What happened to the passenger super glider?

[Frankk]

I can remember once reading that passenger jets in the future will be taken up by a rocket to the edge of space and then the passenger glider released where it would glide to the earth. Can anyone remember this or shed any light on it?

[boxtops]

I seem to remember James May going up to the edge of space recently for one of his TV specials, but I think that was a powered plane.

[Frankk]

Yes I don't think that they've finished this project or perhaps they haven't even started it for some reason but it sounded like a marvelous idea.

[sddsddean]

James May went up in a U2. I think you are thinking along the lines of the HOTOL space plane designed by Barnes Wallis.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A46904835

[jake-the-peg]

I don't think Barnes Wallis designed HOTOL. He died in 1979.

The link says the design owes a lot to the "swallow" design that he came up with.

A lot of these rocket transportation ideas are just too expensive to be commercial. You might love the idea of being zoomed into space to touch down in Australia 5 hours later but £2,000 a ticket is a steep ticket price, and that's their estimate from 2 years ago

Consider this too. If you need to get to the other side of the world quick - you ring up and someone says "Yes certainly sir, we do 3 flights a week - we can fit you in the day after tomorrow"

Not really commercially viable is it?

Still the EU was going to give the project 10 Million to evaluate - don't know if that happened or whether belts were tightened after the banking crisis

http://www.esa.int/es...ng/SEMTCU0P0WF_0.html

and Google LAPCAT II

[ludwig]

£2k a ticket doesn't sound that bad Jake. It's not much more than business class on a jumbo. Are you sure you didn't miss a zero off?

[Andyvon]

There have been plenty of these ideas over the years Frank. I remember the proposal for a vehicle similar to the Space Shuttle which could enter space in Europe and descend over Australia about 30 minutes later! It's good to have all these ideas - it's where progress starts!

At the end of the day though, it all boils down to economics and the market. The cheapest way to move masses of people from A to B is by conventional jet airliner. That's the cheapest means for the airlines as well as for the fare-paying passenger.

[DTCwordfan]

another suspension here....

[Dagman]

It'll take far too much fuel to get so high, it was a Barnes Wallis brainchild, but I think I seen a prog once which said, although it's a good idea to get from A to B fast, the cost outweighs the advantages.