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Hi, I'm Dom Del Rosso, Test Director with NASA's Reduced Gravity Airplane.

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How can I help you?

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We need to learn more about astronauts and how they live and work in space.

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Well, they train in many different ways.

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One of the ways is aboard our KC-135, the Weightless Wonder.

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Why do you call it the Weightless Wonder?

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The KC-135 is an airplane we can use to simulate the free fall of zero gravity

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so the astronauts can experience weightlessness.

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How do you simulate weightlessness in an airplane?

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Well, we fly a series of huge arcs.

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In the sky, we call parabolas.

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It's kind of like riding a giant roller coaster in the sky.

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I learned about parabolas in math, and I love roller coasters.

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Well, then you would love the KC-135.

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We start at an altitude of about 24,000 feet and climb to make an arc.

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When the plane reaches the top of the arc at about 33,000 feet, it dives back towards the Earth.

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Anyone inside the airplane is also falling at the same rate that we're diving.

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This causes the people to float around inside.

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That's really cool.

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Do they float for very long?

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Not really, only for about 20 or 25 seconds in zero-g.

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However, we can change the parabola to simulate either the gravity of Moon or Mars,

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and they last a little bit longer.

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So how does this help the astronauts to train for space?

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Well, it gives the astronauts a chance to see how their bodies will react and adapt to weightlessness,

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as well as give them a chance to practice with their experiments before they fly.

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We can also use it to verify and help design new hardware for the astronauts to use later on.

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I get sick when I ride roller coasters.

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Do people ever get sick on the KC-135?

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Well, yes, occasionally an astronaut will get sick,

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and that's why sometimes people call it the vomit comet.

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But it doesn't happen all that often.

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Thanks, Mr. Del Rosso. This really helped.

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You're welcome, and good luck on your project.

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Goodbye, Mr. Del Rosso.