All aboard the Vomit Comet!

Birthday treat was worth the weight

HOW’S this for taking the weight off?

Thatcham adventurer Cynthia Milton (pictured centre, with arms raised) fancied something a little different as a 61st birthday treat.

So she journeyed to Cape Canaveral in Florida, USA, where she boarded a specially modified Boeing 727 for a once-in-a-lifetime experience of zero gravity.

The parabolic flight – nicknamed the Vomit Comet for the unfortunate effect on some passengers’ stomachs – is used to train astronauts bound for the International Space Station and was also used to film the weightless sequences in the film Apollo 13.

Parabolic arcs are performed to create a weightless environment allowing passengers to float, flip and soar as if they were in space.

Miss Milton said: “The travel supplement cutting had been pinned to the wall above my computer for a couple of years.

“I figured I’ll never actually make it into space, but this would be the next best thing.

“I needed a 61st birthday treat; I looked at the cutting, and then into the piggy-bank.”

A few clicks later and her flight was booked.

Miss Milton, who endured hurricanes, earthquakes and even a tsunami on a 74,550-mile solo global biking odyssey in 2007, said of the zero gravity experience: “The immediate reaction of everyone on board, including the instructors, the pilots and the doctor, is lunatic laughter as we start floating around the empty padded interior of the heavily-modified 727, diving from 35,000ft to 15,000 feet.

“After two minutes of exceedingly silly acrobatics, a man with a megaphone, who is strapped down at the back, yells ‘Coming out... feet down’ – which is a bit of a challenge when you’re kneeling on the ceiling and have no idea which way is up or down.”

She added: “So, I spent an eye-watering amount of dosh in about 25 minutes, but it’s an experience few ever have, or even dream they could have. Not a penny wasted!”