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Zero Gravity Flights for the Rest of Us
waynegoode writes "Zero G Corporation, whose motto is "Question Gravity", is now offering zero gravity flights to the general public. For $3000 you get training and a 90 minute ride with 15 periods of 25 seconds of low or zero-gravity: 3 1/3 Mars gravity, 3 1/6 Lunar gravity, and 9 zero gravity. Peter Diamandis, the man behind the Ansari X Prize, worked 11 years to get FAA approval. Previously, such flights were available only to astronauts, researchers, and Tom Hanks; although recently flights for the public began Russia for about twice the price. Story also here."
Xeni Jardin, over at Boingboing.net has a ticket and is blogging the experience.
Warning! Keep Out of Eyes! Wash Out with Water! Don't Drink Soap! Dilute! Dilute!
Actually this would be quite a different experience than skydiving due to atmospheric drag felt during a dive. Inside the plane all of the air is moving along with you and so there are no drag effects.
Errrr, actually... they've already been there and done that:-
3 52
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0310288/
(see the trivia section)
There's a review here:-
http://www.dvdtimes.co.uk/content.php?contentid=3
You can do this with a single prop plane, it'd be hard to beat 25sec but you can get a good 10sec 0 gravity in one.
As a skydiver, once you exit the airplane (usually a plane traveling at around 100 mph) you begin to accelerate to terminal velocity which is around 120 mph. During this time, you will feel some sensation of acceleration, but it is certainly not zero-g. Your velocity vector simply moves from forward (where it was when you were on the plane) to downwards (gravity pulling on you now that there's no plane/wings to resist it). After about 10 seconds, the air resistance will fully balance the force of gravity and you will be at terminal velocity and no longer accelerating. Of course if you change your body position your terminal velocity can change (lower surface area, same mass = higher terminal velocity), but it's never truly zero G. After 120+ jumps, I don't even feel like I'm falling anymore. It's more like floating or flying.
In an airplane the air is still inside, so you can experience true zero G like astronauts do.
Not saying skydiving isn't fun (it is!) but it's a different thing from parabolic flights.
Goddamn, who rated this informative?
:)
1) "anti-gravity space ship", what kind of rubbish is that?
2) Actually according to relativity, there is no way of distguishing between acceleration and gravity. Therefore if I put you in a sealed box and either a) leave you floating in deep space or b) put you in free fall then there is no way of you telling the difference (ok, there is as there will be slight air resistance slowing you down, and you could measure the very tiny difference in gravity between the top and bottom of the box, etc.).
There is always "c) you hit the ground" too of course
but seriously, this really is zero-G for all intents and purposes foras long as they can accalerate you downwards at 9.8m/s
Combination - fun iPhone puzzling
Penn Jillette of Penn & Teller rode the Comet. I was even posted on Slashdot: http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=115312 &cid=9770946
In Penn's article, he mentions another noteworthy Vomit Comet expedition: The filming of the Pr0n movie, "The Uranus Experiment."
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
To avoid the possibility any other responders to this thread demonstrate a critical need to be cracked with a cluestick:
What a person experiences in this case is *identical* to what you'd experience in Space.
You don't suddenly leave the Earths gravitational field in orbit and start floating around. You just fall in a parabola that happens to miss the ground.
One would think this was common knowledge, but from the posts on here, its clearly not.
Or just go to Carowinds and ride the Drop Zone ride, which drops 16 stories, straight down.
Total cost = $33 admission
Keep the other $2,967 in your pocket.
Okay... I'll do the stupid things first, then you shy people follow.
[Zappa]
You have a profoundly flawed understanding of physics. The only difference falling in a plane and falling in an orbiting spacecraft is the air friction. The orbiting spacecraft misses the Earth thanks to it's velocity. The aircraft in this case counterracts the forces on air friction *nothing else*. So you're as weightless as you would be in space, and in fact it is *exactly* like an orbit in a physical sense when you're inside the plane.
You'd get the same thing if they dropped you out of the plane when it was still climbing almost vertically. When the plane levels off, you'll still be going up in the air while the plane starts going down. That shifts the start of freefall to a little BEFORE it starts falling.
For your information, it has been *already* done:
- The Uranus Experiment
- The Uranus Experiment 2
- The Uranus Experiment 3
BTW, those of us who have been lucky enough to have been in a parabolic flight know how difficult should have been filming such movie...
Legal Disclaimer: I am not responsible of any legal charges if you download such things from P2P networks.
Listen shrub,
I'm in a plane with no windows. Some force is keeping my feet on the floor and giving me the sensation of weight. I take two balls out of my pockets. I drop them.
If the balls fall straight down in parallel paths, I am undergoing constant acceleration.
If the balls do not fall in parallel paths, but rather land closer together, I am feeling the effects of gravity and the two paths intersect at the center of gravity for the system.
Yes, some theoretical gravity field with a center of gravity at an infinite distance will cause objects to fall in parallel paths. The real gravity field affecting the plane, the balls, and me is not such a field, and can be distinguished from constant acceleration.
Actually, methods of determining an un-seen source of 'gravity' (under influence of planet, rotating space station, constant acceleration in a straight line) was in the first problem set on the first of class in freshman physics. See what you would of learned if you had gone to class?
What's funny is that they could only afford to the dive a couple of times, so they only have a little bit of footage. But there is other footage where they "simulate" zero-g with very tacky and hysterical porn special effects.
It's not a very good video. Although it does have some killer 3d special effects, that appear to be done with 3ds r4.
- Derek
Treat me like a marketing stat, and I'll treat your movie like a series of ones and zeros
The reason the occupants of the plane experience this as a zero-G condition is because they are in freefall. They are moving precisely as they would be moving if they were falling toward the earth without air resistance. You need a plane to accomplish this, because in reality you cannot neglect the air resistance.
You can experience the same condition briefly, simply by jumping in the air. During the time you are in the air, you are in a weighless condition.
When I went nearly half the experimenters got quite sick. The smart groups made the experiments automated and spend the time doing flying kicks and walking up walls. Or, of course, Vomiting. Nasa hates the name Vomit Comet, but everyone calls it that. A problem was the camera people would come up to you on the plane while you were frantically working to make your project work due to some bug you missed before hand. When they come you are suppose to smile and wave and say hi to folks at home that will get shown the video. This is rather bad for a serious project that has 10k+ invested in it for plane tickets and hotel rooms.
For some great photos of flights try http://zerog.jsc.nasa.gov/2004SpringCollegeCampaig n/viewer.cgi
I'd say more, but my guild is raiding.
Hmm, don't think there is that much office space near Ellington field. Mostly restricted government areas that you get shot at by National Guardsmen for taking photos of. The KC-135 is done anyway. Too old and time for a very expensive C check, so it is now time for a DC-9 to do the Job. The folks at Ellington are much happier, even if it is smaller than the 707, it has better engines and has much more ease of control.
I'd say more, but my guild is raiding.
I can't believe that nobody else has pointed out something mentioned at the end of the article: They are going to be using regular cargo aircraft that are temporarily reconfigured for the 0G flights, and have been awarded a patent for this idea.
The Zero group has been offering 0-g flights in Kiruna, Sweden, using a special built russian air-plane since last year, and made their first "space-tourist"-flights this year in April (at least they were supposed to but I couldn't find a source actually confirming it with my 5 minutes of googling...). One of the people from there made a presentation at my university in December and said they charged ~$/4000 for it. They are also supposed to used special equipment and lighting inside the cabin to make the flight even more interesting than just having low gravity.
Give me a job. Please?