DALLAS, Texas – Space entrepreneur, Jim Benson, head of Benson Space Company of Poway, California is set to announce a fresh approach in the design of his firm’s “Dream Chaser” space tourism vehicle.
The firm’s new suborbital design will be based on a melding of the NASA and Air Force X-2, X-15, and T-38 vehicles – rather than using an earlier design – the orbital NASA HL-20 lifting body craft. The new NASA/Air Force-derived design is “safer and better,” Benson said. [see image]
A five month-long study by SpaceDev and Benson Space Company (BSC) has determined that this new design will provide “the first, safest and best astronaut-making spaceflights for the emerging space tourism market.” The announcement is slated to occur during the National Space Society’s International Space Development Conference that gets underway here this week.
This new design is deemed safer and more aerodynamic, Benson said. It will also allow Benson Space Company to remain on schedule to make its initial commercial spaceflights in 2009.
Read more of this Leonard David article at SPACE.com
Thank you for mentioning our new spaceship design.
SpaceDev will continue to concentrate on the orbital Dream Chaser, based on NASA’s HL-20 lifting body.
Benson Space will create a new name for our suborbital vehicle, to be powered by SpaceDev’s safe and proven hybrid rocket motors, based on those it developed for Paul Allen’s SpaceShipOne.
Jim Benson
Benson Space Company