Stratolaunch news - Curt Lewis

Rocket for Giant Satellite-Launching Stratolaunch Airplane Remains a Mystery


Artist's illustration showing the planned Stratolaunch system, which will launch satellites using a rocket carried into the sky by a giant airplane.

Vulcan Aerospace continues to assemble the world's largest aircraft at the Mojave Air & Space Port in California, but its builders are remaining mum about the Stratolaunch project's biggest mystery: What rocket will the air-launch system carry aloft to place satellites into orbit?

At the 32nd Space Symposium in Colorado Springs earlier this month, Stratolaunch Executive Director Chuck Beames said he could not talk about the launch vehicle strategy yet, but he promised a series of announcements over the next year about the program and the company's "NextSpace" vision.

"At Vulcan Aerospace, my team has spent the last 12 months focused on refining our vision of NextSpace and, of course, making significant progress on our Stratolaunch air-launch platform," Beames wrote in a blog post on the Vulcan Aerospace website. [See images of the giant Stratolaunch plane]

Company officials said they expect to begin commercial operations within four years.