More on antigravity from spinning discs:
From World of the Strange (reprinting the London Sunday Times).
Evgeny Podkletnov watched in annoyance as clouds of smoke drifted across the laboratory from his colleague’s newly lit pipe and clung to his delicate research apparatus.
The fumes would mean hours of recalibration, but the smoker was his superior and Podkletnov, a quiet, shy man, felt unable to stop him. Then, in the midst of his annoyance, he spotted something peculiar. As the smoke drifted over his machine it suddenly changed direction, shooting upwards to form a bizarre column shape above it.
At the time it seemed no more than a curiosity. But that observation, in an obscure university in Finland 10 years ago, would soon change his life and prompt some of the biggest aerospace companies to come knocking at his door. For Podkletnov had unwittingly discovered a device that, if his claims are to be believed, can change gravity itself.
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The kit was basic by current scientific standards: a ceramic disc coated in specially formulated alloys was cooled to -220C and then spun at high speed in a magnetic field.
It was important but dull work, and had no apparent link with challenging the forces of gravity.
But when Podkletnov observed his columns of smoke he was puzzled enough to investigate further. First he suspended a metal ball above the machine, then some silicone and wood. Each time he found that the objects lost about 2% of their weight above the spinning disc.
That wasn’t all. Investigating further, Podkletnov found that the anti-gravity effect extended far above the machine, right to the ceiling. Then he went up to the roof and, sure enough, there was a narrow circular beam penetrating right the way through the building which reduced the weight of anything placed in its path. It was just as strong there as it was above the machine.
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COULD it be, then, that Podkletnov had stumbled on a secret other scientists had been trying to keep quiet for half a century? What is certain is that since his work was released to the public in 1996 some very big names have admitted their enthusiasm.
Last week George Muellner, the executive who oversees Phantom Works, Boeing’s secretive research organisation, told The Sunday Times that “anti-gravity works”. He added: “We know it can work but what we don’t know is whether it can be useful. The systems we have seen consume too much energy. I believe that one day there will be a breakthrough but it is a long way away.”
What Muellner would not talk about was an internal seminar held at Boeing earlier this year in which the researcher Jamie Childress and other senior Phantom Works executives described the potential of anti-gravity research.
Childress, who has been in contact with Podkletnov, concluded: “It is plausible that gravity modification is real.” He warned that, if it were proven, the aerospace industry would experience a “gold rush” that would alter Boeing’s entire business.
and
But having dropped his bombshell, Podkletnov disappeared again and has never published details of that work. Officially he still works for the Moscow Chemical Science Research Centre, a secretive institute that does not even publish its address.
This weekend The Sunday Times traced Podkletnov to Finland, to a home near the University of Tampere, where he did his first gravitational research. “He will not talk to anyone about anything,” said a woman who then slammed the phone down. What is he hiding from? What does he know?
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