3 ms·

One is an iteration on a proven design. One is a completely unknown new design. I’m not being defeatist, just pointing out that I’m not sure the latter is easie

• mulmen 6y ago
  We had air-dropped spaceships [1] in the early 1960s. It's how some of the first American astronauts were made. It's proven tech but just hasn't had a practical application in the last half-century. Some kind of air-dropped passenger ferry could be imagined that gets people to something like a Starship in orbit, or maybe a space hotel. There are a couple of projects along these lines right now, both involving Burt Rutan's Scaled Composites [2,3]. Stratolaunch went through several iterations of spacecraft, at one point I believe it was even going to drop a SpaceX rocket! With Paul Allen's passing not sure what the plans are currently. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_X-15 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_X-15 [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scaled_Composites_White_Knight_Two https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scaled_Composites_White_Knight... [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scaled_Composites_Stratolaunch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scaled_Composites_Stratolaunch