The vehicle to replace the US Space Shuttle will carry people into space without a crew, says Micky Blackwell, president and chief operating officer of Lockheed Martin's Aeronautics Sector.
It will be the end of the manned spaceflight as we know it and will be a "culture shock" for space travellers, adds Blackwell.
Speaking at a briefing on the X-33 programme yesterday, Blackwell says the operational version of the fully-automatic X-33 VentureStar would fly routine space sorties like an airline operation, carrying passengers in roll-on, roll-off containers.
Vertical launches could be handled by a launch team as small as five people, and the craft would land like an aircraft on a runway.
Passengers fly airliners with a crew on automatic pilot but would they fly an airliner without a crew? Blackwell was unable to venture further into the debate.
Lockheed is working on a Phase 2 contract from NASA worth almost $1 billion, and is investing over $200 million of its own funds for the development of a reusable, half-size, sub-orbital demonstrator, to be built by the Lockheed Skunk Works team, which will fly in 1999. This is part of NASA's Reusable Launch Vehicle programme.
Should that programme provide the confidence and technical credibility, Lockheed and many other investors would move into the Phase 3 vehicle fleet, which may replace the Space Shuttle by 2005.
Source: Flight Daily News
