The European Space Agency's first para-astronaut experiences weightlessness on a 'vomit comet'.
By Rebecca MorelleJohn McFall is the European Space Agency's first ever para-astronaut, selected to study how feasible it is for someone with a physical disability to live and work in space. BBC News joined him on board a parabolic flight, where he experienced weightlessness for the first time.
You feel totally out of control - because you are. Any tiny movement against something solid sends you catapulting around the cabin, bouncing into walls and people. It's like being in a slow-motion pinball machine. He has now been recruited by the European Space Agency to take part in a ground-breaking study assessing how to make spaceflight accessible to people with physical disabilities.
"I'm very much following my heart and I'm following my curiosity," he explains, "and I'm following my passion for science and life."I've joined John on board a specially adapted aircraft to take a parabolic flight. As the plane flies steeply upwards, we experience extra gravity - about twice as much as usual - where your whole body is pressed down into the floor.
Meanwhile, John is faring much better, soaring around and gaining confidence with every period of "zero-gravity".The prosthesis John wears is technologically very complex, incorporating a microprocessor, hydraulics, a gyroscope, accelerometers and other force sensors.
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