IT was the moment Stephen Hawking really let us know what was on his brilliant mind. “My next goal is to go into space,” he told John Humphrys in a radio interview last year.

For most if us the gap between his soaring intellect and ruined body meant it was a quantum leap too far.

Until this week. On Thursday the Cambridge professor takes his first leap towards travel in space. He will float like an astronaut in a weightless flight aboard a specially adapted plane dubbed G-Force One.

Hawking, 65, will be lifted out of his wheelchair so that he can enjoy zero gravity when the plane takes off from the shuttle landing facility at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The academic believes that mankind should colonise space. This week’s mission will be part fun and part training for his place aboard one of Richard Branson’s proposed commercial space flights in 2009.

The plane will climb to 32,000ft to a strip of dedicated airspace 100 miles long and 10 miles wide where it can perform a series of parabolas. As it steeps and dives 15 times, those on board will experience periods of zero gravity lasting 25 seconds.

Dressed in a blue spacesuit, Hawking will be able to float around the cabin, guided by a team of doctors and helpers.

The professor, who has just completed a six-week lecture tour of America, said: “I have always wanted to go into space. I want to show that people need not be limited by physical handicaps, as long as they are not disabled in spirit.

“As someone who has studied gravity and black holes all my life, I am looking forward to experiencing weightlessness and a zero-gravity environment at first hand.

“I am thankful to the people making this experience available to the general public, especially for disabled individuals.”

Hawking, who was born in Oxford on the 300th anniversary of Galileo’s death, is the Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge University, a post once held by Sir Isaac Newton.

His bestseller A Brief History of Time gives a popular account of cosmology and his research into relativity has led to a search for a quantum theory of gravity to explain black holes and the Big Bang.

But until now it has been theory rather than action. Things changed when Hawking gave the radio interview in which he talked about his desire to experience space travel.

First Branson promised him a free berth aboard his future Virgin Galactic spacecraft. Then the Zero Gravity Corporation offered him the weightless trip. The corporation has been operating the flights out of Florida since 2004..

Hawking, who once appeared as a guest on the television show Star Trek: The Next Generation, will fly aboard a Boeing 727-700 that has many of its seats and windows removed to provide a floating chamber. The metal walls are heavily padded.

When a similar aircraft was used by Nasa for space training it was dubbed the “vomit comet” by some astronauts. But the organisers of the flight say that if Hawking and his team take the right precautions the professor should feel no ill effects.

Two doctors from Adden-brooke’s hospital in Cambridge — one a specialist in respiratory illnesses, the other an expert in intensive care — are being flown to Florida to accompany him on the flight.

They, two nurses and Hawking’s assistant will go up in the plane 24 hours earlier with a “body double” of the professor to practise for the mission and to enjoy the weightless experience themselves.

Then on Thursday it is Hawking’s turn. His carers will have access to emergency supplies of oxygen should he need it.

“It is truly an honour to have him aboard,” said Peter Diamandis, the chief executive of the Zero-G Experience. “Our mission is to make the excitement and adventure of space and weightlessness accessible and enjoyable.

“Flying the professor helps us demonstrate how this unique experience, once available only to astronauts, is now open to everyone.”

The firm, which has flown more than 2,500 passengers in 100 flights, has recently been granted approval to fly individuals with disabilities. Normally seats cost £1,750 but Hawking and his crew are going for free.

Sam Blackburn, Hawking’s graduate assistant, said: “The professor has been smiling a lot this week so I feel certain he will enjoy it. We will be on hand to make sure he doesn’t float off and bang into something.”

Explore UK News

• Crime News

• Education News

• Health News

• Scotland News

Times Recommends

• Family cuts its waste to one binful a year
• Cameron can learn from Thatcher in 1979
• VAT is back ... and it's confusing