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Pictures of rocket
The European aerospace giant EADS is going into the space tourism business.
Its Astrium division says it will build a space plane capable of carrying fare-paying passengers on a sub-orbital ride more than 100km above the planet.
The vehicle, which will take off from a normal airport, will give the tourists a three-to-five-minute experience of weightlessness at the top of its climb.
Tickets are expected to cost up to 200,000 euros (£135,000), with flights likely to begin in 2012.
"We believe it is the will of human beings to visit space and we have to give them the possibility to do that," said Francois Auque, the CEO of Astrium.
"Astrium is by far the largest space company in Europe, so we are very knowledgeable in all these matters. We believe our concept is extremely safe, extremely comfortable and cost effective," he told BBC News.
Two in one
EADS Astrium is the company that builds the Ariane rocket, which lofts most of the world's commercial satellites. Its space jet is a very different concept, however
The front end of a full-scale model was unveiled at a publicity event in Paris on Wednesday. From a certain angle, the vehicle resembles an ordinary executive aircraft - but its engineers claim it is in fact "revolutionary".
The production model will use normal jet engines to take off and climb to 12km. From there, a rocket engine will kick the vehicle straight up, taking it beyond 60km in just 80 seconds. By the time the rocket shuts down, the craft should have sufficient velocity to carry it above 100km - into space.
As the plane then begins to fall back to Earth, the pilot will use small thrusters to control its altitude, guiding the vehicle into the atmosphere from where it will use its jet engines again to return to the airport.
The total journey time will be about one-and-a-half hours.
The European aerospace giant EADS is going into the space tourism business.
Its Astrium division says it will build a space plane capable of carrying fare-paying passengers on a sub-orbital ride more than 100km above the planet.
The vehicle, which will take off from a normal airport, will give the tourists a three-to-five-minute experience of weightlessness at the top of its climb.
Tickets are expected to cost up to 200,000 euros (£135,000), with flights likely to begin in 2012.
"We believe it is the will of human beings to visit space and we have to give them the possibility to do that," said Francois Auque, the CEO of Astrium.
"Astrium is by far the largest space company in Europe, so we are very knowledgeable in all these matters. We believe our concept is extremely safe, extremely comfortable and cost effective," he told BBC News.
Two in one
EADS Astrium is the company that builds the Ariane rocket, which lofts most of the world's commercial satellites. Its space jet is a very different concept, however
The front end of a full-scale model was unveiled at a publicity event in Paris on Wednesday. From a certain angle, the vehicle resembles an ordinary executive aircraft - but its engineers claim it is in fact "revolutionary".
The production model will use normal jet engines to take off and climb to 12km. From there, a rocket engine will kick the vehicle straight up, taking it beyond 60km in just 80 seconds. By the time the rocket shuts down, the craft should have sufficient velocity to carry it above 100km - into space.
As the plane then begins to fall back to Earth, the pilot will use small thrusters to control its altitude, guiding the vehicle into the atmosphere from where it will use its jet engines again to return to the airport.
The total journey time will be about one-and-a-half hours.
