Space plane in test run for zero-gravity surgery

0 Comments | AFP, September, 2006

BORDEAUX, France (AFP) — Harnessed to the walls, their surgical tools moored down with magnets, a team of French doctors are Wednesday to attempt the world's first human operation in zero-gravity, as a test run for performing surgery in space. The aircraft enabling the pioneering operation is Zero-G, a plane designed and built by Europe to simulate gravity-free conditions, providing a priceless laboratory-in-the-sky to test out new technologies.

Working inside a custom-made operating block, three surgeons, backed by two anaesthetists and a team of army parachutists, will remove a fatty tumour from the forearm of an intrepid volunteer over the course of a three-hour flight. Miniature surgical tools, held in place with magnets placed around the patient's stretcher, will be...