The news of the successful landing has me wondering if some of the Air Force people might start looking at something like the Black Horse proposal again. For those who don't remember Black Horse was Pioneer Rocketplane's proposal for a "Stage-and-a-Half" to orbit space plane. It would take off like a regular jet but carrying just enough fuel to meet up with a tanker. On reaching the tanker it would take on additional fuel and then burn the rest of the way to orbit (or a sub-orbital hop for the 'Colt' test model).
This is similar in some ways to SpaceShip One but with mid-air refueling instead of being carried up to altitude by a larger carrier aircraft. This means that the Black Horse doesn't have to be designed to be aerodynamic one its own as well as being part of an aerodynamically sound pairing. Especially similar to SpaceShip One, Black Horse wouldn't require the long lead time of building a traditional rocket stack which would have to be built at a factory, assembled, slowly towed out to a launch pad, etc. like the Shuttle, Dragon, and other traditional designs need. It would just need fuel and a runway.
Even if they don't feel like funding the full scale Black Horse, the sub-orbital Colt could be tempting since it would let them put up a satellite more or less whenever they felt like it. Admittedly that's discounting the time needed to build a satellite. But if you have a vehicle that can put a satellite in orbit within hours of a general saying they want it, it would make sense to pre-order a few spy er, weather satellites to keep on base with the launch vehicle. "What's that General? You suddenly have the desire to spy on er, know the ground level weather of The Duchy of Grand Fenwick? Two hours and we'll something launched just for that."
MIT web pages about Black Horse
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Will the transhumanist future have catgirls? Does Japan still exist? Well, there is your answer.
This is similar in some ways to SpaceShip One but with mid-air refueling instead of being carried up to altitude by a larger carrier aircraft. This means that the Black Horse doesn't have to be designed to be aerodynamic one its own as well as being part of an aerodynamically sound pairing. Especially similar to SpaceShip One, Black Horse wouldn't require the long lead time of building a traditional rocket stack which would have to be built at a factory, assembled, slowly towed out to a launch pad, etc. like the Shuttle, Dragon, and other traditional designs need. It would just need fuel and a runway.
Even if they don't feel like funding the full scale Black Horse, the sub-orbital Colt could be tempting since it would let them put up a satellite more or less whenever they felt like it. Admittedly that's discounting the time needed to build a satellite. But if you have a vehicle that can put a satellite in orbit within hours of a general saying they want it, it would make sense to pre-order a few spy er, weather satellites to keep on base with the launch vehicle. "What's that General? You suddenly have the desire to spy on er, know the ground level weather of The Duchy of Grand Fenwick? Two hours and we'll something launched just for that."
MIT web pages about Black Horse
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Will the transhumanist future have catgirls? Does Japan still exist? Well, there is your answer.