PuddleJump Pacific in 45 Minutes or Less by Andy Pierce

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What do spaceships, a belch of fire, Tokyo and the Pacific Ocean have in common?

At press time, the mighty and ever-clever Godzilla was not part of a correct answer, despite his iron-clad resolve. No, this riddle may only be foiled by single-stage-to-orbit "Reusable Launch Vehicles" and the possibility of 45 minute Los Angeles-to-Tokyo commutes for hurrying humans. Actually, incredible travel times may be figured for most earthly destinations.

What does it feel like to sit atop 1.2 million pounds of ready-to-burn liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen? Imagine a vertical launch atop a burst of fire that jettisons you and the RLV craft to a speed of 9,420 meters per second. Ahh. You've achieved orbit. Once there, you spend some quiet time crossing this blue green planet. In order to land, the RLV fires its engines just enough to drag into the Earth's atmosphere. This thin air collides with the RLV at extremely high velocity, which pulls you back to Gaia. Then, the RLV has sense enough to come to rest on its "feet" in an upright position on the country and landing pad of your choice.

"Anywhere on the planet in 45 minutes or less," is the motto of Charles "Pete" Conrad, Jr., the Apollo moon-walker-turned-RLV entrepreneur. "I've ordered pizzas from down the block that take longer, and I didn't get 8,000 frequent flyer miles with them either," he recently reported in Hemispheres magazine.

Experimental designs for a "Reusable Launch Vehicle" closely resemble the hybrid of a Norelco shaver, a Space Shuttle nose and a Stealth Bomber. They're not sexy like a fighter jet. Nor do they appear utilitarian like a bulky Space Shuttle. Reusable Launch Vehicles just look spacey -- and ready to blast off.

Yesterday delivery. Same day delivery. When it absolutely, positively has to be there yesterday. Travel way fast and way far. These catchy phrases frame the RLV ability to toy with the international date line and get the customer or package there quicker than the neighbor or competitor. Travel industry experts say the ultra-coolness of RLV travel will create a new industry, "space tourism." Ticket price estimates begin at $5,000. The Japanese corporation Shimizu claims there is a market for RLV tickets if they can be offered below $50,000. Other travel experts say the cost estimate is not too far out when comparing the anticipated space fare to existing first-class international airline travel. If commandeered for commercial travel, "space tourists" are most likely to sit behind top-of-the-food-chain corporate and peace-seeking ambassador types. However, any RLV seat could be considered "first class" with a lead foot on the cosmic gas.

When compared directly to a familiar Space Shuttle from NASA, RLVs boast big savings in turnaround time, rocket fuel, construction costs and maintenance staff. One test of an RLV was conducted by three men in a trailer who ran the launch from a personal computer. How does that measure up to NASA's colossal mission control?

Compared to NASA's early and fat days when Saturn boosters (essentially modified ICBMs) put monkeys and men into space, relatively inexpensive RLVs will make a middle child of the nearly-defunct Space Shuttle. And, a privately-developed RLV could help NASA get out of the rocket business and delegate launch services to a contractor, similar to the way the feds purchase commercial airline service. It may also get the U.S. ahead of its European and Asian commercial satellite launch competitors.

A bonus for RLVs would be a more conservative approach to materials usage and pollution. All RLVs are to be single-stage-to-orbit crafts. That means they don't drop stages or pieces of space junk as they travel. The RLV's fuel (oxygen and hydrogen) leaves only water behind. Also, the caustic solid rocket fuel used by Space Shuttles is eliminated. With all due respect to the Space Shuttle program, RLV designers are armed with 20 years of scientific and materials advances.

Ironically (stress the "Ronnie" sound), RLVs are a spawn of President Ronald Reagan's megabuck "Star Wars" playland, or Strategic Defensive Initiative Organization (SDIO). The RLV design began when private engineers were challenged to find a cheap way to put 5,000 brilliant pebbles into five near-polar orbits. (It's rumored these pebbles were later downsized to 1,000 points of light by Reagan's successor.) The pebbles weighed in at 1 million pounds. This pebble problem, coupled with the need to put hundreds of "interceptor vehicles" into space, forced the feasibility of SDIO to hinge on the development of inexpensive launch vehicles and dramatically-lowered launch costs.

