Is space ours?
The attention of the whole world is riveted on Elon Musk, who in all seriousness declares his desire to relocate a million people to Mars. Equally interesting are the very real successes of SpaceX in creating a relatively cheap and affordable launch vehicle - Falcon 9. In Russia, they traditionally discuss Angara, promising Federation and Soyuz-5, and also dream of landing on a satellite of our planet.
At the same time, many lose sight of the rapid militarization of outer space, which, if it has not reached the heat of the Cold War times, is striving diligently for this. Most efforts in this direction are made by the United States, which, of course, has the most money and the greatest technical capabilities.
Recall that in 2013, the American defense research agency DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) announced the start of the XS-1 program, the goal of which was to obtain an inexpensive reusable vehicle capable of quickly launching a small satellite or satellites into orbit. The payload mass was supposed to be about one and a half tons at a launch price in the region of five million dollars. This is extremely small - more than ten times less than the launch price of the aforementioned Falcon 9 and even lower than the launch cost of Rocket Lab's newest ultralight rocket Electron. Recall that now, to launch small military satellites into orbit, the United States uses a disposable light-class launch vehicle Minotaur IV, capable of launching a payload weighing up to 1,725 kilograms into low-earth orbit (LEO). In 2013, the price of one launch of this carrier was $ 50 million …
There is another feature of the XS-1. Perhaps even more significant. According to the requirements, the promising device was supposed to provide ten launches in ten days. No other existing or even promising medium is capable of this.
American History XS
A number of companies announced their desire to participate in the program, which was soon renamed XSP. Ultimately, Boeing and Aerojet Rocketdyne were elected to DARPA. The latter had to supply the engine, namely the AR-22. The design of this engine is based on developments on the RS-25, previously installed on the Space Shuttle.
The device itself was seen as a spaceplane with a consumable second stage, which was supposed to launch satellites. The reusable carrier was supposed to go back and land after launch, like a regular plane. The Phantom Express was supposed to take off vertically. The dimensions of the spaceplane had to be comparable to the dimensions of a large twin-engine fourth-generation fighter, or even slightly larger.
In 2018, it became known that Boeing had begun construction of the first flight prototype of the Phantom Express. As of November of the year before last, the production of the liquid oxygen fuel tank was completed and the production of the liquid hydrogen tank began. The year 2021 was named as the first flight of the Phantom Express.
Winners … on trial
The future of the complex was seen as cloudless: Boeing had colossal experience in the space industry, and the state generously paid for a promising undertaking. Back in 2017, the company, as the winner of the competition, received $ 146 million for the project, which, of course, was just the beginning.
However, in January 2020, Boeing abruptly pulled out of the program. And he did it in a very original way. "Following a detailed review, Boeing is ending its Experimental Spaceplane (XSP) program immediately," said corporate spokesman Jerry Drelling."We will now redirect our investments from XSP to other Boeing programs that span the maritime, air and space sectors." DARPA confirmed that the company has notified the agency of its decision to withdraw from the Phantom Express development program.
Boeing's decision, effectively ending the XSP program, adds another chapter to the history of DARPA's failed efforts to develop a low-cost, affordable launch vehicle. Earlier, we recall, the agency launched the ALASA program: the F-15 Eagle fighter was chosen as a platform. He was supposed to launch a rocket that would put small satellites into orbit. In 2015, the program was closed after a series of unsuccessful tests.
The first reason for the new failure is seen (at least from the outside) the grave problems of Boeing caused by the Boeing 737 MAX crash near Jakarta in 2018 and the crash of the same plane near Addis Ababa in March 2019. Recall that in both cases, experts blamed the MCAS stabilization system, which made the aircraft uncontrollable under certain circumstances. Further inspections revealed numerous security breaches, and it was not just MCAS that was involved.
Recently, Boeing shares lost 4% in the course of trading on the American stock exchange Nasdaq: this happened after the company announced a delay in the resumption of flights of 737 MAX aircraft. We will remind, the airline announced that it expects to return to operation of the 737 MAX model no earlier than in the middle of this year. This is a lot by the standards of the modern world.
New opportunities
Most likely, we will never know about the real state of affairs in the case of Phantom Express and the reasons for abandoning the program. However, one more important circumstance should be noted. The fact is that the United States already has a reusable and multipurpose spacecraft at its disposal. We are talking about the unmanned spaceplane Boeing X-37: like its brother, it takes off vertically and lands like an airplane. Theoretically, the spaceplane can be used to launch various spacecraft into orbit.
However, there is one important difference from the Phantom Express. The X-37B is launched into orbit in the nose fairing of a conventional launch vehicle. This will undoubtedly not allow achieving efficiency figures even remotely comparable to those of the Phantom Express.
At the same time, the X-37 itself has even more secrets than the failed spacecraft: the public still does not know why the US military needs such an apparatus. Someone sees it simply as a test bench for testing technologies for launching satellites into space, while others say that we can talk about a prototype of a "space interceptor".
One thing is clear: the capabilities of the X-37 are more than serious. In October last year, the American spaceplane set a new record, having spent more than two years in orbit, namely 780 days. At that time, the number of days spent in orbit under this program was 2865 days. The X-37B mini-shuttle “is capable of forming an orbit that looks like an egg and when it is near Earth, it is close enough to the atmosphere to turn around at that moment. This means that our enemies do not know this, because everything happens on the opposite side of the Earth. And we know that it drives them crazy. Which I am very happy about,”former US Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson noted earlier, which only added confidence to the supporters of the conspiracy theory.
