NASA picks spaceship > Wedge-shaped craft wins shuttle successor search

NASA unveiled the design for America’s first new spaceship in a generation Tuesday, a reusable, wedge-shaped craft called VentureStar that would take off and land almost as easily as an airplane and open space to more people.

Vice President Al Gore announced the winning, futuristic-looking design by Lockheed Martin Corp., calling it a “high-tech marvel.” The project means $900 million for Lockheed and a boost for the Southern California economy, which has been devastated by cutbacks in the defense industry.

“You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to understand the importance of this moment,” Gore told a crowd gathered outside NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

The experimental X-33 rocket is expected to lead to a fully reusable spaceship to replace the current fleet of four space shuttles. NASA hopes the new craft will cut launch costs to a fraction of what they are for the shuttle and be more reliable than the shuttles.

The X-33 also should be able to land and take off again in a few days, rather than the four months it takes to get a shuttle ready for a new mission.

The objective, NASA Administrator Daniel Goldin said, is to open the space frontier “not just to special NASA astronauts.”

“Now we fly dozens of astronauts a year,” he said. “This vehicle should allow hundreds a year to fly, and vehicles that come beyond it to allow thousands of people to fly.”

Rather than name the winner, Gore lifted a model of Lockheed’s design. The crowd at the afternoon ceremony cheered.

The other contenders were shuttle builder Rockwell International Corp. and its streamlined shuttle look-alike, and McDonnell Douglas Corp. and its vertical launcher and lander.

Lockheed Martin’s proposal was the most unusual looking by far. Resembling a horizontal triangle in flight, its X-33 will be 67 feet long and 68 feet wide at the tail, with a gross liftoff weight of 273,000 pounds. Like the shuttle, it will take off vertically, and it will land horizontally, like an airplane.