Rocket-Powered Jet Would Carry Four Tourists Into Suborbital Space

And we thought the Airbus A380 was far-reaching. On Wednesday, European aerospace consortium EADS unveiled a model of its proposed entry into the growing space tourism industry: a rocket-powered jet designed to take paying passengers over 62 miles above the Earth.

Looking a bit like a cross between a Piaggio Avanti and Rocketplane's proposed LearJet-based offering -- to our eyes, anyway -- the spaceplane designed by EADS Astrium would take off in a conventional manner, using twin turbofans.

It would continue to climb on jet power to approximately 40,000 feet, at which time the rocket would be ignited -- hurtling the space plane to an altitude of 37 miles in about 80 seconds. The rocket would then shut off, and momentum would carry the spaceplane to its 328,000-foot apogee.

Passengers would experience about three minutes of weightlessness on each 30 minute flight, EADS representatives told CNN. The spaceplane would then return to Earth via conventional turbofan power, and land just like a standard bizjet.

Specially-balanced seats would ease the g-forces of launch and reentry for the four passengers onboard -- who would each pay anywhere from $199,000 to $265,000 per flight.

"We are counting on some 20,000 space tourists by the year 2020," Astrium CEO Francois Auque said at the unveiling in Paris. "We want to served a third of them. We have faith in this market."

Currently, EADS Astrium builds the Ariane booster used for many commercial satellite launches.

(Photos courtesy of EADS Astrium)

FMI: www.astrium.eads.net