Day 5: Flight day 1

Before the flight we took some medication for motion sickness (scopolamine and caffeine) and did some last minute preparations. Actually those last minute preparations became a last minute panic as we found a broken power connector.

The aircraft doors closed at 09.00 and the plane took off half an hour later. We set up our experiment before the parabolas started. Of course, nothing worked! This was the case for the first 10-12 parabolas. Then suddenly, everything worked.

By now we were too nervous on behalf of our experiment to even breathe normally, so we handled our experiment, nicknamed “L(a)unchbox”, with extreme caution for the rest of the flight.

The problems we had at the start made the flight only a limited success, since we could not risk doing the proper pre-flight calibration and handling of the free-floating box. On the bright side we logged data from the majority of the parabolas, and these should be of a decent quality.

As for the personal experience of the flight, this was a once-in-a-lifetime experience! Nothing can compare to the feeling of floating weightless around in a large aircraft for 22 seconds at a time, doing multiple summersaults with the least effort. All in all we had the privilege to experience a lot of things that are not likely to happen in normal gravity anytime soon.