Insights Into History: Episode 2 ”The Fuge”

Imagine feeling your body weigh 30 times more than usual — sustained long enough to be measured. This episode tells the story of R. Flanagan Gray's 31.25G run inside the "Iron Maiden," a massive human centrifuge at Warminster that helped push aviation and spaceflight forward.

It traces the site's unlikely origin from Brewster carriage makers through wartime aircraft production to the Navy's Aviation Medical Acceleration Laboratory, describing the centrifuge's engineering, astronaut training (including Mercury and Apollo crews), and medical discoveries that improved safety and performance.

Today the facility hosts a museum and event space, preserving the legacy of a place where researchers tested human limits and helped build the future of flight.