Famed physicist Stephen Hawking dropped a big hint yesterday that he would like to take a suborbital spaceflight with Virgin Galactic: as the BBC reported, Hawking said that, “My next goal is to go into space; maybe Richard Branson will help me.” MSNBC’s Alan Boyle follows up on this statement and finds that, yes, Virgin Galactic would be happy to help Hawking realize his goal, and that Hawking might be able to experience weightnessless on a Zero Gravity Corp. aircraft flight as soon as next year. (Be sure to skim through the dozens of comments to Boyle’s Cosmic Log post: while most people are very supportive of Hawking’s desire to fly in space, there are a few that criticized the “morons” who “want to spend billions into a fairy tale journey into outer space.”)
An interesting note: this is not the first time that Hawking has been linked to Virgin Galactic. In a number of previous reports, like this Business Week article back in August, Hawking was listed among celebrities who were either interested in such a flight or who had already signed up. However, since those lists included people like William Shatner and Sigourney Weaver who have since stated that they have no interest in flying in space, it’s been tough to take those lists seriously.