Self-taught rocket scientist gets hard lesson in physics

He finally went up just like the self-taught rocket scientist always pledged he would.

“Mad” Mike Hughes, the rocket man who believes the earth is flat, propelled himself about 1,875 feet into the air on Saturday before a hard landing in the Mojave Desert. Apart from an aching back, he felt fine, he said, after the launch near Amboy, California.

“Relieved,” he said after being checked out by paramedics. “I’m tired of people saying I chickened out and didn’t build a rocket. I’m tired of that stuff. I manned up and did it.”

The launch in the desert town about 320 km east of Los Angeles was originally scheduled in November. It was scrubbed several times due to logistical issues with the Bureau of Land Management and mechanical problems that kept popping up.

The 61-year-old limo driver converted a mobile home into a ramp and modified it to launch from a vertical angle so he wouldn’t fall back to the ground on public land. For months he’s been working on overhauling his rocket in his garage.

It looked like Saturday might be another in a string of cancellations, given that the wind was blowing and his rocket was losing steam.

“I told Mike we could try to keep charging it up and get it hotter,” said Waldo Stakes, who’s been helping Mr. Hughes with his endeavour. “He said, ‘No.’”

Sometime later, Mr. Hughes’ rocket soared into the sky. “This thing wants to kill you 10 different ways,” said Mr. Hughes, who had an altimeter in his cockpit to measure his altitude. “This thing will kill you in a heartbeat... Am I glad I did it? Yeah. I guess. I’ll feel it in the morning. I won’t be able to get out of bed.”

This has been quite an undertaking for Mr. Hughes, who lives in Apple Valley, California.

He’s seen a flurry of reaction to his plans, with detractors labelling him a crackpot for planning the launch in a home-made contraption and his belief that the world is flat.

“I hope he doesn’t blow something up,” retired NASA astronaut Jerry Linenger said as Mr. Hughes’ plans captured widespread attention. Mr. Linenger orbited the globe more than 2,000 times during four months in 1997. “Rocketry, as our private space companies found out, isn’t as easy as it looks.”

Mr. Mikes next wants to build a “Rockoon”, a rocket that is carried into the atmosphere by a gas-filled balloon, then separated from the balloon and lit.