ELI5- Can someone the physics behind Zero-G flights (Parabolic flight) ?
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Zero-G is weightlessness that happens when you feel no weight. This is what happens for example ISS that obit earth. It is not that there is no gravity there, it is around 90% of surface gravity. It is the opposite is just gravity so everything accelerates the same way because of it and you are weightless.
When you sit on a chair you are not feeling gravity pulling you down but what is called the normal force from the chair that stops you from falling down.
Consider what would happen if you throw a ball on the moon where it is no atmosphere. It will fly in a parabola and the only force on it is gravity, it is weightless. On earth, we have an atmosphere so if you throw a ball there will be air resistance so gravity is not the only force.
A parabolic flight follows the path that the airplane would have moved if it was not for air resistance, just like a thrown ball on the moon. Because air resistance exists the pilot uses the engine and control surfaces to compensate for it and the airplane will move very close to the parabolic path it would have followed if the atmosphere was not there.
You could do the same by just diving with the airplane the problem is airplane have a max speed and the acceleration down need to be 9.8m/s^2. So just diving results in a short weightless time compared to if you start when you move up.
This is comparable different to that a ball you throw in an arch is longer in the air than the one you just drop.
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