Displaying items by tag: Fast20XX

FAST 20XX (Future high-Altitude high-Speed Transport 20XX) is a European Space Agency (ESA) program to develop the necessary technologies for a hypersonic suborbital spaceplane. Funding for the program was established under the European Commission's Seventh Framework Programme.

The FAST 20XX program is intended to provide a technological foundation for the industrial introduction of advanced hypersonic suborbital spaceplanes in the medium to longer term. No detailed vehicle design is planned under the program in its current form, with work instead focusing on mastering the technologies required for the development of such designs. Once the needed technologies are identified, researchers plan to develop the dedicated analytical, numerical and experimental tools needed to investigate them. The project will also look at the legal and regulatory issues related to suborbital flight in consultation with government and international authorities.

Two concepts will be focused on under the program:

• the ALPHA, is based on SpaceShipOne, which won the Ansari X-Prize in 2003. A key aspect of the design is the need for a carrier plane to launch the suborbital vessel.
  
  
• The SpaceLiner is a concept of the DLR (German Aerospace Center). The SpaceLiner is an all–rocket-propelled vehicle intended to achieve a step change in ultra-fast long-haul passenger and freight transport, with the intended ability to transport 50 passengers from Australia to Europe in 90 minutes.

The SpaceLiner is a hypersonic suborbital spaceplane concept initiated by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) in 2005 and supported by the EU under the European Space Agency's (ESA) FAST 20XX program since December 2009.

The SpaceLiner is designed to be a reusable vehicle consisting of two stages: the booster and the space-plane itself. Both stages are propelled by LOx/LH2 rocket engines. The SpaceLiner lift-off is vertical (much like the Space Shuttle), powered by the combined thrust of the booster and the space-plane rocket engines. After the booster separation and engine cut-off, the space-plane behaves like a glider, skipping along the high layers of the atmosphere and ostensibly allowing for ultra-fast point-to-point travel. The SpaceLiner is designed to transport 50 passengers from Australia to Europe in 90 minutes or 100 passengers from Europe to California in 60 minutes.