Universe Today Podcast

Episode 577: AstroClipper: Plans For A Two-Stage, Fully Reusable Spaceplane



October 15th, 2019  •  12 mins 43 secs  •  Download (11.7 MB)  •  Link with Timestamp

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Even as the first rockets were launched into space decades ago, aerospace knew it was a wasteful process. Rocket stages, motors, and complex equipment crashed into the ocean or burned up in the Earth’s atmosphere.

Could spaceplanes bring the costs down? Flying to orbit with a combination of jet engines and rockets and then safely re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere again.

Single-stage to orbit spacecraft and spaceplanes have always seemed out of reach, and actually not that practical. But what about a two-stage, fully reusable spaceplane?

Exodus Space Corporation has been secretly working on this concept for a decade now, and what they’re proposing is pretty revolutionary.