CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.–Free of his wheelchair and tethered only to heart rate and blood pressure monitors, astrophysicist Stephen Hawking yesterday fulfilled a dream of floating weightless on a zero-gravity jet, a step he hopes leads to further space adventures.

"It was amazing," Hawking said after the flight, which took off from the space shuttle's runway at the Kennedy Space Center.

The modified jet, named G-Force One but nicknamed the vomit comet, carried Hawking, his four doctors and two nurses, and dozens of other passengers up to 7,200 metres over the Atlantic off the coast of Florida.

Hawking's nurses lifted him up and carried him to the front of the jet, where they placed him atop a special foam pillow.

The jet then climbed to around 9,600 metres and made a parabolic dive back to 7, 200 metres, allowing Hawking and the other passengers to experience weightlessness for about 25 seconds.

The plane made a total of eight parabolic dips, including two during which Hawking made two weightless flips like "a gold-medal gymnast," said Peter Diamandis, chairman of Zero Gravity Corp., the company that owns the jet.

"We had a wonderful time. It was incredible, far beyond our expectations," Diamandis said.

Hawking, a mathematics professor at the University of Cambridge who has done groundbreaking work on black holes and the origins of the universe, has the paralyzing disease ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease.

The 65-year-old was the first person with a disability to experience the flight by Zero Gravity, which has flown about 2,700 people out of Florida since 2004.

"I want to demonstrate to the public that anybody can participate in this type of weightless experience," Hawking told reporters.

Hawking's personal physicians were on hand to make sure nothing went wrong. Others on the flight included financial backers of Zero Gravity and passengers who donated $150,000 (U.S.) to charity to go on the flight.

The jet's interior is padded to protect the weightless fliers and equipped with cameras to record their adventure. The astrophysicist hopes the zero-gravity flight is a step toward going on a suborbital flight, which may be offered by private space companies by the end of the decade.

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"I have long wanted to go into space," said Hawking.

With files from Star wire services



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