THE US military is planning a Thunderbirds-style space-plane designed to fly a crack squad of heavily armed marines to trouble spots anywhere in the world within two hours.
At a recent secret meeting at the Pentagon, engineers working on the craft, codenamed Hot Eagle, were told to draw up blueprints for a prototype, which the generals want to have in the air within 11 years.
Pentagon planners have been encouraged by technical breakthroughs from Burt Rutan, chief designer on Richard Branson's White Knight spaceship, which is due to begin test flights next year and to carry tourists on sub-orbital journeys from 2010.
Mr Rutan, 65, who built the first privately funded craft to reach space in 2004, last week gave his blessing to Hot Eagle, which could be based on White Knight's technology. Mr Rutan said it would be an expensive way to transport troops "but it could be done. It is feasible".
Will Whitehorn, president of Virgin Galactic, which is funding White Knight, recently predicted the craft it could be used to airlift emergency supplies into disaster zones.
"It could be like Thunderbirds, like International Rescue," he said. A passenger version would be capable of flying from London to Sydney in four hours. The two-stage Hot Eagle would be launched from an aircraft carrier.
A large booster rocket would carry a smaller spacecraft containing 13 "space troopers" 80km into space, far above hostile radar, before landing in enemy territory.
The marines first called for a space-plane in 2002 after the US military failed to capture Osama bin Laden in the mountains of Afghanistan.
The project was known as the Small Unit Space Transport and Insertion program (Sustain). Its advocates said it took too long on foot to reach the caves where bin Laden was said to be hiding, and helicopters were too visible.
General James Mattis, leading the marines' central command at the time, said he wanted the space-plane in the air by 2019.
He was recently promoted to be one of the most senior officers in the US military establishment, and Sustain has since become a top priority.
A US Air Force spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Mark Brown, confirmed last week that NASA and Pentagon officers had met for two days of talks to draw up plans for Hot Eagle.
Invitations to the meeting said participants would be discussing a "potential revolutionary step in getting combat power to any point in the world in a timeframe unbelievable today".
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,24522183-401,00.html?from=public_rss
How awsome would that be
