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Spaceplanes From Airport to Spaceport presents a vision of the near future in which space vehicles can take off from an international airport, refuel in space, and fly regularly between the Earth and the Moon. The book is built on the solid engineering foundation prepared by David Ashford in his book Spaceflight Revolution, but develops the argument.§This is a coherent, lucid, and optimistic picture of the future aimed directly at the reader as a future space passenger which explains why the Space Tourist market could easily become the single most important factor in the mid-term future development of space transportation. In a few years it will be possible to board a spaceplane and fly into Earth orbit, and perhaps visit a space station. Later development could include refuelling in orbit to take a tour of cislunar space.§As the latest news has shown, the successful flight of SpaceShipOne and the imminent inauguration of Virgin Galactic s sub-orbital rides from the New Mexico desert have already begun this process.§This book explains the technical details of precisely how all this can be accomplished within the next few decades.Someday, there may be plane-like vehicles that take off from a runway and fly high above Earth, bringing people to work in space, to stay at a space hotel, to visit a Moonbase, or to board another ship for a journey to a neighboring planet in the Solar System. Well, that time is coming, and it s coming sooner than you might think! §There are a number of private companies already taking reservations for passenger flights into suborbital space. There are companies drawing up plans for hotels in space and governments drawing up plans for Moonbases and eventual trips to Mars. §Although the fares for the soon-to-be-available suborbital "joy" rides are still rather steep, prices are coming down, and competition is growing fiercer. Matthew Bentley will guide you through the almost bewildering array of different kinds of spaceplanes being developed and show you what the new "spacelines" have in store for us. A strong believer in the ultimate economic advantages of spaceplanes over conventional launch vehicles, Bentley believes their development will guide us to a new and bigger era of space adventure more grand than has ever been contemplated before.
