Important Innovations

  1 Hour Passenger Flight Beijing to NYC                                             Source:  China Transportation It Is Literally a Blast Chinese aerospace startup company Space Transportation's new space plane is being developed to carry passengers at speeds up to 2,600 mph in suborbital space to go from "point-to-point". That includes space tourism adventures and bullet-fast aircraft flights on Earth. The company says their new technology can fly passengers from Beijing to New York City in one hour. Space Transportation calls the new space plane a "rocket with wings".  They say it will be a fully reusable space plane with large triangular wings with rocket boosters. The concept is a blast into suborbital space and a new form of passenger air travel to space and for travel to destinations here on Earth being developed in China.   How Does It Work? The winged rocket plane takes off vertically and detaches itself from the huge, triangular glider wing.  It hurtle

  Is It China's Version of the USAF X-37B Spaceplane? Source:  USAF X-37B Spaceplane  New Reusable Space Vehicle Shrouded in Mystery China has successfully launched an experimental reusable spacecraft.  It was deployed into orbit Friday onboard a Long March 2F rocket.  The mystery space vehicle successfully landed at a designated location, presumably in China, today.  The Chinese news agency Xinhua calls the space vehicle a breakthrough that will lead to more frequent round trips to space at a greatly reduced cost.  The big question:  is it China's version of the top secret, US Air Force X-37B spaceplane? Low Key Mission with No Photos The Chinese government has kept the mission very low key.  No photos of the spacecraft have been distributed and no details provided on the technology involved.  But there is a great deal of speculation that the vehicle may be the Chinese version of the USAF's top secret X-37B spaceplane.  The X-37B is an autonomous spaceplane developed by Bo

US Air Force's X-37B Spaceplane - Clouded in Mysteries & Missions Successfully Lands After Record Orbit The US Air Force announced that its top secret, experimental spaceplane - the X-37B - just successfully landed at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in FL after a record flight. The spaceplane has been more than two years - 780 days - in orbital flight.  This is its longest test mission for a group of military technologies.  The X-37B is an experimental, test spaceship.  It was built by Boeing, is operated by the US Air Force and was launched into its latest mission aboard a SpaceX rocket. Clandestine Missions This is the spaceplane's 5th mission.  What the missions have entailed are for the most part a mystery.  They are top secret missions.  But we do know the purpose is to demonstrate new technologies, such as propulsion systems, avionics and spacecraft reentry systems for what the Air Force hopes will be a "reliable, reusable, unmanned space test pl

2021 Missions to International Space Station Courtesy:  SNC Space Utility Vehicle Sierra Nevada Corporation's Dream Chaser space plane continues to go through successful milestone testing by NASA.  It's been selected by NASA to deliver and return cargo from the International Space Station (ISS) starting in 2021.  It's a reusable, multi-mission space utility vehicle that easily lands on commercial runways. Fascinating Technology The Dream Chaser is an autonomous launch, flight and landing vehicle.  No pilot is needed.  It has a high reusability rate of 15 times.  It's the only commercial space plane that is what's called a lifting body vehicle, capable of a runway landing.  It provides ground crews immediate access to the cargo onboard as soon as it lands.  And it will do a minimum of six missions to and from ISS starting in 2021.  It's the product of  US company SNC and their 4,000 engineers, scientists and software developers.

Falcon HTV-2 This is one of DARPA's most amazing, daring and high risk projects.  It's called the Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle or Falcon HTV-2.  It was designed to overcome the many challenges of hypersonic flight, which is something DARPA is committed to developing.  It's a concept vehicle that has helped to pave the way to a hypersonic future. DARPA's Goa l The end goal is a vehicle that can reach anyplace in the world in less than an hour.  Falcon, designed by Elon Musk's Space X in partnership with DARPA, was designed to go up to Mach 20 or 13,000 miles per hour.  That would take you from NYC to LA in 12 minutes. Lost in Space Falcon is an unmanned, rocket-launched maneuverable aircraft. Also it's a data-truck with tons of sensors onboard.  In a test flight several years ago, showing the difficulty and risks of developing this kind of advanced technology, DARPA harvested only 9 minutes worth of data, before losing contact with the vehicle.