for 30 Seconds and $3000.
After years of effort, the first commercial tour service to offer zero-gravity airplane flights in the United States is finally open for business. For just under $3,000, regular folks can get a tamed-down taste of what astronauts feel on NASA's "Vomit Comet." Passengers aboard the modified Boeing 727-200 jet will experience weightlessness for about 25 seconds at a time.

A typical parabolic flight lasts about 90 minutes, with 15 up-and-down parabolas at an altitude of 24,000 to 34,000 feet. Two "Martian" arcs simulate one-third Earth gravity, three "lunar" arcs feel like one-sixth Earth gravity, and the final 10 provide the full zero-gravity experience.

NASA's flight path can induce motion sickness in some people — after all, that's why they call it the "Vomit Comet." And during this summer's series of demonstration flights for the FAA, a couple of the passengers aboard the Amerijet plane reportedly looked a little green around the gills, though most were said to be delighted. The FAA's Bergen declined to characterize how the inspectors handled the flights, other than to say, "It was definitely a unique experience for all of them."