C
CalliArcale
Guest
Okay, it's not enough to keep them flying another 20 years, but at least it's *something* other than the Shuttle. Boeing has contracted with NASA to have an SCA ferry the Phantom Ray UCAV from their plant in St Louis, MO to Edwards AFB for testing. This article has a nice picture. That's a fairly big UCAV, but it's still smaller than the 747's tailplane.
http://www.boeing.com/farnborough2010/html/unmanned_072010.html
I imagine the handling characteristics will be much easier than with an Orbiter attached -- no vertical stabilizer, for one thing. The artist's impression in the article above depicts the Phantom Ray sitting on top of the rear attach struts; the forward attach strut is not needed, as the UCAV is much smaller than the Orbiter.
http://www.boeing.com/farnborough2010/html/unmanned_072010.html
I imagine the handling characteristics will be much easier than with an Orbiter attached -- no vertical stabilizer, for one thing. The artist's impression in the article above depicts the Phantom Ray sitting on top of the rear attach struts; the forward attach strut is not needed, as the UCAV is much smaller than the Orbiter.