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A plane being developed by Paul Allen could lower the cost of launching to low-Earth orbit:
Rockets have been the way to get satellites into orbit since the dawn of the space age. But Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen hopes to shake that up with help from the world's biggest airplane.
"Stratolaunch" is a 500,000-pound beast with twin fuselages and a wingspan of 385 feet. Allen's Seattle-based company is developing it as a platform for lifting rockets into the stratosphere before launching them into space. It's seen as a cheaper, more reliable route to low-Earth orbit (LEO) — the sweet spot for many kinds of satellites.
The plane is still in development and has yet to fly, but last December it taxied out onto the runway at the Mojave Air & Space Port in Mojave, California. In another test last Sunday, it hit a new top taxi speed of 46 miles per hour [40 knots]. If all goes according to plan, the plane will take its first test flight next year. As to when Stratolaunch might begin commercial operations, no date has been given.
Twitter video of rollout.
Also at Flying Magazine.
Previously: Stratolaunch: The World's Largest Plane Rolls Out
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bob_super on Friday March 02 2018, @06:53PM
On the other hand, a typical uncrewed mission launchpad explosion is pretty easy to deal with: Mop up, straighten up the bent parts, add concrete here and there, and repaint.
Here, you have serious danger for any crew (don't believe this is a drone, yet) from the time you fuel up on the ground to the time you've released and separated by at least a km. That's a long time, and the rocket could be subjected to significant accelerations in the wrong axis, requiring some over-designing.
It's not a new risk, since USAF has done it many times with B-52s. But in a commercial enterprise and with bigger rockets, it's not a trivial danger to the whole operation.