Despite President Bill Clinton's scrapping the SDIO name and dubbing the program "Ballistic Missile Defense Organization" (BMDO), RLV research has continued through a variety of agencies and means. Clinton directed BMDO to concentrate itself on the development of ground-based rather than spaced-based protection from nuclear attack. Therefore, such research has been carried on by NASA -- albeit begrudgingly -- and private companies such as McDonnell Douglas, Lockheed Martin and Rockwell.

Regardless of prophecy, taunts and touts, RLVs have yet to carry a man or monkey anywhere. At the same time, Astronaut Conrad's enthusiasm for the Delta Clipper Experimental (DC-X) RLV is actually behind the times. Unfortunately, the DC-X completed its eighth and final flight on July 7, 1995. It was rebuilt as the DC-XA, which was destroyed during the landing of its fourth flight on July 31, 1996. A lesson for all travelers using mechanical means, the DC-XA was done-in by a disconnected brake line. The oversight prevented one of its four landing feet from releasing to a vital flat-footed position. Fans of the RLV program mourned the loss. "Like any good experimental vehicle, the DC-XA flew until it was destroyed," wrote Kirk Sorenson in his Delta Clipper Experimental Flight Testing Archive, (http://www.engineering.usu.edu/departments/mae/space/dexa.html). "We will always be impressed by the lessons this little rocket taught us about the right way to travel to the heavens."

Sorenson's online tribute to RLVs is impressive. His paper, Reusable Launch Vehicles: Opening the Last Frontier is an informed and annotated look at RLV history and a look into the (predicted) ultimate success of RLV development -- dateline April 22, 2008. Sorenson paints several telling scenes. The opening scenario begs the reader to compare American colonists with NASA's old timers. "Upon arrival, the settlers had little use for their (Conestoga) wagons but to dismantle them and use their parts," Sorenson writes. "However, this changed dramatically in 1869 with the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad." He goes on to describe how the railroad opened the West to increased trade and new ways of life. "The key to this change was a quantum leap forward in transportation technology."

In another passage, Sorenson praises the resolve the DC-X exhibited after a launch explosion. "The blast crumpled the aeroshell, but flight controllers did not discover it until they looked at their monitors and saw pieces of aeroshell falling away from the vehicle. Unbelievably, this remarkable little rocket had survived an explosion and was still executing its flight program." The DC-X's flight was aborted and it automatically selected a suitable patch of desert to land on.

In another online tribute, Phil Kopitske crunches the numbers on RLV marketability. "At $1.6 million per launch, the cost of each 20,000 pound launch is an incredible $80 per pound," he writes. This is compared to the roughly $10,000 per pound cost on a Space Shuttle ($500 million per launch, divided by 50,000 pounds of payload). "We are starting at around 1 percent of the current cost of space access," Kopitske continues. "It is not unreasonable to assume that when the price of a commodity like space access drops 100 fold, demand will rise at least 100 fold." His musings may be read at (http://www.millennial.org/pubs/ffn1_2/spaceports.html).

Tributes to the Delta Clipper and the development of RLV technology fly with wild abandon on the web. Most sites have excellent links to additional historical data and charts of testing and progress. Also, the RLV-dedicated sites usually have a link to the mostly-friendly NASA-sanctioned site, the Reusable Launch Vehicle Technology Program Home Page (http://rlv.msfc.nasa.gov/). If you dig deep enough, you can get the curt "Not Authorized!" retort from one of the ticklish NASA buttons. Actually, it's not hard at all. Hint: Try accessing the Delta Clipper incident investigation reports. Now you are really on your way to the pinko lists your parents warned you about in junior high. It's hokey. I imagine this access level opens up at the NASA custodian and Congressional page levels, respectively. Additionally, almost all points list an e-mail address of a NASA staffer for more information. Try it. Just don't ask about the incident reports.

Since the fiery demise of the Delta Clipper, the DC-XA program has been abandoned. A winged RLV designated X-33 is the latest development. Working from broad guidelines issued by NASA, Lockheed Martin, McDonnell Douglas and Rockwell have each entered designs. It's anticipated that NASA will choose a single contractor and that construction will soon follow. Flight testing could begin as early as March, 1999.

Could an X-33 RLV be your ticket to ride by 2002? If so, request a window seat and pick up a disposable camera on your way to the launch pad. Point and click quickly. You only have 30 minutes left after the peanuts and soft drinks make the rounds.

Welcome to Tokyo.